Refurbishing the Kitchen Island

 When the kitchen was put in more than 5 years ago now, the oak kitchen Island bench was only oiled. This I suppose should be done quite regularly, but was not, so any protection it had from stains hasn't really happened. 

Things like a pumpkin sitting on it rotted unnoticed from the inside and when I picked it up to use was a mess and had left a deep black stain. Odd things happen like that and in hindsight the bench should have been the black marble top like the rest of the benches. 

Wood represented a kitchen table, and so it had become in need of cleaning up something I have waited for a couple of years now. This past Friday and Saturday, I decided to do it myself, while John was away visiting family in Casino.

 As you can see it is quite large, measuring roughly 6 foot x 4 foot (1.8 x 1.20).

Friday I sanded all day, it had an oil coat on it which gums up the sander so scraped a lot of it off with a blade. That night I slept like a log I was exhausted.

Next morning  I read up on how to get rid of black stains, one suggested bleach so tried that and it worked a little bit, but it also turned the wood around the stains, much lighter which I knew would happen, and I had a way of fixing that. 

The above is the wall into the pantry. It was put in 30 years or more after the pine walls next to it, which had changed colour over the years so I stained it with baltic pine to match. No one would know now. 

So for this bench top I used some acrylic paints I had, and mixed brown, sienna and yellow oxide, and put it on with a rag after sanding. 

The end result came out much richer than the original and helped blend the stains, although lighter in colour, from the bleach. 

This is the result.

The light is reflecting from the window.

 I could have perhaps made the darker blend a bit more wider, but in actual fact you really don't notice it much, for some reason it shows up more in a photo.Once a few things like vases of flowers in the middle appear, it will be gone.

I have covered it all with two coats of clear satin benchtop sealer and today will do another two. This will harden substantially and although we can use the bench after it is dry, will harden it for a week first. I have a plastic soft lined cloth I can cover some of it with to protect it once it is dry today.

Close up of worse stain area.

 Very pleased with the result. There is also quite a few things like this to be done. 

On another note, I received in the mail this week my new kit for the new needle injections. The companies who make these include a box to put the used needles into so you can then put them in a designated bin for removal in the local area. My old one for Actemra was quite a neat one. 

Extra Large Coffee cup takeaway size

The new one came in a box, so when I opened it saw this.

My reaction was it is so huge, but thought how nice to include a cold bag as these injections should be kept in a fridge so handy for picking up at the chemist or taking it with you. When I opened the bag up lo and behold another yellow box.

My first thought was how big are these injections!!!! Where do I keep this stuff.  I knew by the way my specialist showed me on our tele meeting they were made a bit different and looked like a very fat pen rather than the skinny one, but really these were huge in comparison.

Friday in the middle of sanding, another knock on the door, with yet another delivery.

 WAIT FOR IT!

Yep

You have to see the funny side of life sometimes.

 

Till Next Time.