Cedar Hope Chest

A friend found this piece in a dumpster! The outside was a horror but the inside was pristine. We hauled it out and I brought it home. The veneer was coming up in places, but I figured once I glued it down and it was painted it would be ok,

I was wrong. The veneer started to crack and pull up even more after I painted it, so  I sprayed all the veneer with water and put down wet towels thinking it would just loosen the glue and pull up easily. It didn't. 

I used my iron to heat up the wet towels on top of the veneer. It sort of started to heat the glue from the veneer, but it took a good hour and a half to get it all off. Ugh.

I tried a heat gun too, but the iron ended up working the best. The front of the chest had veneer on it as well, but the hot iron didn't even work on that one. I had to use a hammer and chisel! 

I gouged the heck out of it, so I used wood filler to fill all the nicks and divets I made.

All I need to do now is prime and paint it. Stay tuned!