Cabinet Rehab Take 2

So, I've been working on machines, with a little bit of quilting and stuff thrown in.

I got a nifty Singer 15-91 in a rare Trapezoid cabinet (also called Spinet).  I decided to take the machine in to be rewired by Pocono Sew & Vac, my favorite machine dealer, and I would refinish the cabinet, because it was in really bad shape, but hopefully would look good when I finished.  I want a machine I can have available just for piecing, with a good 1/4" seam allowance, plus good straight stitches.  I do almost everything else on my Viking, but sometimes it's set for quilting, and I want to just piece.  It's a different use of my brain and energy, and I need to be able to do both tasks.  So, enter $30 garage sale find.

See my previous post on the stripping part.  After I posted that, I realized I would also need to strip the bottom of the flip top.  So, I got out the chemical again, and went to work.  Then it got colder, just a bit too cold to work outside for a few hours.  Today it was in the 50s, so I decided to spend about 2 hours on this project.  I got the machine back last week, so I want to get it back in the cabinet!

I've also been thinking about this, and how I want this to look.  Since parts of the actual cabinet had a very shiny, thick, finish, I wanted the refinished cabinet to also have a thick shiny finish.  I went back to Home Depot and picked up a can of Polyurethane Gloss, thinking I would use it over the stain/finish I had already done.

BUT, after 2 coats of the all in one, I remembered why I didn't like using that product.  It's very difficult to get a pretty, even, smooth finish with that.  The last restore I did, I used a stain and then semi-gloss clear coat, and I liked how that looked much better!  So, today, I sanded down the stripped bottom, and sanded down the coats of all in one I used.  I had a can of just stain, although it was darker than what I had intended on using.  After applying it, I used paper towel to remove it, and now I love the color!  It shows off the wood grain beautifully, so after the coats of clear gloss, it should be exactly what I was hoping for.

Here's the photos from today.

Side 2 after stripping and sanding.  

Side 2 after the regular stain.  I worked a little more after the picture was taken to make it more evenly colored. 

Side 1 after sanding off most of 2 coats of all-in-one finish.  I used just the stain on this side, too, to make the color