Repurposing an old side table for next to no Money!

Hi guys. In my quest to create something wonderful for next to no money I started looking around the house and found this old side table that I rescued from a roadside dump collection quite a few years ago. I had been using it beside the bed for ages with a piece of plywood sitting on top and a tablecloth thrown over it to hide it's many flaws.

This is what it looked like before I started. Next my trusty handyman partner cut a piece of ply to fit inside the frame at the top of the table and braced it underneath so that the plywood would have something to sit on. I tried it out and it fit snugly. I drew a pattern on the ply in pencil and cut up some red tiles that I'd bought from the tip shop ($2.00 for 25 tiles, not bad huh?). I'd also put an ad in the local freebie site seeking unused or unwanted tiles. I sure didn't expect to get some beautiful glitter mosaic tiles and metal ones for free but I was really lucky and that's what I ended up with. Yay, happy me! I dug through all my glass gems and decided to incorporate them into the design as well.

I'm still using the same tube of silicone to glue the tiles on that I have used in 3 other projects. One tube of silicone for $5 goes a really long way.

This is the table top glued and grouted. I had planned on painting the table but after sanding it I discovered that the timber I thought was pine is something a whole lot nicer and possibly cedar which ties in perfectly with my timber floors and raked ceilings. I have run out of sandpaper and will have to get some more tomorrow but in the meantime I couldn't resist posting a pic of the nearly complete new table.

I'm really happy with the result so far. I've decided to have a go at beeswaxing it instead of painting it with a coat of clear varnish because I have quite a bit of beeswax in my fridge leftover from a previous project. I'll post a pic when it's all finished. So far the cost of this project has been under $10. I'll have to add a few more dollars to the final cost after buying the sandpaper. I did buy a pair of cheap tile cutters for $5 (included in the costing) and they have been very useful. I hope you've enjoyed the process as much as I did. Please feel free to ask any questions or comment below. Thanks for taking the time to read this post, Diana. :D * A few days later now and I've finished! Yay. It turned out so much better than I thought it would. After sanding and waxing and polishing I think I may never make another one (whew was that hard work) but was it worth it? Sure was! I'm loving it. What do you think? This girl who's never used an electric sander in her life created this! The waxing and polishing I did by hand. That was the hardest part of the whole project. Hmmm, now working on a crazy new project idea. I'll let you know how it goes soon.