Lake Life Decor
/Labor Day has come and gone and Halloween is rapidly approaching. Boo! I never want summer to end. Living at the lake is my personal paradise and I don’t want to put my toys away and go inside.
One fine Saturday morning, I was driving into town when I spotted some curbside shit at a house that was getting ready to move out. On top of the pile of shit was a pair of junior size water skis. I made a mental note to slow roll that on my way home…gears were turning in my head.
On my way back, I stopped to check them out. They were old, and I mean OLD. But they were wood, and that’s what I was after. I snagged them and threw them in the back of my truck.
I got home and thought about what I would need to do. I removed the hardware for the bindings, and I got out my random orbital sander and went over one of them to see if the red paint would come off, but that was a non-starter. I broke out some Citristrip and slathered it on to try and strip the paint. My god, this paint was really on there. I did what I could, scraping and Citri-stripping, gave them a mineral spirit wash and started sanding again. No matter what I did, that red paint was not coming out of the grain. As my arm felt like it was about to fall off from the sanding, I took a step back and decided to see what it looked like with some stain.
I started on the bottom of the ski (which will be against the wall) with some Minwax Jacobean and damn if it doesn’t look cool with the hints of red underneath!
I stained both of them and let them dry. Next, I used painters tape to create some designs and painted in between with acrylic paint.
I then put on a couple coats of semi-gloss polycrylic to finish. I picked up new screws for the hardware and reinstalled the bindings. I picked up some L-shaped screw things, anchored them into the wall and hung them over each window overlooking the lake, and I think it looks pretty damn cool! Not bad for a curbside find!
