Monthly Archives: March 2012

Alternate Universe Girl Nursery

Posted on March 30, 2012 | 9 Comments

I started thinking of ideas for Jack’s nursery well before we found out whether it was a boy or a girl. If I’m being totally honest, I had a few ideas swimming around in my head before I even knew for sure that I was pregnant. So, of course, I had as many, if not more, plans for a girl’s nursery as I did for a boy. Here’s what I would have done if we’d found out we had a little girl on the way:

  1. Jenny Lind crib - $170
  2. DIY Tissue Paper Poufs (tutorial from Martha Stewart)
  3. Benjamin Moore Classic Gray
  4. Summer Infant Contoured Changing Pad - $16
  5. Secondhand dresser painted coral pink (image from here)
  6. Bentwood Rocker - $15 secondhand (image from here)
  7. Anthropologie Rose Landscape Shade - $98 (I would try to DIY something similar for less)
  8. Z Gallerie Lemon Gelato Frames 
  9. Yellow Suzani Pillow Cover from Etsy - $19
  10. Waverly Modern Essentials Fabric, Fun Floret in Licorice - $12/yd

A lot of things would have been pretty similar, with the exception of all the PINK. I’ve been dying to paint something a perfect shade of orangey pink for months and months and a little girl’s room would have been the perfect opportunity. Yellow is kind of my favorite color of the year and I love it paired with coral and gray. So pretty. And those poufs! I made a bunch once for a bridal shower and they were super easy. A collection of them in similar shades would be beautiful hanging above the crib, but it just seemed a little too girly for me to carry the idea into Jack’s room. I’d bring more punches of coral and yellow in with fabrics and accessories, but just like In Jack’s room I’d avoid anything too obviously baby-fied so that the room could more easily keep up with the times (I’ve heard they grow up fast).

Nick and I definitely plan on having more kids, so maybe I’ll get to put this plan into action someday. For now, I’m totally thrilled about the little man scheduled to arrive in about 14 weeks (and believe me, I’m counting them down). If you missed it before, you can check out my plans for his room here. Now, to actually get started…

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Posted in baby, Nursery, Window Shopping

A Day in the Life

Posted on March 28, 2012 | 12 Comments

I’m always fascinated when other bloggers write about what a typical day looks like for them. What with my dearth of projects this week, it seems like a fitting time to share mine. My day job has very little to do with my blog other than motivating me to take up some sort of creative outlet to cope with the emotional demands, but it’s such a big part of who I am that I didn’t want to just gloss over it by writing 8-5: work. For those who are unsure, I have a master’s in social work and I provide counseling to kids in the community. I work for a private agency and our services are funded by Medicaid. Let the day begin.

7:00 wake up. I’ve been kind of in and out of sleep for a few hours because I couldn’t get comfortable, but of course now that it’s time to get up I’m perfectly snug and wishing I could stay. I decide to lay in bed for another 20 minutes or so on the condition that I use the time to put the finishing touches on the morning’s blog post using the Wordpress app on my phone. Nick is always chipper in the morning so he’s up getting dressed and making jokes while I’m still groggy. He leaves for work before I’m even out of bed.

7:30ish Get up, get dressed, head downstairs. I scarf down a spoonful of peanut butter for my morning protein. I usually have protein bars on hand to eat in the mornings but I’m currently out.

7:45 Say bye to the pets (Juliet is particularly pathetic when I leave) and head out the door.

8:00-9:15 Weekly meeting with the other two workers on my “team” at work. I’m the team leader so I’m in charge of coordinating our caseloads and some other administrative stuff, but I’m not the boss or anything. The weekly meeting is a nice time to debrief what’s been going on with our clients and-bonus-when I walk in the awesome baristas already have my bagel and cream cheese waiting on the counter and are almost done mixing up the special not-on-the-menu juice concoction they sweetly allow me to order every time (to any locals, the CC’s on Airline at Bluebonnet has the BEST staff).

9:30-10 I make my way out to the neighboring parish where I spend most of my days. I’m feeling a little funky so I stop and grab a protein bar from a gas station. I get a call on the way letting me know there’s a situation with one of my clients I have scheduled for later today. Ugh.

