This weekend I made, and then remade a coffee table for the patio. I liked the original, but thought it too big for the space. After much reassurance from Kevin that it was perfect, I decided to ignore his support and redid it to suit me anyway. I went back and trimmed the top pieces to be in line with the sides of the box and give it a more cart like appearance. I took the plans from Ana White, and adjusted them to meet my needs. The major difference in mine being the height of the table and the top is not inset: therefore, I didn't need the supports in the inside of the base to hold up the top.
The photo above is the table as it sits now and below is the original. You can see how the top extended over the sides.
If you look at the wagon wheel bench behind it you can see the darker weathered places in the cracks. I had wanted to achieve that in the table using an ebony stain, but I had a tiny explosion of Minwax when I opened the tube. There was no going back, I had to do the entire table (and my hands, arms and shirt good thing it was water based) in the stain. I like how the darker color looks as there is so much wood in, around and on my house.
I think for the finishing touches I'm going to add two two inch metal bands around the sides of the bench and maybe a handle like you would see on a red wagon to complete the cart like look.
I used cedar we had in the barn and bough four wheels from our Columbus Ace hardware. I had some issues with the getting the screws in straight but you can't see it in the pictures. I've never been good at getting screws to go in nice and straight, but I missed the edges of the wood in a few places, oops! I'm a beginner what can I say.
I'm looking forward to getting the finishing touches on the table and then I am going to start on a bench cushion for the wagon seat. I'll be doing a no sew project.
