Kitchen Progress and a Couch

It's been a busy few months.  Work is still steady from the shop, and my house is still in progress.  We're getting to crunch time- six month count down to moving is about ready to begin.  The kitchen is getting SO close to being finished.  I've painted all the cabinets, granite was installed (we got a great deal, so we went this way instead of our Ikea butcherblock.  We still have it though, so if someone's looking for the discontinued Oak Numerar countertops-- shoot me a message!), and I put the backsplash in this week.  I still need to grout, paint the windows, install hardware (that's why the drawers are off in the pictures), and refinish the floors...and the pantry-- that thing's become it's own separate room from all this.  It won't take much though.  A little filling, sanding, and painting, and it's done.

My biggest project before the kitchen was this couch.  It was roadkill...found on the side of the road, cushionless- and it actually wasn't all that dirty until I loaded it into my car, and left it in my garage for TWO years.  Countdown to moving- remember?  Hubby said it needed to be out, so I finally mustered up the courage to tackle it.

I took all the fabric off, and then it sat on my porch this summer for a few days until I had room in my "studio" (aka- living room) to work on it.

Then it started to rain, so I had to resort to shoving EVERYTHING into the living room, making a giant cluttered mess.

It's been a back burner project for a while, but as Christmas came closer, and the weather has become cooler, my desire to use my fireplace, and have my living room back, and cute, grew strong enough to make me push on in the couch project.

I wanted to use a fun, bright fabric.  I chose Premier Prints Ikat Domino Flamingo.

When I finally got around to the couch, I found that it had some structural damage to one of the arms, and there was a crack running along the front panel.  A little glue and a few screws and steel plates and it was sturdy again.

I found a large piece of foam at Home Depot for cushion.  It was 3" tall, and thick enough that you didn't feel the floor when you sat on it.  This couch needed a smaller cushion so it didn't look overpowering, so once it was wrapped in dacron, it was the perfect height.  

I went ahead and paid an upholsterer to sew the cushion for me for two reasons.  First- time.  I was so crunched with my house and other projects that I didn't have the time to sit and figure this one out...which leads to Two: experience.  I've sewn a lot of things, but to date I have still not sewn a zipper.  This couch was a pretty big thing and I didn't want to do all that work to mess it up with an inexperienced rush job.  Because the couch had no existing cusion to template from, a little error on sizing from me, and a little error on sizing from him, the cushion came back a little small.  I was disappointed, but solved the problem by removing the fabric on the arms and adding more dacron to them to fill the voids.

The end result was a bright, fun couch.

I'm happy with the way it turned out, and it really wasn't anymore difficult than upholstering a chair.  I would definitely do one again, but I am glad to have it finished and out of the house!  What do you think?  Would you take a project like this on?

Featured on Roadkill Rescue

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