Recliner

We all have them, that one piece of furniture from our husband's bachelor days that he refuses to get rid of. In my case, it's a recliner and it has seen better days. The upholstery is a crusty old beige cord. There are little holes all over the fabric, along with one massive one that is more than obvious.

But he loves it. He sits in it every day and before we got the Sleep Number bed, he often would sleep in in it. Now it sits in our office with a Devil's Rejects throw blanket hiding the worst.
A couple of years ago, I stumbled upon jean covered recliner on craftster. That's when I knew I wanted to recover DH's recliner, and vowed that when I had collected enough old jeans it would happen.
Fast forward to April 2011, I finally had enough jeans! I cut 2 different size blocks, 5"x5" and 10"x10" and began piecing them together. This was the most time consuming and back breaking part of the construction.
I then took an old bed sheet and turned the recliner on it's side to get a pattern. I could have removed the old fabric and made a pattern from it, but it is such a poor condition I feared it would be more hassle than it's worth.


So in random moments of boredom, I tucked and pinned and sewed. I finally finished it yesterday, after carefully stapling and hot-gluing it onto the chair!



There's even pockets on the side for whatever he wants to stuff in there!


And of course, once it was all finished. I noticed that there is red spot on one of the squares on the front of the seat! Dead center. I racked my brains for what it could be (yes, it was from one of my jeans and no, it's not what you think) and remembered it was nail polish! Thankfully it's not noticeable in these pictures and it's not very large.


And DH's first comment after he saw the finished project? YOU RUINED MY RECLINER

Easy Bathroom Decor Update

Okay, when we moved into our apartment we failed to notice that we did not have linen closet. Only when we started unpacking did I realize this not so great fact.

We bought the one of those crappy Target Over the Toilet Cabinet and dealt with it's boring yet functional appearance.
A few months later, I bought a hanging Cabinet at the thrift store for $1.50. They didn't really match and there was wax stain all over the front of the door.


At a random visit to Michaels, I found black wrinkled scrapbook paper and knew I had to buy every sheet they had. 8 sheets for 19cents a piece!

My husband was suspicious when he saw me break out the white glue and started measuring the cabinets and cutting up the paper. He then followed me into the bathroom and watched as I glued them onto the doors.

15 minutes later, and with only one coat of white glue for protection I was done.


Technically I still need to change the knobs on the bottom cabinets to match the upper, but I otherwise I am very happy with it.

Almost a year later, they are holding up really well, and you can't see where I had to piece the paper together. I don't think the paper on the doors are going to survive the move, so I will probably remove and then re-apply later.

Special Request Tissue Box

DH asked me if I could make him a tissue box cover to go with the Budweiser coasters on our coffee table.

I told him to peel the labels off the bottle of Bud and I would accommodate his request.

I started out with an empty Budweiser box. Then I used an existing tissue box to trace the pattern. I then cut out the pattern 1/4 bigger then the original.


A little bit of painters tape was used to assemble the box.

I then decoupaged the Bud labels randomly all over.

Super easy!

After wards, DH decided it looked better in the office, where he shows it off to his friends when they visit. I have several requests from his friends for more, but they need to provide me with the labels.

Devil's Rejects Trash Can

A few weeks ago, my DH commented that he didn't like the dollar store blue trash can we had in our office, he prefered black like the one in our bedroom. Well I am not going to waste a perfectly good trash can, so I pulled out some acrylic craft paint, my trusty modge podge and some Devil's Rejects movie ads that I had found in a couple of magazines.

Several coats of varnish later and it was ready to serve it's function. Note I did get lazy and didn't paint the inside, plus I ran out of varnish.Thanks for viewing!

Sandy Votives

This was a recent gift for my 13 year old cousin's birthday. She had seen similiar ones in a catalog, but they were only in pink! She liked the votives just not the color, so I made some for her.Well, she loved them and couldn't believe I remembered! Sometimes teenagers appreciate little things!

All I did was fine two plain votive holders, applied craft glue, and rolled them in sand and glitter!