Up-cycled Chair Take 2

Finally one of the three old wooden chairs I have been carting around for months on end has been up-cycled for use in my sewing room.  The hubby is very happy to see one less old chair sitting in his garage.  He threatens to dispose of them each time he visits the dump.

I have done one before, the previous post is here, and I basically followed the same instructions except this time I primed the chair twice before painting.

It started off rather humble.

I love the finished result.  Now I just need to finish the sewing room.

DIY Lego Table

What Lego loving child doesn't need one of these?  Or their Lego loving parents for that matter?...  I saw a small DIY Lego table on Pinterest (here) a while back and knew something like this would get used ALOT in my house.  Of course with 3 children I needed something bigger though.  I had an old laminate coffee table that I brought when I first went flatting too many years ago to count now.  I was planning on giving it away.  I am so glad of my hoarding issues sometimes, as it was perfect for this project.  The kids are loving it, and I hope it solves my problem of having Lego spread in all corners of my house.

Want to make your own? You will need:

• An old coffee table
• Sandpaper or a sanding mouse
• Filling putty (if you are fussy)
• Primer (talk to your paint specialist about the table you are using and they will let you know what you need)
• Paint
• Paintbrush
• Lego mats
• Glue (I just used liberal amounts of PVA)

So my humble old coffee table started its life like this.

I didn't take photos of the process, but its really simple.

Being a laminate table,  I brought a special primer for glossy surfaces.  If your table is laminate you must use the correct primer.  Using the right primer there is no need to sand down the laminate surface (unless your husband intervenes like mine did).

I applied two coats of primer, giving it a light sand between coats.  Read and follow the instructions on your primer on drying times etc.

I then gave it its first coat of paint.  This is when my darling hubby came along and intervened.  There were a few small bubbles on the surface of the table where over the years its had things spilt on it and the MDF underneath had expanded.  I figured these were not bad enough to worry about and would be under the Lego mat anyway, but the hubby had different ideas. 

He chiseled them off, sanded them back, put putty in them and then totally re sanded the whole surface till flat. 

Back to me again.  I then gave it two more coats of paint, again giving it a light sand between coats.  And again read your paint instructions on drying time.

Once it was fully dry, I measured and positioned my Lego mats onto the table, applied masses of glue and glued them on.  I piled heavy books onto the mats and left it to dry overnight.

It was really simple to make.  The only time consuming thing was waiting for the paint to dry overnight between coats.

5 Minute T Shirt Upgrade

$3 Kmart T Shirt plus a 20cent silver doily from the Salvation Army.  5 minutes of handsewing.  Magic. 

Chair Upcycle

One day, when I am even more grown up, I am going to have a beautiful sewing room.  And in it is going to be lots of pretty girl things - including the sewing chair I just rehashed!  This was a bit of a nightmare from the beginning and I am sure this chair was determined to stay just as it was!  Here she is before.

I brought it for $15 off Trade Me.  I had a $5 bid on it right up until pretty much the last 4 minutes, when someone came in and put a one off $14 bid on it.  I was suspicious this could be a price hiker but what do you do?  I wanted it, I paid more for it than I wanted, but I liked it!

So getting it home I gave it a sand back.  I wasn't sure how far back I was to go, and being a bit over it after half an hour figured I had done enough haha.  I started with quite a rough sandpaper, and then finished over it with a very fine one.  Technical huh.  Hubby then came along and being the perfectionist he is he attacked it and smoothed out the grooves I hadn't.  Too lazy?  Or just giving the chair character?  You decide.

So after giving it a good brush over, it was time to paint.  I had specially gone to see a Dulux Paint Specialist to ensure I got the right paint, as wanted it to be as near perfect as possible.  After having a major discussion with the guy about how it has to be an oil based paint and why, and choosing my shade from 40 different shades of cream, I had my perfect paint.

I gave it its first coat, and had my suspicions something was up with the paint.  It was soaking into the wood.   He had assured me I didn't need to primer it if I was using an oil based paint.  Hubby came home and asked me why I was painting my chair with a water based paint.  Water based!!!  He sold me water based!  After all that ... oh well, mistakes happen I guess.  I wasn't to know, paint is paint to me!

I left it to dry, sanded it back again and gave it another coat.

It still looked shocking, so again I gave it a light sand and gave it its third paint.  This time it looked OK!  I left it to dry, and while doing this Mr 4 year old decided it needed some dirty finger marks on the top.  I was well over the painting etc by now, so decided this was yet another character mark.  Haha lazy or giving the chair character?  Again, you decide!

While this was drying I attacked the cushion, ripping off the nasty brown vinyl.  I wanted to give it a bit of extra padding so cut some quilt batting out as extra bum wadding.  I figure as my sewing chair its going to have alot of bum time so deserves to be extra comfy!!

I then cut out my fabric, using the brown vinyl as my guideline, but cutting extra to take into account the extra wadding I had added.

So then it was time to use my trusty staple gun and secure down the material.  First the staple gun jammed after the first use.  I unjammed it, went to use it again and it jammed.  On trying to unjam it I broke it.  It was well and truely stuck now.  Hubby came to my rescue and fixed it.  And on the first go I jammed it again.  By now I was in a wee huff and again hubby came to my rescue by giving me his industrial gun to use.  I had to promise him not to to shoot anything with it in fustration though.  So great, I was in action again, but found out I didn't have the strength to get the huge staples in.  So had to go around afterwards and bang them in properly with a hammer.  But they were in and the chair was complete.

I am not sure I am 100% happy with it.  Am still considering giving it that shabby chic, distressed look and attacking it with some sandpaper.  Maybe.  I am going to stare at it for a few days and see how I feel.  But all in all, for a first attempt, I think it passes.  Now to work on getting a sewing room so the chair has somewhere to live ....

Upcycled Denim Pinafore

 

I love denim pinafores on little girls and have been waiting for the denim in Spotlight to come on sale, as at $18- $24 a metre its a bit pricey for me.  It did, but they only had black left and I wanted blue ... Murphys Law!  So decided to buy a pre-loved denim skirt for $6 and upcycle it into a baby dress. 

I love the finished product.  It only took me an hour or so to whip up and I love the idea of upcycling so much I am going to try some other projects.  My photo quality below is poor - I do alot of my sewing at nighttime when the children are in bed, that combined with the fact my camera is on a slow decline to the rubbish pile makes for not great photos.  Here is how I did it.

You need one skirt, 1 x metre of lining (depending on size - I made a size 1), buttons and matching thread.

Firstly cut down a side seam of the skirt to open it up.

Fold along centre seam (or just centre) of the front panel of the skirt,with right sides facing, and pin and cut out the front of you dress (on the fold).  You can copy off a pinafore dress you already have - or there are lots of free pdf's on the internet for pinafore dresses - just google it and you should find one.

Then do the same with the back panel of the skirt to cut out the back piece of your dress pattern.

Then cut out your lining, back and front.

Next you are going to pin the denim together, right sides facing, and do the same for the lining.

Sew along each side seam and once finished press out your seams with an iron.

Slip your lining into the denim dress with right sides facing together.

And pin the lining and dress together along the straps and underarms, matching the straps etc together.

Sew around the whole top piece.  Once sewn trim close to your seam and notch the arm hole edges.

Turn dress right way out and iron.  Now you are doing to sew around the top of the dress to give a nice flat finish.  See picture.

Then its time to put the buttons on.  Use the button function of your sewing machine.

Then hem along the bottom (I folded twice) and sew.

And there you have it.  You can embellish it anyway you want.