Ahem....Recliners... :)

Large overstuffed recliners are not my favorite thing.  If you love them, please by all means go for it, but they are just not for me.  If it were up to me, nary a recliner would be found in the walls of my house.  My husband, however, feels a slightly different.  :)  So we compromised....you may have spotted it in this picture...

Do you see it??  The recliner is leather with a traditional shape and nailhead details so at the very least I find it only slightly offensive, haha, but...I have to admit...it is VERY comfortable and the most used chair in the room.

We've had this chair almost as long as we've been married. (11 years tomorrow!!)  It. has. been. abused.  It's time to be replaced.  Seeing as this *is* the most used chair in the room, I had resigned myself to the fact that it's replacement would probably be pretty similar, but I may get to pick a slightly differently color leather this time.

Until....i found this....

I stopped by one of our local furniture retailers on a whim to get a feel for what my options were and I came across this chair.  Tufted back recliner???  Ummm...yes!!  I thought maybe even the color would be acceptable, but after comparing with my fabric swatches I decided it wasn't going to work.  It was all for the best though....it was available to order in lots of other leather options and the only drawback was the wait for production.... 16 weeks. Yep, still waiting.  It *should* be here in about 2 weeks or so, hopefully, and I can't wait!!

xo,

Living Room: Time-Out Chairs

It's not too often I shop ebay for furniture....but in this case it totally paid off!  Most of the time shipping costs for furniture make any potential good deal a bust, but.....then these popped up...

$20.....for a pair.....and located near me.  Meant. To. Be.

Sure, the existing fabric was less than desirable, and there were broken springs and questionable foam (yuck!)....but the frame was in perfect condition and I was up for the challenge!  I should probably give a shout out to my husband for the demo process of the chairs.  There were *at least* 72 million staples holding that ugly fabric on.  *Someone* wanted to make sure it wasn't going to come off easy!! They succeeded.  My fingers were literally bleeding as a result of the staple removal process, so he offered to help! What a guy.... :)

On to the fun part....picking out new fabric! There were two criteria that had to be met for the fabric on this chair:

1) It had to coordinate with the crewel print already being used in the room.  (See ottoman below)

2) It had to be strong on it's own, but not overpowering.

The fabric I selected was Artissimo in Navy, manufactured by PKaufmann.

It's still available here!  Awhile back I spotted a similar fabric used here by one of my favorite designers...Sarah Richardson!  I knew I liked her... ;-)

One thing I love about this type of chair is the opportunity to use a contrast fabric on the back!  For these chairs I used Le Zebre from Brunschwig and Fils.

I love the way they turned out!!

As a sidenote....I'll also confess that these lovlies are the "time-out" chairs in our house....  Sometimes they are the most used chairs of the day!! Ha!  At least the kiddos get to sit and reflect on their actions in style?!?  :)  Maybe I'll put myself in time-out....

xo,

Future Fireplace?

A few weeks ago, I decided a change was in order for the arrangement of our living room.  The room really doesn't have a ton of options for different furniture placements given the many traffic flows through the space, but the wall where the secretary currently resides was really troubling me!

This wall is one of the first views from the entry hall.  It previously housed the kids toy table with a shelf above.  I don't mind that the kids have and keep toys in the living room...that's just a sign of our current reality ;) ...but I don't love that chaos is the first impression when you walk in the front door!  Anyway, I've been on a quest to find a solution to this problem once and for all!

I really never photographed it in its prior state, at least without mess and toys...haha, except for this one shot from the blue and white post.  You can kind of see how the secretary looked on the paneled wall previously.

Here is the wall today...

Not too exciting.....And very bare.  I miss the secretary being a focal point on that wall, but I really like its new location better overall.  What's a girl to do??

Well...actually there has been a plan all along!  When we first put up the paneled wall, in the back of my mind I had plans for a future fireplace on this wall.  I love fireplaces...who doesn't??...and it would be a great focal point for the room!  A fireplace wasn't really a priority back then because we had *A LOT* of other large projects that needed our attention/$$ first and it's still not at the top of the list, but I could see it happening in the somewhat near future...???  I did a little mock-up to get an idea of how the proportions might work out...

Painters tape....so many uses!! :)  It's a rough layout, but it definitely helps me see what adjustments need to be made so my proportions are correct!

I'm not sure when/if this is going to happen...so for now this space remains dedicated to the kids play table where they still have easy access to their toy closet hidden behind that little door (topic for another day).  And I like that the table is kind of hidden behind the chairs in the current layout instead of in plain view from our front door like before.  It kind of bothers me that the wallspace is so empty, but I'm not sure I want to put much effort into changing that if a fireplace is in the near future.  Fingers crossed!!

xo,