Finishing the New Dining Chairs

The final step to the new chairs was re-upholstering the seat. I removed 2 layers of fabric and the stinky foam to get to the bare wood.Using the left over fabric and foam from the other chairs and many staples, the seats looked brand new. The new chairs are great, much sturdier that the other.

And now we know: the hard wood of the seats (wood veneered plywood) causes the staple gun to jam frequently causing re-upholstering to take longer than usual.

New Fans in the Bedrooms

Home Depot was having a 20% off sale on lighting so we went and bought 2 fans for the bedrooms upstairs.

Here is the old fan in the master bedroom:

And the old fixture in the 2^nd bedroom:

We started in the master bedroom and got the fan about half done when we notice it was on an angle. After taking most of it down, we realized the electrical box was installed on an angle and was sticking out about ¼” below the drywall on one side. After a lunch break and phoning a friend we used shims to install the fan bracket level and re-installed all the pieces from there. It worked well except for the fan cover is flush on one side and is ¼” off the ceiling on the other side. We decided we were okay with this as it was not that noticeable with the blades up and it faced the window not the door.

We figured while all the tools were up there we might as well install the 2^nd bedroom fan as well. Same problem with the electrical box, but this time we knew how to solve it so it went quicker.

The new fans are a good improvement much quieter and brighter that the previous light fixtures. Only 6 more fixtures to replace in the house (not including the unfinished basement) and we already have a fan for one of them.

And now we know: some problem always comes up and wow, did they do some weird stuff to this house in the past.

A New Cover For the Round Chair

I hated sewing this slipcover. Not a fun project. Here is the before, ever since we moved the cream sofa into this room, the yellow undertones were fighting with the cool white of the fabric on this chair and I new I needed to do something.

Here was the sequence of events:

1. Find a great navy blue velvet fabric that goes perfectly with the blue wall colour
2. Cut and sew ¾ of the way round the slipcover with the cat sitting on the fabric as it goes through the sewing machine.
3. Spend 2 hours hand sewing the opening closed as the fabric is so thick the needle will barely go through.
4. Discover the existing buttons are not the type that can be recovered.
5. Take a trip to the fabric store to buy a button making set.
6. Attempt to make the new buttons, discover the fabric is too heavy.
7. Decide to abandon the buttons and just stitch the 8 spots together so at least the cushion will have some shape.
8. Discover the thread is not strong enough to pull the sides together.
9. LOSE THE NEEDLE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE CUSHION.
10. Borrow a giant magnet from my mother
11. Try to find the needle with the magnet but end up cutting the stiching and removing the new cover to find the needle.
12. Put the cover back on and hand sew the opening closed again.
13. Start to tuft the cushion again with a much larger needle.
14. Discover it is really hard to do while it is on the floor so use 4 chairs to get it off the floor.
15. Get lots of help from the cat who attacks the needle and thread on every pass through the cushion.
16. Finally finish!

Fun times. Looks good now though.

And now we know: a standard button making kit doesn’t work with really thick upholstery fabric. Cat’s are really helpful with sewing projects.

New Chairs - Painting the Frames

My parent picked these 2 chairs out of a pile by the road sometime in the fall. They were pretty grungy and smelled somewhat nasty.

Again, looking for low cost projects and getting concerned about the rocking motion developing in our other dining chairs, I decided it was time to re-finish them. Same as the bench; I gave them a sand, a coat of primer and 2 coats of black paint. I didn’t have any of the brown paint left to match the other chairs, so used the same paint as the bench instead. There is a noticeable difference in colour so the plan is to gradually repair the older chairs (the joints need to be put back together and strengthened) and give them a coat of black paint. I was getting tiered of the brown anyways!

And now we know: Free chairs are great, especially when they are well built

Refinishing the Hall Bench

Got this bench at the Glebe Garage sale the month before we moved into our house:

That was almost 2 years ago and I had yet to even glue the loose pieces back on. Since this is a time of saving for future sump pump installation, re-finishing the bench seemed a good lost cots project to do. The fabric I had bought in the fall on sale and a can of paint was covered by a gift card from Christmas.

I gave the bench a light sanding and a coat of ‘fix all problems’ primer, then did 2 coats of black paint. The problem with trying to do a 2^nd coat of black paint in a poorly lit basement after work is that you can’t see where you’ve already painted, so the second coat was abandoned and had to be done the following weekend when there was sunlight.

Overall it is a much cleaner look especially with the 2 new baskets.

And now we know: black paint looks awesome but you need good lighting to paint with it.