Back on Track????

I can't believe that I didn't post for the whole of April! 

Life has been sooo busy. 

Despite saying that I wouldn't take on another full time supply post I was persuaded to take on a four week position with a year 6 class in the run up to their SATs and have now been persuaded to stay on till the end of term.

No sooner had I returned to working full time and my mam was rushed into hospital. She is severely disabled and although I don't want to go into details her stay in hospital ended up being quite distressing for both her and the family so much so that we felt the need to take her home to be cared for. As a consequence my sister who is her main carer and also holds down a full time job has had to take on even more responsibility as she lives in the same street as mam and is the only one living close by. As my brother lives over 200 miles away he cannot help and so although it is a 60 mile round trip I have been trying to get through as often as possible, but it has meant little time for much else.

I've missed blogging though. I enjoy "chatting" to my readers and in turn following their blogs and reading about their to-ings and fro-ings, there's a great sense of "community" that develops here in blogland.

With that in mind I'm determined to get back on the blogging track, and getting back that lovely spirit caring and sharing that exists between bloggers.

Make do and Mend - Recovered Computer Chair.

My poor computer chair!

It gets a lot of wear, and it shows.

It is still perfectly functional and it's certainly comfy enough, after all I do spend an awful lot of time sitting in it. I was therefore unwilling to even contemplate spending cash on a new one, so a little renovation seemed in order.

Way back in my early blogging days I posted  here and here about a huge Indian patchwork throw which I bought as a wall hanging, but was much too big.

Despite having used some of it to make a table runner and some to cover my dining chairs, there was still plenty left so I decided to use it to recover the chair.

First job was deconstruction. The back is held onto the seat by the arms so removal of eight screws et voila - ready to go.

I used my trusty seam ripper to remove the vinyl panel from the back of the top part of the chair then just stretched the fabric over the front and stapled with heavy duty staples to the back. I then restapled the vinyl panel back on to cover the raw edges of the new fabric. (Not sure I'm making sense here, but hey ho!)

I then recovered the seat by placing it upside down on my fabric and stretching and stapling to the underside.

Replacement of the arms secured the two halves together and ...

...one refurbished computer chair.

I have to say I absolutely love how it has turned out.

The bonus is that  the "wall hanging" is finally reduced to the size I originally envisaged, only problem is I bought it for behind our bed and it is so long ago now that we have something else there that we are quite happy with.  Now where can I hang an ethnic Indian wall hanging? Hmmm.

Four Happy Things...

...a very happy blogswap!

I was paired with Ellie from Feltabulous.

The rules were simple, put together a parcel of four happy things.

• One handmade.
• One vintage, retro or kitsch.
• One in a favourite colour.
• One thing from childhood.

What an amazing partner Ellie was, just look what she sent me!

 

Four pretty parcels inside of which was ...

A lovely spring like card and...

• A handmade felt heart, made with wool from Ellie's sister's sheep. It is absolutely gorgeous.

• For favourite colour another handmade item, a beautiful macrame bracelet using agate, sodalite, fire agate, lapis lazuli, aventurine, quartzite and a polymer clay bead. 

How talented is Ellie?

• For an item from childhood Ellie sent me Iced Gems and Lindt Bunnies. Whenever I used to visit my Aunt Mary she always used to give me Iced Gems so they definitely brought back childhood memories, and Lindt chocolate is one of my favourites so I was delighted with the bunnies.

•  The vintage item was the fabulous plate. I literally gave a little squeal when I opened this, I absolutely adore it.

 Oh four very happy things indeed!!

Now to see what I sent Ellie I'm afraid I'll have to send you off to visit her blog post on the swap because as  usual I forgot all about taking any photographs until I had already wrapped everything up ready for the post. 

Linda xxx