The Despains: Kitchen chairs got a makeover!

So almost a year ago we bought a kitchen table with 6 chairs from someone on Craigslist. It was solid wood and really unique design. We knew it would take a little work to fix up a few things but we felt like it was a great deal. The previous owners said the set had been sitting in their sunporch so they were a little dirty. The material they used to cover the chairs was gross to begin with, it reminded me of the super supportive bodysuit/hosiery that Mrs. Doubtfire wears :). Of course it grossed me out a lot in the beginning and I planned to recover the chairs immediately but once you put if off and get used to it, it becomes a much lower priority. I did take off the coverings on the backs of the chairs and found that the stain had worn off. The backs were made of a plastic woven design so I wasn't sure how to re-stain them since you don't really "stain" plastic. So I figured I'd just have to re-cover the backs the same as the seats. I was bummed because I thought the design was really great and wished I could restore it.

Well finally this past Thanksgiving while my parents were visiting my dad offered to try to restore the backs of the chairs using a mixture of spray paint made for plastic called Krylon: Fusion for Plastic and wood stain. He spent almost a whole day in our garage working his magic on these chairs. It just really amazes me how my dad figured out how to combine the right colors and how to apply the paint and stain to get them to match the rest of the chairs that were wood. They just look so perfect. I'm so impressed. My dad is really talented in woodworking, among many other things. I appreciate so much that he spent he time and effort into restoring the backs of these chairs. They took almost a month to dry since the stain couldn't be absorbed into the plastic like it normally absorbs into wood so it had to evaporate and that took a long time. But they turned out absolutely beautifully!!

Then my mom came with me to the fabric store where after some looking around decided that outdoor fabric would be our best bet since it's water-resistant, durable, and there are a lot more colors and prints to choose from. We found some on clearance so we got an awesome deal on the fabric. Then she showed me how to re-cover a chair seat and gave me some really helpful tips. I don't know what I would have done without my parents' help! So this weekend Brandon and I re-covered the other 5 chairs. Taking off the old nasty covers took the longest since there were a billion staples to take out. Then my hand got really sore from stapling on the new covers. I probably stapled like over 600 staples total. But we love how they turned out.