Dining room chairs

Dan and I finished up the dining room chairs! We are so happy with the results. In the photos you can see the small plywood base he added to the seats to give them some extra support. Then it was on to recovering them. All told it only took about 90 minutes to get the fabric on the seats and the seats back on the chairs. The most difficult thing about the entire process was trying to find the right size staples for the staple gun (yes, three trips to Ace Hardware to get this one right). The actual stapling of the fabric to the seat was a very simple, very easy process. I didn't do any fancy corners and also covered over the piping from the original chair. I don't mind the lack of detail that much.

The family has already broken them in with blueberry pancakes (and matching blueberry stains), but that's exactly why we got this table and chair set, right? I was a bit peeved at first, but them remembered that it was a garage sale table and chair set and sale fabric from JoAnn's; I can always go and get more if need be. These chairs are made for sitting (and spilling on). Incidentially, the fabric held up pretty well to my scrubbing at the stain so I think this fabric will stick around for awhile. But, I also started thinking about some cute oilcloth seat covers for the girls...just something like a placemat we could set over the seat while they eat. Maybe a matching one to go under the highchair too? Hmmm...more ideas!

Success

Here is one of the finished new chairs. I love how it turned out. I am feeling ready to move on to the bigger project.

In the interim, my husband has lowered the table, so it is at a more appropriate height for our family. Now, on to the dining chairs and plywood seats...

Trial Run

I picked up two of these chairs at the local thrift store a couple of weeks ago. I wasn't a fan of the fabric, but I had this other fabric in my stash from a previous visit to the local dig-n-save. I think that it is a wise idea to try out reupholstering these chairs first, before I tackle our dining room set.

New Challenge

If you can believe it, my husband and I picked up this table and chair set at a garage sale last weekend. It is an Ethan Allen, solid cherry set that seats up to 12. The set came with six chairs, two of which have arms. The set fits beautifully in our dining room. The set was sold by a family that now has grown children - so the best part is that the table chairs are all 'kid-tested' and gently used. This means that I won't ever worry about the inevitable spills or normal childhood wear and tear (i.e. scratches, permanent markers, tape, paint, etc.) The only hitch is that the table is a little tall for our taste and the fabric on the chairs is not our style (plus the previous owners had cats and Dan is VERY allergic to cats). So, my new challenge is recovering, and firming up, the seats.

It all seems very straightforward at the moment. Buy some fabric, get my husband to make some plywood seats and cut down the legs of the table by an inch, recover the seats with the aid of a staple gun, and I'm done. I am sure that I am in for more of a challenge than that, however. The upside at the moment is that JoAnn is having a 50% off sale on all their home decor and upholstery fabrics so at least I should be able to find a great print that we like.