10-11:30 My first session of the day. This one is with a little girl who’s homeschooled. We play UNO and talk about treating others as we’d like to be treated. She follows me out to my car when I leave to give me a hug and beg for one of my special pencils.

11:30-12:30 I drive right up the road to meet my boss at a middle school. I’ve been out of grad school almost three years and will be eligible for licensure soon, so she wants to observe me in a session before she signs off that I’m ready. We meet with a teenage girl and talk about negotiating compromises.The session ends earlier than I expected because apparently the school is on a weird schedule today (I’m only allowed to keep kids from class during PE or elective periods). Afterwards my boss gives me some good tips on asking more open ended questions and I take the opportunity to ask her about that situation I got a call about earlier. As always she is full of wisdom.

12:30-1 I drive to another part of town and grab a quick burger before my next session. One perk of pregnancy is feeling less guilty about this sort of meal than I used to in my calorie-counting days. It’s full of protein and iron and much more substantial than anything I could pack for myself to eat on the road.

1-2 I pick up a parent who doesn’t have her own transportation and drive her to the middle school her child attends so we can talk to the school counselor together. On the ride back home we have a good talk and she shares some things she’s never told me before.

2-2:30 I show up at the primary school where I have five clients because there’s one kindergartener I really wanted to pop in on, but when I get there I realize they had early dismissal today and the kids are all gone. I do run into the school disciplinarian though, and he pulls me into his office for a few minutes to talk about a fifth grader that I see. I figure at least my trip to that school wasn’t a total waste. I’ll be back there all day tomorrow.

2:30-4:30 I head to what ends up being my last session of the day (with a teenager and her parents). I’d had another teen scheduled for 4, but I think this one’s going to be a doozy and will probably run late so I call my other client to reschedule. The session was worse than I’d anticipated. I got yelled at a lot. I was really glad I’d talked to my boss about this case earlier so I could feel confident in my response. Thankfully, the situation seems to be stabilized by the time that I leave.

4:30-5 I spent the whole car ride home calling various folks I work with to update them on the situation (including my boss, who asked that I keep her posted)

5-6 I get home, let the dog out, and make one more call to check in with the client I’d rescheduled. I feel guilty for not hopping on the computer to enter my notes into the new electronic billing system, but I’m sick of work for today do I decide to do it first thing tomorrow. Nick gets home a little earlier than usual and I help him prep dinner (meatloaf muffins and roasted potatoes. Delish). Pistachio starts throwing up her food while dinner is cooking, but she seems to be in a good mood so we don’t worry too much. A little while later she tries to eat again and throws up again, so we google it and decide to pick up her food bowl for the night so she doesn’t dehydrate herself. We’ll give her breakfast tomorrow and if she’s thrown up when we get home from work we’ll take her to the vet (they take walk-in’s until 8pm).

6-7 we eat dinner on the sofa and watch CSI: Miami on DVR

7-8 I still can’t bring myself to work on the computer, so I draft this blog post on my phone while lying on the couch and watching Netflix’d episodes of Saved By The Bell with Nicholas.

8-9 I drag myself upstairs and take a bubble bath, then climb into bed. I read blogs on my phone for a few minutes before drifting off to sleep. I require a solid ten hours a night so I’m out pretty quick.

No day is ever the same for me. Sometimes I start or end earlier or later. I almost never help with dinner. I usually spend more time blogging. Sometimes I have orders to ship out. And I don’t always get a bath before bed (although that is my goal since it helps me relax and, you know, cleanliness is important). Today I won’t leave the house until 8:45 but I probably won’t be home until after 6, then my friend Cassie is coming over to visit for a little bit. I used to have a job where I had to report to the office every day at 8am and I hated it. I really prefer the flexibility this job offers (even though it does mean doing more work at home). And although some days my blog and my shop just seem like more work piled on, having those creative endeavors in my life really does help me stay happier.

Thanks for reading. I hope I haven’t bored you to death with the minutia of my daily life. If only I could tell you more about my clients! Now THAT would be fascinating!

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Posted in On a Personal Note...

My Hopes and Dreams for the Kitchen

Posted on March 27, 2012 | 4 Comments

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, although I’m extremely happy overall with the kitchen we inherited when we bought our home there are lots of little things I’d like to change. And I’m not a picky person. I don’t mind at all the mismatched old and new cabinets-adds character, I say. The biggest beefs I have with this space are functional.

