TELL CITY CHAIR FIND & ANNIVERSARY #41

SWEET TELL CITY ANDOVER CHAIRS

My sweet La Chaumière de Briarwood looks best when she is dressed for Autumn...  Just the style of our nearly 50 year old home ushers in a timeless look of simple beauty and charm.

Several years ago I found three antique/vintage Tell City Ladder Back Chairs at a local Oklahoma thrift store.  I desperately needed four and found another one up in Missouri (my late Momma and I made the four hour trip up north to get it and then back home again!)...  If I remember right I paid only $28.00 each for the first three...but then had to paid five times that for the fourth one.  Still a great deal as the chairs are now highly sought after and getting harder to find all the time!

Anything with the TELL CITY logo has gone up in price and I'm sure will continue to go up in years to come!

PAINTED BLACK

I love the way the chairs look in our breakfast room.  I painted them black and then heavily distressed them so the original maple stain color lightly shows through.

I've often wished I had two more chairs for extra seating...just haven't wanted to drop the cash!

Every once in a while I get online to just LOOK and SEE!  Incredibly I found another sweet chair like the four I already have on FB Marketplace (Oklahoma/local)!

Guess how much?

ORIGINAL MAPLE

The silly thing was only $20!

ORIGNAL AD ABOVE

The chair had been on Marketplace for 15 hours when I saw it...I couldn't believe it wasn't already SOLD!  I contacted the seller immediately and my Mr. AGPMan picked it up after work!

SCORE!

On a whim I decided to check eBay just to SEE if I could possibly find ONE MORE!

Well...I actually found TWO MORE...

But guess how much?

eBAY AD

A WHOPPING $600 for two...or $300 each!

I just very nearly GASPED out loud!

I knew the chairs were valuable...just not THAT valuable.  To be fair, I also found another one that was quite a bit less...but it had some damage to it!  They were all in Nebraska and even tho the hubby grew up there...we certainly weren't planning a trip north anytime soon.  Wouldn't have paid that much anyway!

I hope in the future to snag one more chair for an equally amazing price.

Sometimes great deals take patience!

A COUPLE YEARS AGO

Today is our 41st anniversary!  WHAT?

DINNER OUT LAST NIGHT

I can't believe it.  In case you forgot (or are new here OR haven't followed along in a bit...) Here is our wedding photo taken on September 8, 1978!

What's the secret to our success of living together and not killing each other for nearly 15,000 days?

(14,975 to be exact!)

Hmmmm...

MY BELOVED AND I

Love, Respect, Passion, Faith, Trust, Hope, Hard Work, Good Choices, Sound Financial Decisions, Great Kids, Fun, Date Night, Laughter, Good Health 

and

GOD!

Hope you are having an awesome Sunday.  After celebrating our marriage last night with a beautiful dinner out and breakfast this morning...we are doing some Fall planting and having homemade vegetable soup for a calm, quiet dinner.

Loving my simple life.

Love to you...

Rebecca

~CHALK PAINTED UPHOLSTERED CHAIR REVEAL~

Our day started off bright and early with two big trucks and a trailer parked outside our home...they hold our new furnace and A/C unit.  After three days of HOT HUMID TEMPS we are ready to feel cool again!

If you don't follow me on Facebook then you didn't see the reveal picture of the Chalk-Pained Upholstered-Chair reveal.  Here it is!  I still need to do a final sanding of the entire piece AND add the wax coating...  But~seeing this one finished to this stage was very exciting for me.

I will tell you this about the process...IT WAS WORK!  After the 4th coat I thought...WOW...this is grueling work and very time consuming.  At that point I wasn't sure painting the thing was going to work or IF it was possible to cover up the black and white Savoy-style print!  By the time the 5th coat went on I knew it was truly looking fab!

I added a tattered edge to the bottom and I will be adding one more coat of paint to that.  Because it is ruched up it has taken a big longer for it to dry.  Sometime tomorrow I will finish it up and start on Chair #2.  

I purchased these neat looking "feet" to add to the chairs as the original front legs were covered up with the flounce and looked too skinny/thin once they were exposed.  They will be stained and waxed.

