i'm no professional, but i am currently refinishing my guitar. basicly, you've got the idea. but after you clear coat it (about 5~6 layers seem good enough..), you need to give it sufficient time to dry (similarly after the color coats).. then sand it up to 1500 and polish. you're done.
a few tips.. when sanding the clear coat, make sure you get ALL of the shiny spots or they're gonna be a problem when you polish..
since you're painting wood, i would suggest some lacquer-based aerosol paint.. that stuff dries pretty fast.. its probably a wrong thing to do, but i'm in a hurry so i spray a new layer of 2 passes every 45mins ~1hr. it isn;t giving me any trouble so far..
lastly, when the paint is drying, make sure you suspend it as whatever surface you leave it on while the paint is still soft will leave a mark..
Hope this helps and good luck, dude...