Exhibit A: Why are there no upper cabinets on this side of the kitchen?

I really want to add some attractive storage on either side of the range hood. I was thinking cabinets for a long time, but the more I think about it open shelving seems like an easier option. I could DIY it and easily customize the length to fit the space available. I’m digging the look of these, from Young House Love.

But I think I like the bracket style of these shelves better (from Pure Style Home). And that beadboard is pretty amazing, too.

Also on my list of complaints for this area of the kitchen is the range hood. I like the way the big metal cover looks (although it could use a good scrubbing and a few coats of paint), but the vent inside has seen better days. It doesn’t really even work at all, just makes a bunch of noise. I don’t know how to go about replacing it, though. Do I just buy a new vent and mount it up inside there?

Exhibit B for the case against this kitchen’s lack of function: the lighting. This is the only light fixture in the room. Lots of people come over and oooh and ahhh over the fact that it appears to have been designed to double as a pot rack. The only problem with that is that it hangs smack dab in the middle of the room, as opposed to over a counter or island, and even our nine foot ceilings are not tall enough for us to be able to hang pots from it and still walk underneath. Well, I could walk under it, since I’m only 5′ tall, but anyone closer to Nick’s height would have some serious problems.

The other issue with it is that it is always behind me when I’m working, casting the area in front of me in shadow. I get so sick of prepping meals in shadow. That’s my excuse for why I make Nick do all the cooking these days. I’d like to move it to hang over the section of counter I’m about to talk about in my next point and maybe add recessed lighting spread throughout the room for better lighting overall.

And third in my list of stupid things: this.

I think the official name for it is a pass-through. I hate it. It’s better than having a solid wall there, but not by much. If I had unlimited funds I would call a structural engineer right this minute and get that wall knocked down ASAP. I have dreams of someday opening it up and adding a bar overhang to make it a bona fide breakfast area. Check out my very, very rough mockup below.

Doesn’t it make so much more sense? The kitchen feels bigger already just looking at it. Unfortunately, it’s not exactly the kind of project Nick and I can tackle ourselves over a weekend, or even feel comfortable hiring a handyman to do. We need someone professional to come out and determine if it’s structurally safe to take that wall out and make sure it’s done right. Can’t have the house falling down on our little family. And when I think “professional,” I think, “expensive.” How much would a structural engineer charge for something like this?

So that’s my list of complaints, in order of most simple to remedy to most difficult. What would you do if this were your house? Would you just leave well enough alone, or chip away little by little at turning an okay kitchen into a really nice one? Would you knock out that wall? I don’t know if I’ll ever be brave or rich enough to do it, but a girl can dream.

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Posted in Kitchen, Projects, Renovating, Wishing & Hoping

A Dilemma

Posted on March 26, 2012 | 3 Comments

Happy Monday, lovely readers! Did you have a nice weekend? I spent most of mine laying in bed trying to get well. I keep getting sick and let me just tell you, I am so over it. I hate missing work just to lay there and do nothing. The good news, though, is that all that R&R seems to have paid off. It’s Monday morning and, although I’ve still got a little cough and a bit of nasal congestion, I’m ready to get back in the saddle of real life.

A weekend of rest is generally followed by a week of boring blog posts (as indicated by my entire first trimester), but I do have a few things I’ve been meaning to write about so we’ll see how it goes. Today I want to share with you a little dilemma that’s been rattling around in my brain for months.

When we bought our house one of the big selling points for us was that the kitchen had been updated relatively recently. It’s waaaay too messy after pretty much three weeks straight of being sick to take any wide angle shots, so here are some older pics borrowed from our house tour page.

Overall, I’m really happy with this kitchen. There are lots of little things I’d like to change, but that topic deserves a post all its own. One thing I thought I could do to bring a little bit more of my own style into it is to change out the hardware. And one day at Lowe’s I bought these cup pulls on a whim. There are only five drawers in the whole room so it seemed like a cheap and easy upgrade.

I came home so excited to switch them out, but quickly realized that would be easier said then done. One thing I didn’t take into account whilst impulsively sweeping those lovely cup pulls into my arms as I pranced down the fantasy-ridden aisles of Lowe’s is that maybe the new hardware would not match up perfectly with the old. Uh-oh.

