school desk makeover

Back in my 3rd grade-teacher-ing days, our school was getting rid of a few "outdated" desks... the type of desks I sat at as a kid complete with a little dip at the top to put your pencil in. There wasn't anything wrong with the desks, besides several years worth of marker, #2 pencil, sticker goo, and other school-y stuff on it. So I convinced my husband to take one from the dumpster and put it in our itty bitty 1992 Nissan and take it home because after all, they don't make 'em like they used to. Probably.  It has actually been an enormously useful desk, because we store all our AV equipment inside (which we only use if we are watching a DVD) so we don't have to see all the ugly cords everywhere.
Unfortunately, it is a little grungy.  I have been wanting to do something about it for a long time, but I have been sort of indecisive about what to do. Enter: Claire's outlet store.  They had 4 rolls of paper tape for $1.  Yes! I'm not sure why Claire's had paper tape, but they did.  I'm not sure I love the colors, but it was a buck!  And it's removable which means that indecisive me can always do something different later.
I didn't think to take a picture of the desk before I started, so here's a picture half way through:

 This was a super easy project. I didn't measure anything and I just eyeballed it to make it straight.  I alternated colors, but I think it would be super cute to do colors in a more random order, or use more than just 4 patterns.  I just made sure to cut it with enough tape at the end to be able to wrap it underneath the top of the desk.

 As I said before. It's not permanent, so I'm not sure how long it will last with little fingers playing/spilling stuff on it, but I'm sure you could varnish over something like this to make it more durable.