When we first bought this house about 7 years ago, Eric told me that he wanted a pool table someday. I kind of laughed it off and asked him where he was going to put it and he figured the basement was a good place. I didn't necessarily agree and had my own plans. Let's just say it's a good thing pool tables are so expensive. I hadn't really given it more thought, and Eric would only bring it up occasionally.
Then a few months ago, his good friend, Anthony bought a pool table for his basement and Eric's been over there quite a bit shooting some pool. It's something he's always enjoyed, we just never had the funds for it and if we did, there were other things that needed our attention first.
Well this tax return Eric decided enough was enough and he was going to get his own pool table. I wasn't thrilled with the idea, but this house is every much Eric's as it is mine and as of now that basement is serving no real purpose other than storing junk.
Eric was going back and forth on buying a cheap table from somewhere like Walmart or looking at pool tables for sale on KSL. One day he found a listing for an 8 foot, slate pool table for only $100. He was anxious and went to look at it that day. He decided that he was going to buy it. The couple selling it had moved into a house and the previous owners had just left it. The current owners wanted nothing to do with it and wanted it out of their basement, thus the great price.
Eric's plan was going to be to go on the Saturday after he looked at it, but then because he was so anxious and the weather was supposed to be crappy on Saturday, he went and got it on a Wednesday night. He brought it home in pieces and I was afraid it would sit in pieces for months.
Eric was super anxious to have his table though and did the bits and pieces that he could when he could. He did build the frame back up the night he bought it, but the following Saturday he went to the hardware store and bought some supplies. He redid the ball return system using rain gutters. Seriously, brilliant idea. He then had to wait for his corners, corner tops, and felt.
...Corners it came with. Plastic and Eric said they were cracking...
They all came within a day of each other and Eric wasted no time getting busy. He did have to wait sometimes for a bit of extra man power, but I think he's completed this table within 3 weeks. He did run into a problem where his top corners, weren't the same size as the previous corners, so he then had to get creative again and figure out that issue.
...Eric's new corners and sides...
...The problem: Eric's new tops weren't quite as wide as the originals...
His solution was to put leather underneath it and I wasn't so sure how that would work out. We went to a leather store kind of thinking you could buy it by the yard, like fabric, but were super surprised to find out you buy the whole roll kind of thing. The leather we were looking at at that time, $220! We found the cheaper leather, probably deer, and bought that roll for $40. Eric then figured he could dye the leather and he'd get the look he was hoping for. It worked out pretty well, although the gloss cover made it a little more red than anticipated, but it's not bad.
...Dying the leather with some helpers...
...The finished corners...
Last night he finally completed everything and I am not sad to have a pool table in the house. I need to work on my form and shot, but it'll be a fun thing to have around. And I am super proud of my hubby for using his creative side and putting something like this back together, mostly by himself. He does have one thing left to do and that's to replace the pockets, but that's and easy and quick fix. He's just got to order the parts and do the waiting game again.
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