There is no better piece of furniture to complete a traditional, rustic kitchen than a nice, quaint farmhouse table. It can be perfect for family dinners, and you’ll get plenty of compliments when it’s time for Thanksgiving dinner.
Buying a farmhouse table can be expensive, and paying someone to build a custom farmhouse can cost double that price. It can be cheaper to build your own, and this step by step guide will help you with every single aspect of building your dream farmhouse table.

STEP 1 – GET TOGETHER YOUR MATERIALS

Before you start envisioning how adorable your family will look eating dinner together again, you need to get together your materials. You’re going to need plenty of wood. These lengths are just a guideline, though.

Measure out how long you would like for the table to be, how tall, etc. and then make your own adjustments as necessary. You will need:

• 3 2x12x61 inch pieces of wood (table top)
• 4 4x4x28 inch pieces of wood (leg)
• 2 4x4x26 inch pieces of wood (short stretcher)
• 1 2x4x56 ½ pieces of wood (long stretcher)
• 2 2x4x19 inch pieces of wood (short apron)
• 2 2x4x49 inch pieces of wood (long apron)

STEP 2 – PICK UP YOUR LUMBER

After you look at what you will need, you need to pick up your lumbar. This can be trickier than it sounds. You can pick up some wood from a home supply store to make things a bit easier. Write down the cuts in the following steps, and some places will even cut it perfect for you so that all you have to do is take it home and put it all together. DIY doesn’t get easier than that.

If not, you still need to go pick up the wood. It doesn’t matter where you get it from. A lumber yard will have more than enough, so just browse and pick out something you like. If the piece of wood is bigger than you need, you can always cut it down to size.

Some people also like to upcycle things they already have. Sanding down a previous kitchen table may be a nice idea. Old kitchen cabinets can provide the shorter pieces of wood as well. If you’re in a pinch for money and want to do this on the lowest budget possible, take a good look around the house to see what you don’t use anymore.

STEP 3 – CUT THE PIECES

After you get the lumber, it’s time to cut the pieces. During this step, just follow this list, and take it one thing at a time.

• Cross cut the table top pieces
• Cross cut the stretchers
• Cross cut the legs
• Cross cut the aprons
• DO NOT CUT THE LONG APRONS TO THE PERFECT LENGTH YET (you’ll see why in a minute)

STEP 4 – ATTACH THE LEGS TO THE APRONS

To start making the base of your new farmhouse table, you’re going to put one of the short aprons in the middle of two legs. You can then attach them however you want. Pick up some braces, or you can simply screw the apron into the leg. You can do this from the side on the inside of the table so that no one will be able to see it if you want.

NOTE: The aprons are the short pieces that go at the top of the legs. The stretchers are the pieces of wood at the bottom of the table, closer to the floor.

STEP 5 – NOTCH THE LEGS

Before you put the short stretcher into place with a few basic screws, get out a chisel and make a couple of notches into the legs. The short stretchers are those short pieces that will go at the bottom. After you make the notches, don’t put the short stretchers in just yet.

STEP 6 – MAKE ROOM FOR THAT MIDDLE STRETCHER

I’m not going to include the measurements exactly because I already encouraged you to freestyle if you want to. Instead, measure out the length and width of your long stretcher, and notch out some room for it in the center of those middle stretchers. This is the exact spot that your long stretcher will sit.

STEP 6 – ATTACH THE LEG BASES

After you have done this with both of the aprons, and all four of the legs, you will need to connect those pieces with the long stretchers. Using a nice crosslap joint will make your table look pretty, and these are pretty easy to make.

STEP 7 – PUT IT ALL TOGETHER

Now, put the short stretchers in those notches that you made earlier. They should fit rather snug, but it never hurts to use some Gorilla Glue just to make sure.

After the short stretchers are in place, it’s time to use that same glue and slide the long stretcher into place. After this, the base of your pretty farmhouse table should be nicely put together.

STEP 8 – ATTACH LONG APRONS

Next, measure and cross cut the pieces of wood that will be used for the long aprons. After that, use pocket screws to put them in place. This part shouldn’t take too long.

STEP 9 – THE TABLETOP PIECES

This is, by far, the easiest part of this DIY project. To start off with, take all three pieces of wood and line them up perfectly. Then, you put four pocket screw holes in the top piece (all together, not four per piece of wood), and then glue the edges that are touching. For these three pieces of wood, you want to line the inside with glue. Gorilla Glue works wonderfully at holding together wood.

STEP 10 – BREADBOARD

At this stage, some people like to add in another short piece of wood at the ends of the table. This is called a breadboard. If this is in your plans, simply use these pieces to make the pocket screw holes, and then glue those pieces of wood in place as well.

STEP 11 – PUT THE TABLE TOP ON

Next, use same basic brackets to keep the table top in place. Simply put the tabletop that you just completed on top of the base, screw the table top on, and you’re almost done!

After this, everything you do is only for cosmetic reasons. If you like the look of the table, and the wood, leave it alone and simply enjoy it! If not, sand it down, pick up some wood stain and get to work.