a new design plan

 If it all gets approved and comes together, GradGirl will be moving to a new place. 

Here's the living room space...

We'll have some painting to do, a few minor fix-ups, and a few new light fixtures to install, but we love a good project! The fun part will be changing up her living room. She's buying a new sofa, instead of using our 33 year old sofa from our first home back in the day. It's this one below, from Macy's, but in a darker shade of gray. Very chic don't you think?!

 And to add to the grouping... she'll have 2 of these chairs but with a slightly different arm and a pillow back 

 A wall unit like this would be great to display her aqua glass collection! 

We were thinking it would all look great with an exposed brick wall on one side...

The brick wall is hopeful, maybe later as a future project. 

We're waiting for final condo approval from the bank and for the repair items on the inspection list to be completed. But... the fun part is to plan the decorating! 

We love that part.

a clean new design slate

Grad Girl, now "Working Girl", has a new place to live to go along with her new job back here in Atlanta. Perfect for her and her pup Greyson.
A 1 bedroom condo in a gated community... amenities include a beautiful pool with a waterfall, a 2 floor full gym/workout room, a big screen theater room, and a newly decorated clubhouse used for parties and get-togethers.
I've heard she "just has to go" to the Christmas party in a few weeks!

Her condo opens here in the foyer

With a coat closet to the left and shelves to the right

the living room into the kitchen
sorry I didn't have my wide angle lens to take the photos

the dining area
love the plantation shutters!

the bedroom
real oak wood floors in the entire place

Bathroom with a
full size washer and dryer behind those doors ahead
so convenient!

Check this out...

yes... that's one awesome closet!
I am jealous!

It's a great place to live and only 1.5 miles to her office. Can't get much better than that!

so... remember back in May...

We moved GradGirl to Savannah,

well, good thing I still wear this hat:

because she got a new job and is moving back to Atlanta! Hooray!

I'm searching for condo's for her to rent.

Gotta find a great pup friendly place for her and Greyson. I'll be a bit busy previewing for the next few days. Wish me luck!

Savannah flea finds... and finished projects

I visited my daughter this weekend in Savannah. We spent the morning browsing the local consignment shops in the Thunderbolt area and had a bit of luck at a shop called "Two Women and a Warehouse". Catchy name for a cute shop with a great selection of affordable used and refurbished furniture.
This photo is the "before" of GradGirl's living room with the TV on a handmade trunk,

and now on the aqua blue refurbished hutch bottom she fell in love with.

It makes quite a statement and gives her a bit more of much needed storage space.

And... tada! Here is my latest completed sewing project...

cafe curtains for her dining area.

It gives her more privacy with the ability to leave the blinds open for light.

They go so well with the recovered chairs too! ;-)

closing Pandora's box...

or should I simply say... 10 days later...

The chair is finished! Hooray!

I added this little piece of cording

But before I celebrate too much, I do still have the matching chair to rehab. For all that will involve see the "before" here and here. I started in on the 2nd one today with hubby's help. He's taking the staples out and he's going to sand it for me. Thank you! Then I get to do the 4 coats of paint and the re-upholstery.

It was all worth it... because I took an unused, dirty, old chair and turned it into a "Cinderella" chair. All new again and ready for GradGirl's condo. I am quite pleased!

And... as an added bonus! I found this adorable chair while at the Flea Market the other day and reupholstered the seat cushion to match. It had already been white washed and I love that!
I love that I didn't have to paint it too! ;-)

everything old is new again!

chair rehab progress

Here's the chair frame from my last post, remember... the upholstery demolition?

Well... not too much progress this weekend as we played more than we worked. GradGirl was home for a visit with her new Pup Greyson. He's a MinPin-Chihuahua mix and only about 4.5 lbs at the moment.

I did start in on sanding the chair and giving it 2 coats of paint so far. I can see another 2 coats are needed! We also cut a piece of MDF for the seat base with our trusty jig saw. This is instead of the rope and springs.

And... I cut a piece of foam for the seat cushion, very tricky with a scissor since I don't have one of those old electric meat carving knives.Here's the color, Martha Stewart "persimmon red", with the fabric just to get the picture, because we all need our final inspiration to work on, right?!

Today I will continue, I hope to anyway. I love the fabric with the coral paint color, so fun! What do you think?

Have you ever opened Pandora's box?

I just did...

This chair is over 100 years old, a real antique! It was Great Grandma Edith's, and we actually have 2 of them. Grad Girl has the other one at her condo. It's in much better shape than this one, having been brought out of storage and recovered already years ago. The plan is to recover them both to match her new decor.

So dirty from being in the attic when they re-roofed the house 2 years ago.

It has such pretty carved detail doesn't it?!

So today I started the demolition...
who knew this chair had previously been recovered 3 times. I guess that's not bad for 100 years. Funny though, the upper fabric was dirty but not water stained like the bottom two fabrics.

The tacks were all rusty which had me thinking... hmm, when was my last tetanus shot?

That's just the beginning, but there were definitely enough rusty tacks for 3 layers of fabric.

Underneath the 3 layers was a layer of cotton batting , a layer of horse hair and a layer of rotted burlap that turned to dust when you touched it. Yuck! Oh, and of course the comfy springs tied with rotted rope.

I had gone this far so I figured I would just go all the way and strip it down completely to the wooden frame.

So... now I have a chair frame. I guess I'll have to build a seat before I can recover it, right?! Where's the Jig saw?

We plan to repaint the chairs a shade of coral, Martha Stewart's " Persimmon red", and then reupholster them in this fun fabric:

Then both chairs will match. Hopefully, as far as I can remember, Grad Girls chair is not in as bad of shape as this one and we can actually just paint it and recover it. I hope. Fingers crossed.

They should look great in her dining room and add an additional pop of color!

I'll be sure to post the "after" when we're done... which may not be as soon as I originally had planned!