Eliza

Eliza is an petite antique rocker that I acquired from a lovely family in Verboort who had loved her for a long time, but needed to find her a new home.

Isn't she beautiful!

She still had remains of her original finish.  Even after I carefully sanded her down there were crackled areas of old finish.  It is just lovely.

I gave her a good coat of clear wax, which made her beautiful wood grain pop right back to life.  She was so dry I actually had to wax her twice.  I've never had to do that before.  Isn't the wood stunning?

I had some vintage upholstery fabric in my collection and knew it would be perfect for her.  She had been re-covered sometime in the 80's with a Native American inspired tapestry fabric.  It did not suite her at all.   However, the same person who had chosen the fabric had done an excellent job restoring the structure of her seat.

After digging many a staple out of her, I gave her a pretty new dover and she was once again restored to her natural beauty!

Let's have one more look at her.  I placed the Dahlia on her to give you some reference.  She is small woman's rocker.  At 5'7" I am too tall to truly enjoy rocking on her, but she is so beautiful, I would happily keep her around just to look at!

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Eliza is for sale.  Find pricing and dimensions on my Portfolio and Available Page.

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 I will be sharing at:
Primitive & Proper's: Piece of Work Wednesday

Button, Button who has the Button (Table)

This fun side or occasional table was a lot of fun to do, and a lot more work than I was anticipating.  It took a LONG time to glue all those buttons on there!

First I started by painting the table in a pretty cream color, then distressing it and rubbing it all over with a dark stain.

Next I purchased buttons in a particular color way and then dyed them to give them a bit of age and patina.  It would have been fun to do this with vintage buttons, but it would have been far too expensive, and would have taken me even longer to find the buttons.  I had to buy three packages of buttons.  Unfortunately, the first Michael's I went only had one.  I found another at another Michael's location, and then continued to look when ever I was nearby, but they never got another package in the same color way in for weeks and weeks.  Finally, I found the third package at a Michael's in Utah while I was there visiting and brought it back with me!

The last step was to use a product called Envirotex Lite from a company called Environmental Technologies to pour an epoxy finish over the buttons.  I got it at my local Ace Hardware, but you can find it on Amazon. 

If you decide to try this, be sure to follow the instructions.  You can only pour 1/8 of an inch at a time, so I had to pour it on in three coats.

The finish is VERY durable and feels nice and smooth.  I have had so many people touch it and be surprised that it isn't glass or plexiglass. 

It was a lot of fun to work on.  However, next time I think I will chose something a bit bigger than tiny buttons.

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The Button Table is for sale.  See my Portfolio and Available page for pricing and dimensions.

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 I'm sharing at:
Elizabeth & Co.'s: Be Inspired 
Primitive & Proper's: Piece of Work Wednesday