And you may not have noticed, but some of the cabinetry in our kitchen is new and some appears to be original. In the image below, the cabinets on the left are new and the ones on the right are definitely not.

My problem is twofold:

  1. The new hardware requires new holes
  2. The new cabinets and drawer fronts are not solid wood

I don’t know what they’re made of. I guess particle board with melamine or whatever is the standard composition for inexpensive cabinets these days. I do know that I’m scared to drill into it. How do I prevent the smooth surface from cracking? And, although I think the new hardware will hide the existing holes should I choose to just leave them, what if do end up needing to fill a hole to hide it? Will regular ‘ol wood filler and a few coats of white paint do the trick? I’m really scared of messing it up and having to replace the drawer fronts altogether.

This is scary stuff for a gal like me. Any advice?

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Posted in Kitchen, Projects

Because Bare Arms are So Not in This Season

Posted on March 23, 2012 | 2 Comments

I’ve been slowly tuckering away at the wing chairs. Last week I fixed the back of Chair #1, but the front of the arms were still nekked. Not a good look for them.

I got started by deconstructing the pieces I’d pried off the fronts. I’d already gotten started by removing the piping from both and recovering one with the new fabric back when I was working on the wing chairs every weekend last fall.

To remove the fabric from the other one, I just used a flathead screwdriver to pry each staple out. A pair of pliers worked perfectly for grabbing any particularly stubborn ones.

Here’s what it looks like with the fabric removed. Just a strip of cardboard with nails sticking out the back and a thick layer of batting along the front.

I used the old fabric as a template for cutting the new stuff. I just traced it with a sharpie and then cut along the lines.

Then I laid my new fabric out flat with the piece to be covered lined up on top of it.

And started stapling in important places, like in the center and at each end. The staples don’t come through the front thanks to the thick batting.

I kept on stapling until the fabric was smooth and taut across the whole thing, and in no time at all I had two pieces ready to be piped.

I’m really proud of this piping. I made it myself. I’m hoping to post about it soon, once I make some more for the seat cushions and take pictures of the process.

The old piping was attached with staples, but I’ve decided that hot glue is my new go-to resource for upholstery so I used that instead. I just ran a line of hot glue right along the line of stitching and then pressed it to the back of the arm cover.

See? Easy peasy.

Once I’d made my way all the way around I cut each end at an angle and tucked them into each other, creating what I hope is a rather inconspicuous transition.

Ta-da! In no time at all I had two piped pieces. The piping helps beef them up a bit and makes them look more finished, plus the extra width helps cover more of the ugliness at the front of the arms.

Here’s the view from the back. I was kind of nervous about reattaching them because of the crazy nails sticking out. I was pretty sure I wouldn’t be able to get all those nails back into their original holes just so, and even if I did they wouldn’t hold.

I decided to give it a try, though, and figured if it didn’t work I could move onto trying to hammer the nails down flat or cutting them off or something. But I was thrilled to find that once I got the very bottom nail shimmied into its original hole the rest of them lined up perfectly. As I’d expected, however, the nails didn’t do a good job of holding the piece tightly against the chair and there was a visible gap in some areas.

So I broke out my glue gun again and just ran a line of glue all along the edge, pressing the piping down toward the chair to create a nice, smooth look.

And just like that, all those staples I used to attach the fabric at the front of the arms are covered.

It’s obviously not perfect, but I’m pretty impressed with my self-taught rookie upholstery skills. And it’s definitely an improvement over the original mauve velvet that was so old it actually smelled of dust.

Can you believe that this chair is finally ABC (all but the cushion)? And even the cushion cover is halfway done. All I have to do is attach the bottom piece and a zipper at the back. And lucky for me someone offered to help me with the cushions after I wrote a post whining about how I was so scared of teaching myself to sew a zipper. After that I’ve just got to tackle the back and arm covers on Chair #2 and this whole dang project will be DONE. I’ll be so excited to have it behind me! No more feeling embarrassed when people come over and eye my Frankenstein chairs suspiciously.

I hope you each have a wonderful weekend! I’ve come down with my second cold of the month and this time it’s accompanied by a fever, so I’m stuck in bed all day today to rest and hopefully get better before the entire weekend goes down the drain. My plan is to sleep, sleep, and drink lots of fluids.

