Penny Table

I wish I had taken more pictures of the table before I started staining it.  I honestly didn't even think about it.  This was an unremarkable coffee table bought at Goodwill or Savers, can't even remember which.  It sat in my house for a year or two just waiting for me to actually do something with it.  I finally decided to get to work and had the Main Man cut some molding to outline the top of the table to contain all the pennies and epoxy, and then I stained it all this beautiful dark brown.  Gluing, nailing, filling and staining that thing took the longest.

Then came time for the pennies...  It took more pennies than I thought it would...

It took a while to get the pennies all set the way I wanted.

I almost stopped there and decided to just glue the pennies... but since I already had the epoxy I figured I might as well keep on keeping on.   I used this, it's a two part epoxy that you mix together and pour on to give it a thick bar-top type finish.  There are better things to use I'm sure but it's coffee table that I don't expect to be under a lot of wear and tear and that stuff I could quickly and easily pick up at Home Depot.

Mixing it was tedious, you have to be careful.  Make sure to use a bowl you can throw away when you're done because cleaning it up is next to impossible.  I picked up one at the dollar store as well as a cheap plastic spoon for stirring it as well.

Make sure what you are covering is on a flat surface, you'll need to help spread out the epoxy after you pour it on the table.

I found I needed something to be able to push a few of the pennies back into place as well for about 20-30 minutes as everything set.  I used a pair of cheap bamboo chopsticks I had left over from take out.  There were also a few air bubbles that I needed to pop as well.   I kept a pretty close eye on it for nearly an hour to try to keep bubbling and shifting to a minimum.

Pretty darn happy with it!  I don't have a good picture of it but in this case it might have needed more epoxy for a completely smooth finish.  It took 3 days before I was comfortable that it was cured enough to bring into the house.  What we noticed as it dried though was that it shrank a bit.  So you can actually see little divots between each penny, giving it a slightly textured finish instead of completely smooth.   The Main Man thinks it adds character.  :)