Another project on the go. We are doing up what we grandly call ‘the guest bedroom’ at the moment – on a shoestring. So having to be nifty and thrifty in lots of ways. We’re even calling a pair of new cream curtains from Penneys (or Primark as it is in UK) ‘splashing out’! Anyhow, we had this tired old headboard, a decent piece of fabric from Hickeys – a remnant at a fraction of its original cost per metre, a set of doll-makers needles (very long), some nylon fishing wire, some Fray Stop, a staple gun and some hot glue. Nothing we had to run out and buy. The technique is really easy – I won’t write up a proper tutorial – Google ‘upholstering a headboard’ and you’ll get dozens of hits from pictorial guides to You Tube videos on how to do it.
Basically though, remove the buttons and rip off the old cover. Cover the whole area with new fabric and pull taut over the padded section. Staple down securely all around the edges. Feel for the indentations for where the buttons go, squeeze a little blob of Fray Stop in the middle and before it has time to dry, pass your long needle and strong thread (or nylon fishing line) to go through it and and come out on the other side where the button holes are. Staple and/or hot glue the thread tails in place at the back and continue until all the buttons have been threaded through. That’s the ‘hard’ bit done – simples, eh?!
Next step will be to attach it back to the wooden mounting board. It was wooden, it was tired and fairly horrid so painting it was the easiest and cheapest option. We wire-wooled it down, washed it with sugar soap and gave it a first coat of paint and will get it finished over the weekend. We’re painting it in a rich cream colour. When it’s ready, we’ll glue and screw the padded bit on and attach the headboard back onto the bedframe. It really is as easy as that.
I had some fabric left over so have made a few heart-shaped lavender sachets, ooh la la-ed up with some beads from my charity shop find the other weekend. A scrummage in my ribbon box found a nice length of chiffon to finish them off with lovely flourishey bows. The pic shows one finished and one all nudey waiting to be gussied up. Got another few cut out ready to be stitched – three, I think.
Another junk yard find. This was a rusty candelabra. It’s been spray-painted using a tin of Rustoleum (not a whole tin!). It’s dry and I’ll be giving it the rough treatment this weekend to make it look more shabby chic. I’m not sure if I want to hang some of the fabric hearts from it (it will be hanging from the ceiling) or maybe some paper flowers and a few beady jewels. I’ll have to see how the room takes shape and go from there.
Finally, I think I have enough fabric left to make a bolster pillow. I found a great tutorial to do this online somewhere so need to go through my history to find it. Some clever person used a ratty old towel and some spongy stuff to swiss-roll together to make the pillow then covered it in nice material. She then finished it off by sewing circles of fabric onto each end and stitching some furniture cord around the seams.
I think I’ll make mine easier still by making it longer and adding a drawstring channel at either end so that it looks like a Christmas cracker – a roll with a gather. It”ll make it easy to wash or change the filling, if needs be. And make for a very simple sewing project. Hopefully, I’ll be able to get started on it over the weekend, if not it’ll have to wait till next weekend. A long bank holiday weekend. Ah.