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Posted in Crafty Goodness, Living Room, Projects

Random

Posted on March 22, 2012 | 4 Comments

I had a post lined up for this morning, with pictures and everything. It was about the wing chairs. But the various forces of pregnancy, cold and flu season, technology, and full time employment seem to have conspired against me. So the wing chair update will have to wait. In its place, some random babbling.

I am so excited to see The Hunger Games this weekend. And if that’s wrong then I don’t wanna be right. I read all three books in record speed right after Christmas and was delighted. Nick is usually willing to come along with me to movies like this if there are enough action scenes to hold his interest and I kept telling him the whole time I was reading it, “You are going to LOVE this movie.” We always go to Sunday matinees to avoid the crowds and save a few bucks. Bonus: I can usually talk him into treating me to lunch while we’re out.

Guess what else! My little sister got engaged! She’s a very low key kinda gal and I wasn’t sure if she would even have a wedding party at all, so imagine my excitement when she called yesterday and said she’d decided to have one bridesmaid-me! I’m thrilled! They’re planning a casual rustic wedding for next February. I was in four weddings in one year (including my own) back in 2009-2010 so I consider myself sort of an expert bridesmaid. It’s been a while, though, so I’m excited to have a chance to do it all over again. And it’s my sister! I’m so excited!

Also on the agenda for this weekend is a morning full of classes at the hospital where I’ll be delivering (if you’re local you’ve probably already guessed that it’s Woman’s. Their Baby Grand event is on Saturday). We’ll be learning all about things like installing a car seat and keeping the cats from mauling the baby. Sounds like a blast.

For today, though, it’s back to work. Hopefully this evening I can get the kinks worked out in the post I had scheduled for today and it’ll be up for your viewing pleasure tomorrow. I hope this Thursday is sunnier in your neck of the woods than it is in mine!

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Posted in baby, On a Personal Note...

The Plan for Jack’s Room

Posted on March 21, 2012 | 11 Comments

I’ve been working on my plan for Jack’s nursery ever since we first found out we were expecting back in October, but until now it’s all been just in my head. Little by little it’s come together, and I finally feel like I’ve got a pretty good idea of where I want to go with it.

  1. Jenny Lind crib - $170
  2. DIY Ombre You Are My Sunshine Canvas
  3. Benjamin Moore Classic Gray
  4. Summer Infant Contoured Changing Pad - $16
  5. Double Dresser in True Blue - $1179 (!)
  6. Bentwood Rocker - $15 secondhand (image from here)
  7. Pier 1 Teal Honeycomb Lamp - $55
  8. Geometric Retro Cushion Cover - $25
  9. Schumacher Zenyatta Mondatta Peacock Fabric - $128 (!)

Some of these things I’m pretty set on, like the crib, wall art, and rocking chair. Others are just inspiration. I definitely want to have a low, wide dresser double as a changing table, but I will definitely not be shelling out 1200 bucks for the one pictured here. I hope to spend at least 1100 fewer dollars on something secondhand and then paint it navy blue. Same goes for that chevron fabric. At over $100/yd it will definitely be serving more of an inspirational role in the real-life nursery. I’ve already got the rocker, plus I’ll be moving in a wooden side table from the living room to hold books, burp cloths, a colorful lamp, and whatever else I need to keep close at hand while rocking and nursing.

The room currently has a basic light in the ceiling, but I’d like to install a ceiling fan for air circulation and white noise. I can’t decide, though, whether to get one with a light kit or not. The switch is really inconveniently located behind a door and I’ll probably be keeping the room rather dim at night anyway, so I’m tempted to do just-a-fan and keep it on all the time, using the lamp for light. All the fancy bloggers always talk about how fans with light kits are ugly and I guess they’ve gotten in my head a bit. When I imagine selling our house eventually, though, I picture buyers frowning at a fan with no light. And when I think about it, the fans with lights in the living room, office, and guest room don’t bother me in the least. Maybe because we have high ceilings? Decisions, decisions…And as for the daytime light situation, the room gets great natural light so I’m planning to whip up some DIY blackout shades to play a supporting role to the white muslin curtain panels already there. Shades up = awesome natural light. Shades down = naptime perfection.

