In May, Melinda, her sister and I were checking out the thrift stores for treasures. We found two chairs that were begging to be transformed into new chairs for Melinda’s garage/playroom transformation. They were sturdy, well built chairs that looked a little dull. New seat covers would have done wonders, but we had something more creative in mind. It took a while to get started on them. But once we did, the kids were excited to help transform their chairs. The girls jumped in to help clean the wood.

My Princess eagerly helped me put on the first base coat of paint. And then I painted the legs and lower part with several coats of yellow paint.

Then it was time to take the old seat covers off. It was hard work pulling out the staples, but the kids had fun using the tools like big people!

Melinda and I chose scrapbook paper that coordinated with the colors for the new playroom and cut an assortment of shapes and sizes. We papered the front and backs of the chairs and the sides of the seats in a patchwork design using mod podge to stick the paper to the wood.When the paper dried, I sealed it with several coats of clear acrylic finish. Last step was recovering the seats. we used the old cover to make a pattern for the new fabric and then surged the edges of the covers to keep them from raveling. We assumed we could use the staple gun to attach the fabric to the seat board, but it was made from solid oak and the staples we had were too thick to go into the wood easily. Not having the right equipment (as in upholstery tools), we decided to try using thumbtacks, which worked quite nicely. 

And here is the finished product. They will look great in the new playroom!

In case you are new to our blog, you can read about the garage and new playroom here and here. It is getting closer to being finished and we can’t wait to show you the pictures of the final project (because that means it will be done.) In the meantime, we will keep showing you sneak peaks!