So there you have it.  Will share photos again with the other chair is finished.  I wish I could snap my fingers and have it done

Have a wonderful day...I'm soooo looking forward to sleeping tonight with our new A/C system cooling everything down.  The Oklahoma humidity has been a killer.

Blessings~

Rebecca

~THOUGHTS ON A SUNDAY MORNING...Painting Our Upholstered Chairs~

CHAIR TO BE PAINTED

Our trusty A/C Unit bit the dust this weekend and even though it's never a good time to shuck out hard-earned money on something so expensive...we knew this day was coming.  My Mr. AGP Man was in the Air/Heat biz many years ago and knows the business very well...  He has babied the A/C along for a long, long time.  Yesterday we bid her good-bye and a brand new (hopefully more efficient!) until will soon take her place.  We've opted to have our very, very old furnace replaced as well (in 2020 it would have been 50 years old!).  While we wait for installation it's going to be insufferable around here.  We'll be sleeping at our daughter's because last night we were absolutely miserable...

AFTER ABOUT ONE COAT

Anyway...before all this happened with the A/C I had long before decided to take the plunge and CHALK PAINT my living room chairs (upholstered).  Yeah...I know!  SCARY!  I've had the chairs for 13 years and they were still in beautiful condition.  No rips, tears, sags, etc.  But...I had grown tired (very tired!) of the Savoy-style black and white print and had tossed about having them reupholstered for at least a couple of years.  The chairs are fabulous and except for the flounce (skirt) I still really love them.  So...after a ton of research and gobs of reading, I jumped right in!

I have two matching chairs and opted to do one at a time.  I had my guy haul them inside and put paint cloths down (I used old, but clean, moving blankets) to protect my floors.  Doing one at a time will better help me determine the final cost and just how much paint each chair needed to be completely done.

AFTER ABOUT THREE COATS

Here are some photos of where I am after three coats.  I'm certain they will need FIVE COATS of watered down chalk paint before they are ready to be lightly sanded and waxed.  My plan is to add a vintage French image to the top-back area.  Nothing big or floral...maybe an old ad or something like that.  We'll see.

 ORIGINAL SKIRT REMOVED

This is what the one chair I'm working on looks like after three coats.  Some places are still showing the Savoy print (flip side of cushion has yet to be done) and I suspect the chair will take at least another full day to dry before I can apply coat #4.

Opting to have the chair recovered ($400 quote on each one PLUS the fabric cost of $200 for each one!) made me sick.  I'd rather purchase new chairs.  So, opting to try the chalk paint was sort of a no-brainer for me!  I'll be out the cost of the paint if I absolutely hate the outcome...I figure it will take 1 1/2 quarts to do one chair.  About $50-$60.  

I'll also be out lots of labor.

LOTS OF LABOR.

The process is slow and slower.  But, I'd rather be out TIME vs. $$$$.

I'll share more pics later this week of how the chair came out!  OK?

Here's what I did!

I first cleaned the chair by giving it a thorough vacuum and then sprayed the entire thing with a good mist of water

Next I started with the paint.  I did NOT water it down.  I opted instead to dip my chalk brush (a must have!) into the paint and then the BRUSH TIP into a bowl of water.  The paint went on great and the first coat soaked right in.  That's what you want it to do.  You want the paint to penetrate the fabric vs. sitting on top of it. Lots of thin coats vs. thick ones!

I waited 24 hours between coats to give the paint a chance to dry.  The second coat covered a lot more of the Savoy print and the third even more.  Not all the coats are even so by the time I apply the fifth one I'm hoping I'll be done and the chair will be reading for a light sanding, wax and image transfer.

I used LOWE'S Valspar Chalky Paint in the colorway of Kid Glove only because I was too lazy to drive 15 miles away to buy Annie Sloan.  Kid Glove is a white color and I like it.  I've used it once before on a project and had good results (not a chair, but a dresser). It is $29, but it is three ounces short of a full quart.  So far I've used one container for the three coats!  I did a test run on a scrap of the Savoy fabric and I knew ahead of time it was going to take at least five coats.  Keep in my mind my chairs are good sized chairs.  Yours might take more or less.

