The Stripper

I've been doing some stripping this week.

No, not THAT kind of stripping. Get your mind out of the gutter! 

This old table has been sitting in the bay window and the sun has bleached the wood and melted the 1920s black varnish. Plus there were water stains and scrapes and dents and the top was a nasty mess, so grandson Callum and I carried it huffing and puffing out to the garage. The middle bit folds away and it becomes a narrow table.

A can of chemical stripper, a couple of scrapers, lots of newspaper and rags and sandpaper, and the loan of a neighbour's electric sander, then some walnut stain and a couple of coats of clear acrylic, and the table top looks as good as new. I didn't touch the legs or frame, they didn't need any attention. Definitely not a professional job but 100% better than it was. 

The table is back in the window now, and should be able to stand up to the sun with it's new modern finish. I still have some stripper left..... now what else needs some TLC? I'm in a stripping mood.

Chair Time

As promised in my previous blog post..... the chairs in the AAP Collective art exhibition on display at our local Municipal Offices until the end of April.
AAP? What does that stand for? It could stand for many phrases.... Another Artist Paints, Amazing Art Projects, but in this case it's.....

ART AIN'T PRETTY!

BLUE VINCENT by Colin W

NAMASTE by Ed K

CHANNELING PIET MONDRIAN by Margaret G

ENDO by Diana B

FISH by Susan W

THE THREE HARES by Fenella R S

(Oooops I forgot the title, I'll have to look it up) by Sabrina S

More paintings and prints are on the right wall.... I'll post some more pics soon.

Have a Seat

Our Monday morning art group are hosting a mini art exhibition starting next week, and one of our art projects has been to renovate and decorate an old piece of furniture. It could be a chair, a table, a footstool, whatever has been discarded.

Sometimes treasures can be found at the side of the road on garbage day, you just have to be at the right place at the right time. I kept looking but didn't find anything suitable.

I eventually found this child's chair at the local thrift shop, and took it home, but when I started sanding it down I noticed one of the stretchers between the chair legs was missing, making the whole thing a bit wobbly and unsafe.

A quick trip to the local lumber store for a dowel and then some TLC from a friend with a saw and a hammer fixed things fairly quickly.

Then a spray can of glossy black paint covered up the worst of the dents and scratches, and the Three Hares design was carefully painted on the seat in gesso. 

The Three Hares is an ancient design found in many locations including China, the Middle East, France, England..... a puzzle really, with each hare having two ears, but only 3 ears actually appearing.

Then the hares were painted with colourful acrylic paint. 

Now I'm debating whether to add any colour to the existing pressed wood design on the back of the chair..... what do you think?

Blog edit a few days later: I've decided to leave the chair as it is, no more colour. Just a coat of gloss medium over the paint to give it some shine. I'll be posting pics of the other art chairs once we get the exhibition started.

Guest Bedroom

Can you imagine yourself sleepily opening your eyes and waking up in this wonderful bed?
No, not my guest bedroom, unfortunately. This is the hand made bed in Park Cottage, one of the guest cottages at Chatsworth House in the heart of the Peak District in Derbyshire, England.
Chatsworth is the magnificent home of the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire.

The closest I have been to Chatsworth House is to watch a TV programme about it, which is where I first saw this fantastic bed. The house is open to the public and hosts many events... concerts, fairs, theatre, art shows. There are a number of beautiful cottages that can be booked for holidays.
I fell in love with this unusual bed created from from willow harvested on the Chatsworth estate. I was thinking..... if I went out to nearby York Region Forest and cut a few branches.... tacked them together....  no, it just wouldn't be the same.

Pipe Dream

YoungerSon has recently been building furniture using black iron pipe and plumbing fittings and recycled wood.

So far he has built a curtain rail, a coffee table and a bench, and they really look good... sort of "Industrial Domestic".

I saw this bedside lamp at a street fair in a nearby town. All made of plumbing fittings. It had been made by a local welder for his teenage son's bedroom. He was also building a bed and some bedroom furniture along the same lines.

I really liked the lamp so I'll show YoungerSon and perhaps he might like to try his hand at building his version of the same design.

Would you have a lamp like this in your house?

An Auction and Spaghetti

Well.... so much for my resolution of blog posting every couple of days through January. I only made it to 13 posts, and my record for February has been even worse so far.

I've been spending money again.... well, not very much money. I went to an auction sale and came home with this lovely little child's rocking chair. The cushion isn't very exciting, so I'll be making a nice new one, now that my faithful Singer sewing machine (purchased in 1967)  has been repaired. Oh, I didn't tell you that it was broken? It was making very unhappy noises, and suddenly produced a loud "Clunk!" and seized up. Well, after working diligently for 45 years without any major maintenance, I'm not really surprised.

