have a seat
This project didn’t actually make it to my undone list, because it was so close to being finished that I didn’t think it counted. Plus, I am going to blame the delay on the craft store stencil thieves. Can you believe there are actually people who want to stencils so badly that they are willing to risk jail time? There’s an ugly craft world underbelly out there. These are their stories (insert Law & Order sound effect).
Bonus shot of Pixel scrounging for food in the background.
I was checking out the Martha Stewart paint aisle at Michael’s recently, and saw her line of stencils. They are much nicer than your typical craft store stencils, and I particularly liked this lace set. I’ve had this chippy chair sitting on the porch forever, and it wasn’t the nice kind of charming vintage chippy, it just looked bad. I had also recently pinned some painted and stenciled chairs, and so all this inspiration came together, and I bought my little stencil set and went happily on my way, blissfully unaware of the stencil drama to come (okay, I may be overstating this a bit, it wasn’t actually very dramatic, just inconvenient, really).
I sanded and sanded my chair, and got a reasonable amount of the paint off. Then I just taped it off and painted a little over half of it with a couple coats of semi-gloss white paint. I eagerly applied the big lace stencil in bright pink and got ready to do the smaller lace stencil when I discovered that my package was missing one of the sheets. Armed with my receipt and incomplete (and now used) stencil package, I went back to Michael’s to exchange it for a complete set. When I went back to the aisle for a replacement I found only one other package of the same stencil pattern, only this time, not one but all three sheets were missing! I want to know how one smuggles a stencil out of the craft store. I wouldn’t think you’d want to fold them up, and these things are pretty big. Plus, they are just not that expensive and you can always get a 40% off coupon. Anyway, the manager was quite nice and called a nearby store for me. They had it in stock and had it sent over for me to pick up the next day. Just don’t be surprised if the stencil aisle now has video cameras monitoring you as you shop, and for goodness sake, check the package before you buy it to make sure they are all there!
Back to my chair…I finished with the smaller lace pattern in blue and then sealed the whole thing with a wax finish, so it’s still a little chippy on the unpainted side, but it’s nice an smooth. I totally love it and now I want to stencil everything in sight. I will try to restrain myself.
Cushion is from Pier 1, but I don’t think it’s available any more.
One project down, seven (or more) to go.
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