When we moved into our house, we bought a new dining room set and my old dining room table was moved into our office and used as a craft table. I bought this set (from Walmart I think) 7+ years ago when I moved into my own apartment after college and it has held up pretty well! We wanted space for more people at the table and have a big dining room, so it seemed like a good time to change things around. And I am so grateful for my craft table--I've already gotten a lot of use out of it.
It also left us with 3 extra chairs that right now reside in our 3rd room ready for when we have people over and need additional seating. One of the projects I knew I wanted to do was to update these chairs by adding a cushion and a fabric cover. So I bought some fabric a while back. Then I decided I wanted to paint the base too.
The week between Christmas and New Years David went with me to Home Depot and we bought some navy blue paint for the chairs. And then it proceeded to fall off our counter and spill all over our kitchen floor. The one we had just updated 2 months before. I had never been more grateful that we got the dark wood laminate than I was that day! It cleaned up pretty well (after a lot of time) and since the laminate is so dark you can't see the little bits of paint that are remaining.
After that, I decided I needed a break from that project. But after a few weeks to recover I decided to try again. I've had lots of friends rave about Annie Sloan paint, so I thought maybe I'd try that out. I texted my friend Laura to see where she gets hers. She told me where, but then told me she had a friend who had tried out the following recipe to make her own since the Annie Sloan paint is fairly expensive.
I figured since I was just using it to update chairs that we rarely use I would try out this recipe. I went to Home Depot on Friday to buy more paint and the Plaster of Paris and then spent most of the morning painting in our garage (the paint never even made it inside the house this time!)
After 2 coats of paint I felt like they were covered pretty nicely. They did end up lighter than I had anticipated. First off, I couldn't find the exact shade of paint that I'd used the last time. And secondly, the plaster of paris makes the paint a little lighter. But it covered really well. Since I've never used Annie Sloan paint, I don't know how it compares, but I was pleased with the coverage of this paint for the chairs!
I followed this tutorial for upholstering the chairs (except I'm not a perfectionist at all, so mine are not as exact as hers). But I like the added cushion and fabric on the seats.
Then I screwed the seats back on and I've got 2 "new" chairs. In the next few weeks I'll work on the other 2--I figured I'd start with half of them so that if something went wrong I only ruined 2 of them!
Voila!
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