There are a few things i haven’t totally figured out yet, like a mobile, additional wall art, and extra storage, but I’ve got lots of ideas and am really excited to get started! I’m also happy that the one upside of having four freaking months left of pregnancy is that I’ve got plenty of time to put the room together at my own pace. No last-minute scramble for this girl (hopefully). My plan is to start with the big stuff and then let the rest of the room sort of fall into place. Priority mission: find a dresser.

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Posted in baby, Nursery, Window Shopping, Wishing & Hoping

Easy Update: New Drawer Pulls

Posted on March 20, 2012 | 4 Comments

Back in October I picked up the saddest little desk I ever did see for twenty bucks at the Goodwill. I painted it green and made it my new sewing desk. (you can read all about it in this post)

Isn’t it adorbs? It’s perfect for sewing. All my little scraps and doodads are stashed in the drawers. I’ve been looking over at it a lot lately, though, and thinking about how the wood knobs I painted to match the rest of the piece are a little bo-ring. I considered switching them out. Then, when I stopped by Hobby Lobby yesterday and saw that their knobs and pulls were half off, I decided it was fate. So many to choose from, though. I was pretty tempted by these knobs wrapped in jute.

After much deliberation I decided they were too trendy and settled for these little lovelies instead. They felt much more timeless to me, which is the number one quality I look for when I’m unsure about a purchase. Trendy and quirky are great if I’m absolutely, positively sure that I’m in love, but if there’s any doubt whatsoever in my mind I always go for the more classic choice. Do you know how much I spent for four of these on sale? Ten dollars. Can’t beat that.

I used a flathead screwdriver to remove the bolts holding the old pulls to the drawers.

I realized pretty quickly, though, that it was not going to be that easy. Those knobs had been painted over a bunch of times and were stuck on there pretty good. I ended up having to use a box cutter to score the edge of each and then a hammer to knock the knob out of place. Nasty little rings of mismatched paint were left in their wake.

I went over each with some sandpaper. Just enough to smooth things out a bit.

Then, I gave each spot a few coats of leftover green paint. Oh, the wonders of flat paint. The freshly painted spots blended right in.

As soon as it had dried I put the new hardware on. Ta da!

Isn’t she pretty? Ignore all the clutter on either side. We’re still working on some storage and organization in this room, remember?

I think the new pulls are just charming. I love how the minty green color looks with the paint. If I’d tried to match a paint color to those knobs I probably would’ve gotten it all wrong, but the happy accident of picking out knobs in a store months later and having them complement the color so nicely is just gravy. Now I feel so fancy and smart every time I walk in the room. Maybe this will even encourage me to spend more time sewing? There’s a bunch of wing chair piping calling my name!

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Posted in Before & After, Crafty Goodness, family room/office, Projects

6(ish) Months Pregnant

Posted on March 19, 2012 | 6 Comments

I say six-ish months because it’s around this time that things start to get a little sketchy. I’m 24 weeks, 4 weeks to a month, you’d think that to be about six months, right? But when I say six months people tend to think that means I’ve only got three months left, and by a cruel twist of reality pregnancy is actually 40 weeks long. That means I’ve got 16 weeks left. And believe me when I say I’ve begun counting them down.

In the spirit of keeping it real, I’d like to go ahead and admit that pregnancy is much harder than I thought it would be. I was massively unprepared for the demands it would place on me physically and emotionally. I mean, I knew that the early weeks would bring some morning sickness and that I’d probably be pretty uncomfortable towards the end, but the internet led me to believe that the second trimester would be a breeze. Lies! I’ve had a lot of pain in my ribs (I guess due to my short torso), a couple of fainting spells, weakness and fatigue thanks to anemia, and lately the littlest thing can bring me to tears. But it’s all worth it. I’m feeling the little guy kick, punch, and roll around every day, and Nick even felt it for himself for the first time the morning that we took this picture. I work hard to keep a smile on my face and a positive attitude in my heart despite the things I’m struggling with because I know that in a few months all this will be a memory and I’ll have a whole new set of challenges to adjust to. Might as well embrace the chaos!

Also upping the positive vibes is the fact that we’ve picked a name!

