A few years ago I decided to slather on some latex paint onto an old desk while painting the room the same color with the same paint. The desk was old, had a finish that I think is actually a wood grain painted onto pine. It looks artificial. Now I decided to remove the paint, have been using a gel stripper. Most of the paint bubbled up and came off, but some of it is melting and making a very thin layer of turquoise (my lovely paint color) residue across the wood. The old finish has kept it's wood grain look for the most part but the stripper has brought up brown finish color along with my turquoise coming off. Most of the old finish varnish seems to be off but the wood has an almost waxy feel to it. Does anyone have a clue what I can do to get the remaining turquoise paint off with out continuing to smear it into the wood where it almost seems to be bonding?

Thanks for ideas; at this point I've given up and come inside after hours of scraping so far.