~the never-ending chair story~

Well friends, these chairs were a while in the making. Let me start at the beginning…

{this could be a longish post, grab a coffee}

Many years ago Mr RGV and I bought a handcrafted wooden farmtable and chairs. They have stood up to multiple moves and family dinners, but one by one the chairs were falling apart, literally. It was time to replace the chairs.

But new chairs are very, very expensive, and I’m not overly fond of new furniture anyways. So began the search, I had a budget of $100 and I wanted Queen Anne style chairs. Solid wood with tall backs and shapely legs.

Easy right? Not really, I found plenty on craiglist and such but they were either way overpriced or sold with the table, which we did not need.

Finally, finally around 18 months ago (yes really!) I found a set of four chairs while out treasure hunting one day with my friend Janis, they were $24.99 each. Even better, they were reduced to half price. $12.99 each. 

Perfect. Well within the budget. They started out looking like this:

Good solid bones, shouldn’t take long. Only I had never actually completely refinished chairs before!

First step was sanding, BIG job, and I couldn’t figure out how to get the seats off them so eventually just pulled them off. BIG MISTAKE! In the process I basically stripped the screws right out the wood and wrecked the bases.

Soooo, Mr RGV decided we needed new wooden bases and kindly cut them for me. Then when I removed the fabric to reuse the foam cushions, the foam disintegrated into powder. So then I had to get new foam cut. My budget chairs were starting to get expensive.

Then on a whim I decided to use oil based paint, what a nightmare (this was before ASCP hit our shores, my BFF). Just my opinion and I know oil based paint has it’s place, but honestly it took forever to dry between coats and ruined my brushes. You get the picture. Now me and ASCP, we get along just fine!

Anyway, you get the picture, lots of work and extra steps along the way. To be honest around this stage they kinda got put on hold, the staple gun wasn’t holding the fabric and I was about done with the chairs. 

Only problem was we were down to 3 of the originals, the situation was dire! I’d already pulled the bench in from the hallway and pretty soon we’d be perched on the floor!

So finally Mr RGV bought me a new staple gun, we upholstered them with a layer of osnaburg covered with a layer of burlap, so they’ll be easy and inexpensive to recover.

Now I totally love them! They have that classic french country look I was after and I love the touch the ruffles and ties give. 

I ordered these awesome chair covers from Paula and Erika's etsy store {Check out their store, the quality of their work is awesome and their pricing very reasonable.}

Don’t they look fab!! Now if Mr RGV would just agree to me painting the table legs white it would be perfect, don’t you think….

I’m sure we’ve all had projects we start that become larger than life and we just have to walk away for a while. It was so worth finishing this one up! Plus now we don’t have to sit on the floor to eat dinner!!

Hope you enjoyed the never-ending chair story!!

linking up to Feathered Nest Friday 
Nifty Thrifty Tuesday 
Furniture Feature Friday 
Show and Tell Friday
Frugal Friday
Piece of work Wednesday furniture

Tracey