little big chair.

when we were engaged tim's mom gave us a cool vintage chrome dinette table and a couple of unmatched chairs. i used it in the house i shared with a couple other girls and then after we got married and settled into our house, we fetched them.

one of the chairs had seen better days. it was fine comfort wise, but esthetically, it was gross. or more specifically, the seat was gross.


a couple of years ago, in a fit of random crafty energy, i took it apart, determined to recover it and make it presentable. when i was taking it apart, the bolts were really weird and i wasn't sure that i would ever be able to get them back together, so i abandoned the project. (i do things like this a lot.)so there it laid, disassembled, under my craft table for a couple years.

(i also wasn't very motivated to finish it because we didn't really need another chair. i don't like doing projects just for the sake of having a project, especially if it's going to cost me anything.)

in june i was cleaning out and decided that i needed to either finish the chair or just trash it.

spurred by my self imposed ultimatum, i went for it. i burrowed my dad's staple gun and went to town on the seat, using a thrifted sheet that hopefully had a busy enough print to hide wear on the fabric. fast and dirty is an appropriate description of my reupholstering style. seriously, looking at the underside of this chair makes me laugh.

i just went over the old fabric because i knew the stuffing of the chair would crumble if i took it off and i wasn't at all interested in having to buy new batting or stuffing.

once i finished the seat i decided to put the chair back together, that way, if the bolts wouldn't go in (the problem i suspected two years ago) and i had to pitch it, i wouldn't have wasted any more time on the backrest part of the chair. after trying to put the chair together for over 45 minutes, some swearing involved, i was about to throw it out the window. instead, i went to bed and asked tim to take a look at it on his next day off. he got it in less than 10 minutes. (score one in the "why i should keep him" category ; )

i hesitated on the backrest part of the chair for several weeks because i wasn't quite sure how to recover it. the way it had been done before looked a little more detailed (read: effort requiring). remember, i am a lazy, fast project crafter.

last sunday, i was in a cranky mood and i was tired of the unfinished chair sitting around so i went with the "i don't care how you turn out-i'm tired of looking at you" method.

i learned a pleasant thing about myself: i enjoy hand sewing. that's what i had been trying to avoid, but turns out, it's very peaceful and satisfying.


so i got the chair done. i feel like it turned out well, but honestly, just like i felt two years ago, i don't really need another chair. sure it's nice to have to pull up to the table if i need an extra chair, which i have already used it for, but i actually already have another extra chair stashed in a different corner. so right now it's the glorified basket holder for toys and other stuff that need to go upstairs but i'm too lazy to actually take upstairs.


the thing that i really do like about this chair is the funny little face that the back of it makes. i had planned to paint the screws white, but decided to keep it this way. it reminds me of the little brown guy in a game my brother plays, little big planet. apparently, his name is sackboy.





it's okay if you don't see the resemblance. i know it's there.