Farmhouse Serving Tray DIY

Rather than throwing away a broken TV tray, I repurposed it into a farmhouse serving tray. This simple project came together in a few steps using wood stain and craft letters.

BEFORE

As you can see the TV tray was falling apart.

I unscrewed the tray from the legs and sanded the top and bottom of the tray to strip off the white spray paint. I used my orbit sander for this.

This tray needed some handles!

I spray-painted two brass handles that were from our old kitchen cabinets.

I used flat black spray paint.

I made a quick trip to Home Depot to pick up a can of wood stain. I fell in love with all of the Varathane colors, I wanted to buy them all. I decided on this Dark Walnut!

I applied one coat with a foam paintbrush

Now comes the fun part...stenciling! I thought the word GATHER would look nice on the tray and give it a farmhouse feel. I found these letters online on Amazon

I used the same method of stenciling as I did for this project Stenciled Number Trays

I folded clear tape to make it double-sided. Then I placed the tape on the back of each letter and pressed them down on the tray. Next, I painted over the letters with the wood stain. I waited a few minutes until the stain was partially dry, then I peeled the letters off. The letters didn't turn out perfect, but that's ok! The jaggeder letters give the tray an aged look. Plus a little sanding and another coat of stain covered most of the imperfections.