Chairs, a long time coming

One of our recent home improvement projects was finally finished, thanks to Brian who got down to it and started painting a few weeks ago.

I bought these chairs on Craigslist not too long after we bought our house and all of the sudden had a dining room. Actually, I bought a table (which never made it to our dining room and instead sits in the basement, becoming the cat's feeding station away from the crazy food stealing dog) and these chairs came with them. At first I thought we'd trash them but then I looked at them again, and realized that they could probably be pretty cute with some help.







This summer I picked out some glossy white paint with my mom and got to work...





But then, I got really sick of it. And stopped painting entirely. For months. I had no motivation without having a fabric picked out to recover the chairs. And I realized that I was very oddly freaked out of picking out a fabric. So one day, I made my mom come with me and I found a cute green print.

But the chairs still sat there, unpainted.

Then, over Thanksgiving when our neighbors asked to borrow our dining room chairs (they needed extra), I said yes but I was mortified. Our chairs were falling apart, chipping, stained, and totally disgusting. So I almost decided to start painting again, but didn't.

Then, Brian got frustrated and picked up the paint brushes, and painted for about 3 days straight. And we brought the fabric to this wonderful upholstery gal in Bellingham who finished the job -- in one day -- for only $30 a chair.

And voila! Cute chairs!







Now our dining room is getting close to being done. I would eventually like to get an area rug, and we were bummed to find out that our Christmas present to each other, a beautiful dining hutch that was partially paid for through a compilation of saved gift cards to Jayson Home & Garden over the years, is actually a piece of crap. (Thanks again to the honest sales lady who wanted to save us from the frustration of shipping and picking up a heavy pile of poo.) Anyway, we would eventually like to find another hutch that we like. But it's looking pretty good and I have to say, I think it's really a fun challenge to decorate on a budget; it makes you appreciate it all the more.