Recovered Dining Chairs

Thanksgiving was a couple days ago and we were so excited to utilize our newly updated formal dining area.  I am so happy that this random series of events has allowed us to bring a fresh look to our dining areas.  Today in the series, I am sharing our newly reupholstered dining chairs.

Last week I shared our new kitchen dining chairs, the leather parsons chairs.  Oh how I love them.  However, I recently fell back in love with our larger, formal dining table too!  The upholstered seats were boring, uninspired and nasty dirty.  Not anymore.

Over a year ago, I was perusing the mounds of fabric in my favorite local discount fabric store and came across this beautiful gray and white graphic upholstery fabric.  I literally scrounged through the mounds of fabric to find a couple of pieces that were reasonably good sized. 

The difficulty of the discount fabric store is they buy left-overs, end cuts, etc. so the pieces are generally not real large or can have damaged areas and flaws.  Any piece under 2 yards you must take the entire piece.  I didn't care because I payed $3.99 a yard for this designer fabric that is available at Jo Ann's for almost $30 a yard.  I was ecstatic.

While I have wanted to redo these chairs for quite some time, I feared ruining this beautiful fabric since we were still using these chairs on a daily basis.  Now that we were moving these back to the formal dining room, I was free to proceed.

Here is the dining table before.  As you can see, the fabric on the chairs was neutral and uninspiring.  (Never mind that it was snagged, stained and disgusting.)

And now with the beautiful new chair covers.  The subtle print and neutral gray brings some character and style to the seats.

I am absolutely loving the chairs. The table itself got small makeover too.  In our previous home, this was our only table and we used it everyday.  The finish was beginning to look dull and scratched.  After cleaning it thoroughly to remove any grease or food residue I used a 220 grit sandpaper and gave the top a very light sanding.  I followed this up with a couple of layers of fresh polyurethane.  I then declared this table off limits for a week in order to make sure that the finish had plenty of time to cure.  This simple one day project gave the table a bright and beautiful new life.

Finally, in order to add some accent to the head chairs, I made a simple lumbar pillow out a gray velvet I bought at the same time I bought the chair fabric.  With an elegant silver fringe, the pillows add a touch of glam.

Come back later this week when I share my favorite addition to this room, a new sideboard that has undergone an amazing transformation in the past couple of weeks.

The Perfect Little Desk

Dilema #1: 
There is this awkward space to the left of our fireplace that most likely was designed to house a bookshelf to hold the components to your home theater system.  We have neither currently so it is just an odd looking space.

Dilema #2: 
Our kids are forever wanting to play on the computer.  However our desktop computer sits in the office at the front of the house.  We don't want the kids in there playing without being able to keep an eye on them.  So I have been contemplating how and where we could move the computer into the main room without it becoming a focal point (read: messy catchall area).  I love that we have the office space that can house my craft supplies and our home office "stuff".  Reality right now - the office is a storage room where boxes, papers and "stuff" goes to hide because the room has doors!

YIKES!!!

Solution:
The other day I stopped in to my favorite Goodwill store and found the PERFECT FIT!  There amongst the small furniture and other oversized items was a small, Mission style desk that I was convinced would fit into that awkward alcove to the left of our fireplace.  It Did!!!!  I also found a great, simple white chair to go witht he desk. And the the perfect spot to tuck away the computer for the kids was found.

Of course, a birch wood desk and a white chair do not quite go with the warm wood and earth tones in our home.  So I headed to the store, picked up a few cans of satin finish dark brown spray paint and got to work.  I originally thought I would put a glaze over the paint to give it some character but we actually love how it came out so no glaze was necessary.  I did, however finish the top with 3 layers of polyeurothane to further help protect the surface from the inevitable wear and tear it will receive from 2 young kids.

I want to wait a few more days for the finish to fully cure before we put the computer on the desk but I couldn't wait to share this with you.  The kids are so excited to have the computer out here in the main room and to be able to play their games.  This project has gotten me revved up to finish the two student desks I picked up last fall at this awesome flea market that one of the local churches holds.  These desks need a bit more "love" before they are ready for paint but I hope to finish them up this month.  They will love having their very own work spaces in their rooms.

Linked up with:

Tatertots and Jello

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