It’s Back……

My project A.D.H.D.  that is.  I haven’t posted much lately because I haven’t completed many projects lately. 

For instance, I had a million things to do yesterday, woke up, walked down stairs and decided today was the day to start on a REAL slipcover for my living room sofa.

So I sewed all day yesterday.

It’s coming along though.

I’m about ready to start on the skirt. 

I have been met with a certain amount of resistance!

Ornery little thing!  I swear, she’s right in the middle of  the sofa every time I turn around.  And moving chubby little miss is no small task!

Other projects that I’ve been working on include these number blocks.

Hubby cut them for me and then I painted and glazed them.  I think these would look cute in an apothecary jar with other numbered goodies.   Or maybe in  jar with some old baseballs and a pic. of your kiddo, and then the block with his uniform number?  Or maybe in an old wire basket. 

Anywho……I love anything with numbers or letters  right now.  These are just the first batch and will be heading to the Rink and our booth soon.  I’ll be making some with letters also as soon as I can find a font that I love.

As you can probably see….I have also begun decorating for Halloween.

Love the way this tray turned out.  It’s all silver, black, and creams.  I’ll take a better pic. later.  The background is a huge slipcover in progress mess!

 

The window above the sink in the kitchen.

 

More later…….

Denise

About Autumn……

Will it EVER arrive here?  It’s in the low 90’s again today.  Maybe a  little Fall decorating will at least set the mood.

I picked up a couple of sweet little pitchers recently.

Love love this one.  All cracked crackled and brown.  Totally useless really but so cute.  And only $5.00!

Cute!

This  pitcher I couldn’t resist.  

Yummy……brown transfer ware!

It looks wonderful with my other two pitchers.

Actually, my hutch is one of my favorite places to create vignettes of late.

I had thought about changing everything to black and cream for Halloween, but I’m really enjoying the brown and cream!  Maybe I’ll just add a little orange……..

 

Denise

We ARE…..DIY Diva’s!

If there is one thing that this lousy recession has done that is positive, it is this bigger than life DIY movement among women like all of us.

We haven’t just taken lemons and made lemonade.  We are WOMEN!  We have taken lemons and made sweet,  sparkling, yummy lemonade and then shared it with each other through our blogs.  And isn’t that a wonderful thing?

Fantastic, beautiful, low cost, and sometimes even no cost projects that are just amazing.

If there are two industries that are thriving, it must be paint and…..well…..drop clothes. :)   Who’d uh thunk it! 

  

I’m currently making drop cloth chair slipcovers for two chairs.  Not only that, the chairs came from a swap that I did with a friend.  She now has some new accessories and I have two new chairs!  Win win for both of us and loooowww cost to transform my new chairs.

Some of us have drug out sewing machines that we haven’t seen in years, dusted them off, and gotten busy.

   

Slipcover parties, craft parties, on-line blog parties, new, cost conscious ideas every week in blogland.  The inspiration is endless.

Now, many of us are preparing for autumn.

We’re taking reuse, repurpose, and recycle to a whole new level.

Things that we may have had for years are taking on a whole new look.

When we do buy, it is often vintage.

 

And if we’re really really lucky…….everything we do is kitty approved!

So I guess the purpose of this post is just to say a big THANK YOU to all of you wonderful women out there who inspire me every single day to forge on with my projects.

You ARE…… DIY DIVAS!!

Denise

The Project

There are projects, and then there are PROJECTS!  This was one of the latter.  I purchased this piece of furniture over two years ago.  I couldn’t decide how to proceed.  What color of paint?  What fabric?

So….here she is.

Or I should say WAS.

Faded, ugly, it even had a cigarette burn on the back.  But I loved it.  It was love at first sight.  It  was just so….tacky.  But in a good way.

Finally, with the big change that I was making to my living room, it was time to DO something.

I decided on chocolate brown paint.

I mixed it myself.  I got grey.  The funny thing is, it was the best mistake that I could have made!  I had previously started painting it turquoise, so when I sanded, it showed through.  Perfect!

Neutral fabric. 

I am NOT an upholsterer.  I have never upholstered.  But……have glue gun….will upholster.

Tufting.  I was scared to death that I would screw it up.  I decided to leave the old fabric on the chair and glue right over it. 

You have to have the glue gun set on hot so that the two fabrics fuse with each other.  OUCH!  Watch those fingers!  I used the end of an old spoon in each of the tucks while the glue dried.  I made sure that it was totally dry each time so that I could pull the fabric nice and tight.

Believe me, once the glue is dry, you won’t be able to pull the new fabric off even if you want to.  It’s stuck, and good.

So I proceeded all the way down the inside back and at the bottom, glued and tucked the left over fabric in a good four inches.

The same on the sides.  If you decide to tackle a project like this, be sure to use a heavy fabric like this canvas so that the glue doesn’t show.

After each side was glued, I took a razor and cut it as close to the edge as possible.

As you can see, I used buttons along the front to cover the raw edges.  I will use gimp along the sides and back ( haven’t quite finished that yet) since it won’t show nearly as much.

Thank goodness I love collecting vintage buttons.  I used a bunch. 

For my seat cushion, since this chair isn’t one that we sit in often at all, I decided that I wanted it soft and mushy and very shabby chic. 

I drew my pattern from the old cushion and then tossed it in the trash.  Made a muslin insert, stuffed the T’s with batting, then purchased a 27” down pillow  form and stuffed it into my 22”  inch muslin insert for  a nice fluffy cushion!  I was too lazy to sew in a zipper, so it just ties shut along the back.

Not okay for a chair that you sit in a lot.  But the cat sure is gonna love it. :)

Soft and very shabby yummy.

I really love my chair!  It looks perfect in my new and evolving living room. 

Denise