Kitchen Island Progress - Sanding and Painting

I have discovered that there are three things that produce a good paint job on wood: priming, sanding, and never mess with drying paint (keep the wet edge). The biggest pain is sanding, but it also produces the best results - and my new toy for it is the Ryobi Corner Cat sander I bought at Home Depot for $30. Here is a picture:


Its a simple little one-speed sander that takes hook & loop pads. I allows me to get into most of the edges and tight places.

I found that I was spending more time and energy worrying about how much sanding I needed to do, rather than just doing it - so now I just do it. Normally, if I am painting, I sand 3 times: raw wood, after primer and after first coat. This seems to give the best results.
- Bare wood needs to be smoothed
- The grain raised by the primer needs to be taken down (water based primer)
- A small amount of grain seems to raise again with the first coat that should be taken down

My plug for Ryobi tools: they work well for home-owner use, don't cost a lot, and seem to be very reliable.