Distressing is wonderful but I do it with sandpaper. By the way, the furniture in my house might as well be distressed. Our furniture tends to have more battle scars than most from encounters with our crazy dogs and cats.
Sausha at Show and Tell refinished a chest of drawers using 0000 (super fine) steel wool and denatured alcohol to distress, allowing the wood to show through.
This technique looks like it may give a better look than sandpaper, but it does require a finish coat of poly (she loves Wood Classics poly from Sherwin Williams). The finish coat is needed because the alcohol leaves a cloudy, dull area.
Sausha learned this technique from Christa at Stories of a House. Christa has a short video tutorial on the technique here. She also describes the technique in this post (with a few extra tips) here.
I can't wait to try out this technique. I'd also like to experiment and see if a coat of finish wax would do as well as a final coat of poly. I guess denatured alcohol will be on my next shopping list.