Chair Revealio!

I finally finished! My flatmates old chair that she found on the side of the road has been re-upholstered and looks AWESOME! (if I can say that)

Wanna see it?

TA-DA!

So inviting!

Her best side

Or this side might be her best side

Her back-side (tehe)

What do you think?

Later on when I have a bit more spare time I will do a more detailed how-to post.

But for now, enjoy her new look!

Quilling

I am a lover of Pinterest - the site where you can get inspiration for anything. I recently stumbled on this cool blog The Sweet Spot who gives a tutorial on my latest crafty escapade.

Quilling.
The art of rolling strips of paper into shapes and turning it into a masterpiece (well that is my definition). It has been around for years and is mostly used for card making or scrapbooking. But I like it as a work of art in itself.

My strips of paper, my swirly collection and my skewer

I went out and bought some coloured paper and started cutting it into strips. I dug out a kebab skewer to use as my 'roller' and used tape to join ends together. I started doing the shapes in the tutorial but got bored and decided to make my own work of art.

I started with the two large swirls that make the heart shape - there are 3 strips of paper in each one to give a bit of interest -  then made heaps of teardrops in different colours. To glue them onto the canvas I used PVA glue which I brushed on with a paintbrush.

The side view. Ignore the tape strips, next time I will glue them

The next thing I attempted was slightly more abstract. A bird. Based on a swallow painting I did a while ago I followed the basic structure with swirls and teardrops. I started with just red strips and added the yellow afterward.

Haha later on at night I added the yellow, thats why the lighting changed

The canvases I have are quite small so the next quilling project I do I want to be on a bigger canvas and I want to use blues, greens and purples.

This is a project that takes a lot more time than you think. It is definitely something to chip away at but I love the end result so the time is worth it.

One day I will do a revealio of my next quilling project but don't expect it to be for a while, other things have grabbed my crafty attention.

Oh and by the way I have added a subscription link at the top right of this page that will allow you to get my blog posts by email if you so desire. Or you can link with an RSS feed if that is what you are into :)

My Collection

My little collection

So for a couple of years now I have been collecting these old ornate brass frames with silk pictures inside. It started as an idea that I could replace the picture with my own but that didn't seem to happen. 

Sitting Pretty

I LOVE Op-Shopping, These wee frames kept popping up at most shops I visited and at $0.50 - $2 a pop why not! All of a sudden my little collection became a large collection and I need some ideas!

Perhaps a good polish and my own photos added to create a whole wall of awesome?
Maybe a coat of spray paint?

A few of these graced my Christmas tree this year, they fitted with the theme of the tree nicely.

Dave managed to smuggle 3 of these frames away and re-purposed them to create a birthday gift for me last year - which I Love! The pictures are of me in a Trash the Dress photo shoot I did a couple of years ago.

So I am after ideas about what I can do to give these beauties a better life!
Comment away!

A Project Halfway & My Kitty

The last few days (alright its been a week, being on 'holiday' merges everything together) I have been attempting a super sneaky project for my old flatmate. She is currently away with family and will be back next weekend.

She found a cool old chair on the side of the road and went and bought some awesome fabric with a bright print to re-upholster it. After pulling off the back cover and about 50 staples she gave up for the moment. This was 2 months ago. Now it is definitely not my place to say anything about unfinished projects but after re-covering the dining chair and seeing how awesome it looked I thought I might give her one a go.

Now that chair probably had about 100000000 staples in it. My trusty multi-tool has withstood the punishment of prying staples out of wood. My hands have cuts and blisters, but it is now stripped to its bare bones and is ready and waiting for its new outfit.

This time I have mostly been taking photos so hopefully by the end of the week I can post my how-I-did-it with pictures!

My sewing machine is an old Globe beasty and overheated slightly after a days worth of sewing but giving her a rest for a couple of hours seemed to do the trick. I had to teach myself how to sew in the piping/edging and it seems to look alright.

I can't wait to show you guys, and my flattie, the finished product, it is definitely something I will attempt again but I definitely need a good chunk of free time to do it in.

On another note, Christchurch has been having epic sunsets lately and when I went out the other night to take some photos Killer (my cat) followed me out and sat in the driveway as if she was posing for me. So cute!