I can't wait to show you the final reveal.  Hoping to have the one chair finished later this week.

~*~

Today I'm thanking God for two good hands, a good strong back, healing neck AND a house that right now feels super hot on the inside.  I'm trying my best to live my best life and be positive and grateful in all things.  I'm very aware some people do not have houses or even chairs to paint.

God is good.  

ALL THE TIME.

Blessings...

Rebecca

IT'S LINDA'S FAULT

Let me explain.

The junkin'-gene has always been alive and well inside me, but lately it's been in turbo-manic-mode.

I believe it's a brilliant madness, this tag-sale addiction of mine!

Truly!!!

I was doing great until my sister Linda and I each hopped a plane to the West Coast last month for our brother's birthday.  We ended up dragging him all over Southern Cal  while begging to stop at every thrift store, swap-meet, resale shop and antique mall we passed by.  While Bill rolled his eyes, we, his two older (and wiser) sisters, swooned with dizzying delight.

We unabashedly love JUNQUE!

I had NO PLANS on going anywhere yesterday except for ducking into my nail salon for a quick mani-pedi combo.  I'm trying to get my new booth space ready and that means I have a lot of tagging and pricing to do.  Plus~ I'm wanting to make up some fresh white cotton pillows for sale and they take time...

But then while my nails were drying my cell phone rang and...and...and...well...

"Beck!

It's Linda!

Guess what I found today......................................?"

My big sister began to brag her head off tell me about all the fabulous things she snagged at a local thrift store and for the next ten minutes, I promise you, that sibling of mine never once drew a breath!  Now I'm just going to state for the record that Oklahoma has some great places to shop but I've NEVER seen better great junk than what's offered in the state of Tennessee.  I think all those aging country music singers have so much money that when they redecorate they toss out their fabulous old stuff and then my sister sneaks in and buys it all up.

 Anyway...after hearing about Linda's haul I told her how excited I was over all she had found.  Especially the

***FIVE MANNEQUINS***

she STOLE for $5 each!

(she's going to use them for display in her own shoppe...more about this soon!)

Who gives AWAY FIVE MANNEQUINS anyway????

After we said our good[buys] Linda's great finds kept jumping through my head.  Even so, I decided to forgo a thrift store visit opting instead to just return home to start on those white pillows I told you about earlier...

Now...I promise you, I don't know HOW this happened

(I WAS feeling a bit dizzy),

but my car, all on it's own, started driving in the opposite direction of my home and without even realizing it the thing drove straight away to my favorite second-hand store and deposited me right by the front door!

(Tis true!)

  Want to know what was waiting there for me to find?  Just waiting to be rescued and transformed for my brand new booth space????

 Six vintage rockin'-out French Dining Room chairs for an itty-bitty price!  I've shown you pictures of them...five are standard chairs and one has arms!  They probably hail from the early 70's, but who knows?  Not sure what kind of fabric I'm going to use on the seats, but I'm drawn to the plain linen...  I might even make white cotton skirts for them...we'll see!

Anyway...

NOT TO BE OUTDONE or anything by my parent's

favorite oldest child...

And so I immediately dialed my sister's cell phone....

"Linda!

It's Beck!

Guess what I found today..................................?"

(I just love to brag!!!)

So who cares???  My newly found chairs MAY NOT be as good as Linda's FIVE MANNEQUINS~but, hey...they will surely sell and that means money in my piggy bank for my new kitchen remodel!!!

(I'm just sayin'....)

Now...see that white fencie/cabinet looking thingy above?  Well...my Mr. AGPMan built it for me sometime back and I have yet to use it.  It's also going into my new booth space and used for display.  

Pretty cool, huh?  I love it's shabby-chic-ness! :)

Hope your day is wonderful!  I'm off to glue and clamp (yep, the hubster taught me to do that!) and then sand and paint!  Busy day ahead!

Love to you...