This is going to be a very quick post on a project that we Pavlo did this weekend. I technically helped by taking care of the kiddos while he repaired, sanded, stained and polyurethaned my parent’s front door.

In the picture below you can see that the door had taken quite a beating over the years. The harsh rays of the sun had caused discoloration on both the door and sidelights. They were no longer the same color as each other, as is the norm, and the front door even had some cracking and spots of uneven fading (this can especially be seen on the bottom half of the door and sidelights).

About 6 years ago (before Pavlo and I were even dating) he replaced my parent’s front door. That door had been there for twice as long as the current one so it was decided we would just refinish the existing door.

First any cracks were filled with wood filler. Then, after the wood filler dried the entire door and the sidelights were sanded

Then came the stain. I chose the “cherrywood” color of Minwax gel stain. The gel stain has always given us wonderful results and since we were staining an installed door the no-drip formula was the perfect choice.

Once the stain dried we realized we weren’t entirely happy with one section so Pavlo went back and resanded the bottom half of the door and then reapplied the stain to that area.

Then came a coat polyurethane.

Even after just one coat (of three) of the polyurethane the difference in the door was dramatic. The cracks had been fixed and the door and sidelights matched once again. Next weekend Pavlo will apply 2 more coats of polyurethane and then the door will be complete!