Jack Pot!

Driving home from the fabric store one day, I notice what I thought might have been a treasure in an alley, to pull off a discover it was only trash! And as I turned around to get back on the main road I spotted what looked like a bolt sticking out of a dumpster, so of coarse I stopped to take a look. There were TWO bolts of Knoll Textiles, fabric dumped, still in plastic, waiting for me.

I had to back our car up to the dumpster and use the bumper as a boost, to get in the dumpster to pull off bags of garbage, to be able to pull out the heavy bolts of fabric! I shoved them in the car and drove home happy as a lark.

I can't ever find nice gray fabric at our fabric store, I'm always looking. So who can believe that I just found two bolts, 45 yards of beautiful , expensive fabric. The fabric is still sold by Knoll a is $29 a yard, so that means I found over $1300, worth of fabric!

So now I have no excuse to not start or finish a project, I've got enough fabric to upholster anything I may possibly bring home.

Finished daybed

Well, there it is in all of its glory. The little DIY I had posted about a couple of weeks ago. The project was very simple, a solid wood door from my husband, the large cushions were found and given a through cleaning, the hairpin legs were also found by my husband attached to a old warped piece of plywood. The back cushions were in my attic, I bought a couple of yards of unbleached muslin, I had the gray wool for the contrast welt on the back cushions, and after using some danish oil, I decided the color was too light, and bought a small can of walnut stain.

So, the total on that is about $10.

I'm happy with the finished project, and would recommend it to anyone in need of a couch, with a tight budget.

(my welting is getting a lot better, and with a few more projects, i'm sure I will be totally happy with it!)

Self-welt

This is the first time I've actually used welting on an upholstery project. I sew on a very average Brother sewing machine, and I first of all didn't feel it was capable of sewing that many layers together nicely, I also feel that welting eats up a lot of extra fabric cutting it on the bias.

Well, I decided that I needed to better my upholstery skills, and teach myself something new. It wasn't as hard as I thought, but it also wasn't as easy as it it could have been. I thought using some left over black fabric would be a great way to use up leftovers.

I started on the bottom cushion, and had a very hard time getting the welting as tight as I wanted it, and usually if I force my machine to do something it doesn't want to, it results in breaking something. For the next cushion, I decided to just go ahead and ride the welt with my sewing foot, and that did the trick. Since I have picked up a specialty foot for my machine, and I think at this point it is going to take some practice.

Think Danish modern daybed

Because I don't have enough unfinished projects, this is my new one. Our house had two black vinyl couches, and on a whim I decided that two was too many. So, one is now gone, and we now have a large empty hole where a couch used to sit. It's kind of nice for the moment, since it's usually too much furniture, not, not enough.

But, if I have an empty space it is sure to be filled, and since Baby J has two Danish modern daybeds in his room, I thought it would be easy enough to just bring one down and be done.

But, its really never that easy is it ? I found a couple of great stone colored, brushed canvas cushions in good shape, I brought them home washed them up, and low and behold they are 6'' too short. So, then I decided we would just make a daybed out of plywood and screw on wooden legs and be done. But, now I'm thinking hairpin. My husband had found a set in the alley, and I think they may work. I'm thinking about not using wedge pillows in the back and going with something more like the last few photos.

I think this maybe a project we'll knock out over the weekend, If I can get rid of this stupid head cold!