A little help? Not fitness related.

BlisterLamb

Hi...Lots of people on here, so I thought maybe there might be someone who can give me some suggestions.

My grandmother had some furniture custom made back in the 50's. She gave it to my parents in the 60's when I was about 6 or 7. They still have most of it, but I got the dining room table. I grew up with this monstrosity. It's been refinished, but it's distressed oak, so they left a lot of the dings and dents in it because it's supposed to look that way. I can locate the two little marks where i bashed my sister's front teeth into it when she was about 3. It has faint dotted lines in it where the pattern tracing wheel went off the cardboard protector thingy when my mother made my clothes. And if you look really close, you can still see "is a" etched into it where I wrote "Lisa is a brat" really hard on a piece of paper and it went through. I tried to convince my parents my sister had done it, but they weren't buying it. Aaaanny way...

The finish is new and looks good. I keep a tablecloth over it to protect it from my grandkids...matchbox cars, crayons, whatever. But my grandson spilled a bottle of water on it and I didn't know. It's a tan cloth with an off white antique lace cloth over it. I don't know how long it was wet before i realized it, but now there is a big, cloudy, water stain on half of the table. I dried it with a towel and have a fan blowing on it now. Does anyone have any suggestions for repairing the finish? I don't know if it will go away once it's dried or if I will need to put something on it. Oil maybe? I love my table and I don't want the finish ruined.
Thanks.

WinnerVictorious

http://www.ehow.com/how_5836573_repair-water-stained-finish.html
http://www.essortment.com/household-cleaning-tips-remove-water-stains-wood-furniture-46325.html
http://www.doityourself.com/stry/how-to-repair-water-stained-wood
http://tlc.howstuffworks.com/home/how-to-repair-wooden-furniture-surfaces.htm

if worse comes to worst, you can always wait until its completely dry, and try some very fine grit sandpaper or fine steel wool on the area to see if you can remove most of the stain without having to fully refinish the piece. if not, you probably just need to sand the top and recoat it with new varnish or whatever lacquer finish was used previously.

BlisterLamb

Duh...I should have googled it! Thank you. I was so flustered and already had this site open. Great idea. Thanks. I would be scared to death to try to varnish it or stain it myself. I would have to have it professionally redone and money is tight right now. I'm hoping the stain will fade when it dries and I can just use some kind of oil or something.

Thanks for responding.

WinnerVictorious

Duh...I should have googled it! Thank you. I was so flustered and already had this site open. Great idea. Thanks. I would be scared to death to try to varnish it or stain it myself. I would have to have it professionally redone and money is tight right now. I'm hoping the stain will fade when it dries and I can just use some kind of oil or something.

Thanks for responding.

read those links. there's lots of info in them. however, the stain might just be in the varnish and not actually all the way down to the wood. if so, all you do is strip or sand the varnish and re-varnish it. it's not hard. it looks like your piece has a clear varnish or lacquer coat on it. you can get a little jar of minwax clear varnish at Home Depot for a couple of dollars and a sponge brush for a buck or so. if you don't feel up to it, ask some of the men in your life - odds are they've done something like this before.

BlisterLamb

Thank you so much! It's looking better since I put the fan on it and the cloudiness has faded. I was kinda freaked when it happened. It was such a big mark!