Party Ready

We have reached the tipping point. Just two more weeks before the big reveal of our One Room Challenge™ project. If you follow us on Instagram, you probably saw the picture of our party-ready dining room last Saturday. Getting to that point was a quite a feat. Earlier in the day, I was still running around with a paintbrush in my hand, playing Enya on repeat. (I listen to Enya when I am stressed. I joke with Andy that Enya makes me feel like someone is stroking my hair and telling me everything will be all right. It did NOT work last Saturday. Enya let me down.)

At 2:00 PM, Andy was hanging photos, and I was putting away all of the tools that had covered the dining room table for three weeks. Then, we all rushed around cleaning the house from top to bottom. By the time our guests arrived at 7:00 PM, we were doing the equivalent of leaning casually on the counter trying to pretend that getting ready for a party was no big deal. Oh yeah, we do this all the time.

The good news is that the party was a rousing success. Almost everyone in the neighborhood attended. Some were new families like us, and other attendees were long-time residents who knew and loved Dorothy very much. They shared stories about her, and they oohed and ahhed over the changes that we have made so far. It was a night of friendship and fun. We look forward to making this party a yearly tradition.

Week 4

Back to the One Room Challenge™…

Since we were in a rush to get the dining room ready for our party, I completed some projects very early on in the challenge. One of those projects was recovering our dining room chairs.

I was speeding through the project so quickly that I did not take a photo of the chairs prior to covering them. However, you can catch a glimpse here:

The Mission style table does not fit in with our Victorian/Colonial home. However, as I have mentioned before, the dining room project must be completed with a very small budget. Getting a new table to improve the design aesthetic is not a possibility, but changing the cushions did fit into the budget quite nicely.

I had my heart set on plaid, and I spent a lot of time perusing fabric stores. Sadly, the high-quality new fabric was too expensive for this project.  (If you are a plaid lover also, you might enjoy our Pinterest board devoted to plaid.) Since I could not find new fabric in our price range, I headed to the thrift store. I bought six L and XL plaid shirts for $3-$6 per shirt.

Recovering The Chairs

After vacuuming and then scrubbing each chair cushion with upholstery cleaner, I flipped the chairs over and removed the screws that attach the seat to the chair base.

Tip: Every chair that is made like this uses the same method to attach the seat. However, finding the right screw can be tricky. Take a moment to observe how your chair is put together. This will reduce the chance of removing the wrong screw.

I measured the back of each shirt against the size of the seat. Once I knew how it would best fit, I removed the sleeves, collar, and additional fabric.

Being careful to pull tightly, but not so tightly that I would make the lines of the plaid wavy, I fastened the fabric with a stapler. I folded the raw edges of the fabric under so the staple would go through two layers of fabric. This was necessary since I did not use sturdy upholstery fabric.

I continued stapling around the entire seat making corrections to fabric position as necessary. The last step was to cut away the extra fabric on the corners and reattach the seats to the chair bases.

When I was done, we had a set of mismatched plaid chairs which I think are quirky and fun vs. garish and amateur. I may be kidding myself. I can live with that.

Fun fact: One of these chair seats was actually my pajamas. Can you guess which one?

When the chairs are pushed in around the table, it is not very noticeable that they are mismatched. However, when they are pulled out, it is a fun surprise to find out which chair you will get. The kids approve. They like surprises.

Millie is also in favor of this design risk. In fact, I had to keep shooing her out of the photos.

She looked so pretty in this photo, though. I think plaid and labs go together like peanut butter and jelly.

Next week, I will write more about the additional details of this project including the photos on the wall, the scavenged mirror, and our $10 dresser-turned-sideboard. We still have to finish painting before we can call this project a wrap, but we are definitely in the home stretch.

Please make sure to visit the One Room Challenge™ featured designer posts from yesterday, and the other guest participant posts. The guest participant posts are my favorite weekend reading. Enjoy!

This post is also linked on Thoughts of Home on Thursday. Don’t miss Laura’s adorable Little House on the Prairie Halloween costumes that she made for herself and her husband.

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This is my favorite industrial stapler. It works perfectly for smaller hands. The reverse handle design prevents fatigue and is easier to use for overhead applications.