A new lease on life - A chair recovered

A couple of days ago I went for a trip to this awesome recycling shop in Christchurch - The Eco Shop and found an old dining chair that had really nice wood but was in dire need of recovering. Luckily I had some spare fabric lying around for such a purpose as this.

After taking the screws out

After making sure I had enough fabric I started unscrewing the fabric pads from the chair frame. Then came the fun part, removing ALL the staples holding the fabric to the foam covered boards. I used my multi-tool with its flathead screwdriver attachment to pry the staples up and then needle nosed pliers to pull them out. After removing the black cover layer in the photo below I figured I might as well just put my new fabric right on top of the old stuff. 

The black cover material hiding all the foam and frame

I cut my fabric to size and got my staple gun out. I started with the seat pad which was mostly square and all straight edges. I stapled the first edge and then enlisted the help of my wonderful hubby. Staple guns are HARD to use! My poor hand! I pulled the fabric tight and he stapled. The only tricky parts were the corners, the fabric has to be folded just so to make it look neat.

Once the four sides were stapled I put the black cover material back on to hide the edges I just stapled. This is on the underside of the chair so no one will really see it anyway. 

Ready to be screwed back on

I screwed the finished base onto the chair using the original screws. Then I moved onto the top pad. The top and bottom of this pad are curved and the back will be seen so the edges needed to be on the sides. A Challenge! I decided to cut the fabric so there was a fold on one of the edges. This would be on one of the straight sides of the pad. I started stapling this side.

The next edges had to be done in two lots. Two rows of staples needed to go on each edge with the fabric joined in the middle. I forget to take a photo of this step so I'll just try and blab my way through it. So, straight edges first, then the top. With Dave still lending a helping hand, he helped me stretch, pleat and staple around the curves. The bottom was next and same deal there. The next step was to trim back the excess fabric as short as possible and fit the finished product together.

There was a small piece of wood slotted into the top edge of the chair which fitted into the top of the pad to make the chair sturdy and not just rely on the screws. Dave used a craft knife to cut through the fabric to make the slot for the bit of wood. We pushed it into place and screwed it into the frame.

All put together

My kitty Killer trying it out

The back view

Finished! That's all there was to it! All up it took about 2.5 hours and I think next time I could definitely cut that time down.

I'm now on the look out for a whole set of chairs and some awesome fabric to make a whole set. Can't wait!

A (belated) Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

There is nothing like Christmas. After so much stress from everyone rushing round present hunting, winding down from work, trying to get the all-important Christmas Dinner sorted, it is so nice to actually have Christmas Day. Where no shops are open, there is no need to leave the house and you can just spend time with family and eat until the button pops on your jeans (or if you are smart, you wear leggings or a dress for maximum comfort levels).

From left- Me, Dave, Dave's Mum & Dad, Dave's Sis and her new hubby

               

This year I was in Timaru with my hubbys family. We had a new addition this year, Dave's sister got married! So this year there was 6 of us and it was great. My favourite part about the Chiles family Christmas is after we have finished opening presents we go off down the garden to pick peas. Then we all sit on the floor with a scrap bucket and a bowl and collect fresh peas for Christmas lunch. Every year! What a great tradition to have. We don't have kids yet but a few of my friends have had wee ones this year so I spent Christmas thinking about what sort of traditions I want to have when our family grows.

This year we also played petanque and quiotts (sp?) on the front lawn and boy was that fun! I think we all learned why we aren't sporty people!

This year we went hunting for boxing day bargains (probably another tradition to add)
The best part is when Christmas decorations get marked down to clear. We spotted a black Christmas tree at 70% off and decided on red and silver decorations to match. Dave and I have a weird obsession with the colours red, black and white, they were our wedding colours and are a winning combo in our books.  So this was perfect. Next on the list was an angel to go on top. A proper angel, not just a star. This proved harder to find but we got one. She will be proudly on top of our tree for years to come.
Since the only flaw to our plan was that Christmas was already over and there was no need for a tree, we travelled home and put it up. It stood proud in our flat until New Years Day.

So Pretty!

                          

So I'm claiming this tree as my crafty adventure this time around. I hope you enjoy Christmas as much as I do!