I really wanted a simple, classic name, and since Jack is the nickname my PawPaw on my dad’s side has always gone by it seemed like a perfect choice. His middle name will be Bernard, which is Nick’s middle name (after his late grandfather on his dad’s side). It’s so nice to have a name picked out so we can talk about him like he’s a real person, and thankfully even though we’ve been sharing the name pretty openly with anyone who asks we haven’t had any regrets.

Baton Rouge’s annual St. Patrick’s Day parade ran through our neighborhood on Saturday. It’s a lot of fun and we consider ourselves very lucky to live so close to the route. I don’t have any green maternity tops, so I settled for a green camisole underneath and whipped up a green flower out of some scrap fabric to pin on my shoulder. Of course it all got obscured by beads anyway.

We were both clearly having awesome hair days, haha. Nick is overdue for a trim and my post-parade bangs left a lot to be desired, but I’ve been really wanting to get some casual pictures of Nick and me together while I’m pregnant so I didn’t even hesitate to ask a friend to snap this one with my phone after the last float rolled by.

24 weeks down, 16 to go! In the next few weeks I’ll probably start working on the nursery more and more. I’ve got big plans to paint it the first week in April and my eyes are peeled for a low, wide dresser to double as a changing table. Very exciting!

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Posted in baby, On a Personal Note...

Wing Chair Repair; The Good Enough Method

Posted on March 16, 2012 | 7 Comments

I tackled upholstering the back of this wing chair way back in September. It started falling apart pretty much right away, and by March was looking pretty pathetic.

The cats like to test all my furniture for quality construction, and they did an excellent job of revealing the deficits in my upholstery job.

What a mess. I wasn’t up for tearing it apart and starting all over, though , so I decided to take a few shortcuts just to get the thing looking presentable again. If you are the kind of person who prides themselves on doing things the right way you might want to avert your eyes. It ain’t gonna be pretty.

I repaired the area where batting was coming out of the wing with hot glue. I just pulled the fabric so that it laid properly, glued, and held it down firmly until it dried. Is it cat-proof? Only time will tell.

All of this was done under feline supervision, of course.

I had this whole side repaired in no time. It’s not perfect, but it’s a major improvement.

After that I just had to deal with the top. I removed the old curve-ease because it sucked. I made sure the fabric that came around from the front was neatly stapled down.

Then I cut a piece of cardboard (scavenged from the box of one of my many, many internet purchases).

I laid the chair down on top of the cardboard and used a sharpie to trace the curve along the top (being careful to not mark on my chair or my rug).

I could tell just from looking at it that my tracing left something to be desired. I mean, it obviously was not symmetrical. I went ahead and cut it out anyway. Then I trimmed the sides just a smidge so it would fit down underneath the fabric.

I slid it on in there, stapled it down, then trimmed the curve until it looked nice and even.

Then, I just folded the fabric down over the curved edge and glued. Easy peasy. Doesn’t it look so nice and neat? This was so much easier than battling that curve-ease the first time around.

I was feeling kind of on a roll so I went ahead and flipped the chair over and stapled down all the bottom pieces, then trimmed the excess to be nice and neat. If I wanted to I could cover the open area at the bottom with a piece of muslin or burlap, but it seemed unnecessary to me. This way I can hide letters to myself in the springs.

Ta-da! Look how much better it looks than when I started! Of course, I’m only showing you the back because the front is still a hot mess. I’m working on the little pieces that cover the fronts of the arms but they require piping and I hate piping like I hate staying up past midnight. It’s fine for other people, but just not for me.

It feels so good to get back to work on these chairs after a six month hiatus. It’s like I can feel the guilt melting away. Now I’ve just gotta keep the momentum going long enough to finish the front of this chair, tackle the front and back of the other one, and, scariest of all, whip up those cushion covers. I have never wished so hard in my life that a cushion would just be attached to the dang chair. At least each cushion is a nice square, though, and I don’t have to deal with any of that t-cushion nonsense. I’m going to try to keep this anti-procrastination-just-dive-in-and-get-it-done thing going this weekend. Let’s hope the St. Patty’s day parade rolling mere blocks from my house doesn’t throw too big of a wrench in my productivity! I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a spectacular St. Patty’s day!

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Posted in Crafty Goodness, How To, Living Room, Projects