Another Family Spaghetti Dinner took place in the local Community Hall this week. A couple of young families band together every few weeks and produce a magnificent spaghetti dinner for the amazing price of $1.00 per person. This is the fifth time they have done this.

On the menu: Spaghetti with tomato & meat sauce, mixed salad and a choice of salad dressing, buttered bread, lots of different desserts including cupcakes, rice krispie squares, brownies, cookies, and then coffee, tea or lemonade to wash it all down.

And if that's not enough to fill you up, you're welcome to go for a second helping!

Just put your money in the donation box, nobody checks the amount you're putting in. I should think most people put in more than $1.00, I certainly do. Long tables are set up and you just sit down next to whoever's already there and start chatting. There might be a neighbour sitting there, or a newcomer to town, it's a great way to make new friends. The money goes to the local Food Bank, with just enough left over to buy the ingredients for the next Family Spaghetti Dinner!

Chair Update

If you missed the start of this sad chair story, scroll down to the previous post.

Phone call from the UPS Store this morning: We have a package containing two chairs for you. It's been here a while. Sears wants us to ship it back, do you want to pick it up?

Me: Yes! Yes! Yes! I'll pick it up this afternoon. I didn't pick it up before as UPS didn't answer my phone messages and neither Sears nor UPS told me it had been delivered.

UPS Man: Sears is supposed to let you know that information, not UPS.

Me: But Sears said they didn't know where the chairs were!

So now I have a package containing two chairs that apparently I have not paid for as my Sears card has been credited with a refund, but now they have deactivated my account due to lack of information which I have not supplied as the local Sears outlet was closed when I went there!  And I was promised a $40.00 credit for my inconvenience..... so what's the next move, Sears?

I'll just sit tight on the chairs and see what happens.

I Just Want to Sit Down...

Early last November, YoungerSon and The Bride acquired a large dining table and 6 chairs so they gave me their old Sears set. But I needed two more chairs.

So I went to Sears and Lo and Behold! the matching chairs were on sale. Yippee! So I ordered two, and put the cost on my Sears card. Delivery was free to my local UPS Store for me to pick up there.

2 weeks later.... no chairs had appeared.

I called Sears (3 times over the next ten days).... where are my chairs?

Sears: they were shipped but we don't know where they are. We will cancel your first order, credit your Sears card, and reorder, and deliver to the UPS Store.

Me: I've waited nearly a month, can't you deliver to my home, free?

Sears: I have to ask my supervisor about free home delivery, but we could deliver to the UPS Store and give you $30.00 discount.

Me: But I'd rather have home delivery now.

Sears: How about $40.00 discount?

Me: Thanks but I prefer home delivery.

Sears (later, after talking to the supervisor): OK, we can deliver to your home free, we can only deliver on Friday between 7am and 5pm.

They expect me to be waiting for them at home for TEN hours a couple of days before Christmas???? Am I being unreasonable here?

Me: But I have to be away from home most of the day Friday. How about Saturday?

Sears: No deliveries on Saturday.

Me: OK, we'll go back to delivery to the UPS Store with $40.00 discount.

Sears: I will let you know when the chairs can be picked up.

Sears (later): I have cancelled your first order, and credited your Sears card but I can't reorder as your Sears card has been deactivated.

Me: WHAT???? WHY?

Sears: We need more information.

Me: But you had enough information when I bought the first two chairs.

Sears: Not my problem, talk to the Chase Credit Card Company.

So I called Chase and told them the story, but the answer (from a lovely polite girl who plays the guitar and sings, so she told me) was still they need more information.

Me: I can provide that information over the phone.

Very polite Chase rep: I'm sorry, you have to go to a Sears store and provide the information in person.

GRRRR...... can you believe this? Do you think I'll ever get to sit on those chairs? I'll keep you posted.

UPDATE Monday 19 December: I went to our local Sears Catalogue Store today to update this infernal information that they need.... and it's CLOSED on Mondays!!

Impulse buying

Yesterday, it was a planned shopping day with No1Son, No2Son and No2Son's Beloved to look at washing machines (Boxing Week sales y'know). While they were discussing the virtues of energy saving and low water use with the salesman in the appliance department, The Space Cadet and I wandered towards the furniture.... that was not a wise decision. There it sat, waiting for me... the taupe leather sofa from heaven! I sat on it, walked away, sat on it again, and walked away again, but it was calling my name. TSC warned me about the dangers of impulse buying, and he's right, so today we checked out another half dozen furniture stores, but that sofa is the one I have been waiting for..... all I had to do was take some measurements to check that the delivery men can get it through the door, and it will fit! So tomorrow I'll be the happy owner of a new sofa. WOOHOO!

Impulse buying ROCKS!!!