Dresser Makeover

I bought a bedroom suite at an estate auction while we were in Tennessee.  I wasn't paying attention when people were bidding so some other guy won the bid for $10, I talked him into doubling his money and selling me the set for $20.  Bryant was super stoked when he came home to a garage full of furniture, In addition to this set I also bought 6 dinner chairs, an ottoman, and a TON of fabric.  But it was a great deal!  The set is probably from the fifties. 

Here are some before pics:

These pictures were taken after I sanded all the scratches and water rings out, just before painting.  You can see my dogs 'helping' in some of the pictures.

Here are the current pictures, still not quite 'after' pictures because I'm not sure how I am going to handle all the broken drawer pulls.  I'd like to find someone with a lathe that can recreate them for me. 

um.  Do you like my drawer pull selection?

I think these are what really appealed to me.  Simple, clean furniture with curvy, feminine pulls.  I really need to find a lathe.

I just learned to upholster.

I just came back from visiting my parents in their new home in south Texas.  It was a really fun trip and I picked up a new skill while I was there.  About 10 years ago my parents bought a new couch and matching chair.  The couch was made of a casual blue cotton and faded quickly in the California sun (my parents move a lot) so my mom bought a slip cover while they were living in Tennessee.  The chair however remained uncovered except for my moms very creative attempt at converting it to cowhide chair.

Moo chair

Pretty cool huh?  Mom is great.  She sewed it on there with raffia.  I don't know exactly how to describe her style but its something like 'contemporary rustic.'  Is that an oxymoron?  I think you can see from the picture that the chair has some stains and is quite faded and mom had a few yards of some really cool fabric so I decided to try to cover it.  I made some pattern pieces out of an old sheet but I could not win my game of fabric Tetris to try to get my pattern pieces to fit on the 3 yards of cool fabric.  The solution was to buy a complimentary fabric to make parts of the chair.  Here is the result:




Front o chair



Oh and there was an ottoman too.

Upholstered Headboard

Headboard Frame by Bryant

Drum roll please (drum rolling in your head) Presenting. . .My first Project!  It may not look like much now but by tonight it will be an upholsered headboard.
   
To build the frame Bryant cut down a peice of particle board to 80"x44", it is going to be big but our room is big and it needs big furniture.  He made the frame using some 1x2's. Bryant always makes things that are super sturdy, check that thing out!

I got this awesome print fabric from Sirs, it was remnant fabric so I got two peices that are about 1yard and 1/3 each and matched the print when I sewed it together. I was pretty excited because I had never tried to match a print before.  I think it turned out pretty good and the tufting should help to conceal the seam.
 
A few months ago our lovely neighbors gave me their granmothers button collection so I will be digging through it for the right buttons for tufting.  I don't want to do fabric covered, instead I am going to go with a contrasting color. . .probably black since the print is tan with french writing on it.  More Later!