All I Want for Christmas is a Table

With all of the furniture complete in the nursery the husband was able to work on a project for his "little brother."

The husband joined the Big Brother's Big Sisters program years ago.  He was matched with a seven year old and they have been a big part of each others lives for the past 16 years.  I have been lucky to know him for 11 years.  This past year was a big one for the little (actually not so little) brother as he bought his first house at age 21.  He has worked very hard to be in the position to afford and maintain a house. 

He ended up buying a HUD home that needed a lot of TLC.  It has been a great experience for him as he has had to put in a ton of hours ripping up floor boards, scrapping paint and texture off of walls, and replacing plumbing.  I wish I had some "before" pictures to show as it was truly a mess with the walls and carpet in desperate need of replacing.

As part of a Christmas gift the husband made an entryway table for the new house.  The little brother and his girlfriend picked out the design from the web.  In true Wood fashion multiple adjustments were made to the original plans which can be found here.  The husband did end up making one of the drawers a functional drawer which will be nice to have.

Again I unfortunately did not get any in progress pictures but here are some of the finished product.  The husband spent a large amount of time getting the "antique" finish completed on the table.  This took 3 undercoats of the dark paint and 3 of the lighter top paint.  Then came the stressing where he rubbed off the top coats in some areas giving it a worn look with a bunch of character. 

We took the table over to the little brother on Christmas Day and were finally able to see the finished house.  We were treated to a wonderful lunch and he even had Christmas decorations up!  This is such an exciting time for him and we couldn't be prouder of the choices he has made.  Enjoy 2013 in your new home!

Wood - Update - Laundry Room Remodel

According to the husband I am delusional with a weak grasp of reality.

I went into last weekend with the assumption that the laundry room cabinets would be completed by Sunday night.  I am not a complete head-in-the-clouds so I didn’t think they would all be painted…but I did think they would be completely assembled.

So when the husband came in from the garage on Sunday night stating that he had gotten further than he anticipated on the cabinets I assumed that he had started sanding to get ready for painting.

Apparently not.

From project to project I tend to forget that it takes time for things to glue and set.  Gluing ready should hurry up as it is non-exciting bummer step.  I like flashy steps that are quick and progress is right up front and on display.

However it is hard to get furniture that doesn't fall apart without some of the more boring steps.


So what did the husband accomplish last weekend?

The 2 outside cabinent pieces are put together with the face frames.  No cabinent doors yet. 

In the husband's eyes total cabinent domination.  For the wife...I really wanted to paint everything this week.

Patience is not my strong suit.

Wood-Project Update-Laundry Room Remodel

Finally some progress was made on the laundry room remodel.

We got to get this thing done as spring is on the way.  Soon there will be gardening to do, bikes to ride, and pugs to walk. 

The husband took to the wood shop (aka the garage) this past weekend and got a good start on the cabinets.

This project he actually didn't spend too much time drawing out all of the plans.  He sketched out a few things and then started letting the saw dust fly.  I am hoping I don't hear a bunch of cursing coming from outside when he realizes that he didn't have a measurement correct.....I am hoping.

After going back a forth on what material to use we settled on plain old particle board for the interiors.  We chose particle board for a few reasons.

1.  We wanted to do this project fairly cheap as it is the laundry room! 
2. The husband was a bit concerned about the overall weight of the cabinets if they were made out of hardwood plywood.  I plan on loading these bad boys up with heavy stuff like laundry detergent, large bottles of cleaning stuff, and gold bouillon bricks.  Okay maybe not gold bricks but some pretty heavy stuff.
3. I wanted something I could paint or maybe even do some crazy contact paper type lining.  No need for nice wood when you are just going to cover it up.

The of all of the shelving and cabinet pieces will have hardwood face frames so you won't see any of the ugly particle board edges.

The cabinets consist of 3 parts.

The middle piece that is shown above and below will have one enclose shelf, 3 openings for baskets, and then the top of the shelf will be open to the ceiling.  I wanted to be able to put tall decor on top of the middle piece. 

The right and left pieces will be the ones with the doors (no picture as they are not put together yet).  They will each have an upper shelf that will feature a slightly curved molding across the top.  The top of the side pieces will actually be higher than the top of the middle piece.  These 2 pieces will be where the real storage takes place as you can hid a bunch of sins behind a cabinet door.

The husband also wanted to give the project a bit of depth so the side pieces will stick out a bit further from the wall than the middle piece.

I have to say designing the cabinets was pretty fun.  I can't wait to see how they look once they are finished.

Also I may or may not have purchased wallpaper this weekend. 

Black and white stripes no biggy.

Wood & Cloth-Archive-Craft Room

I need a redo.

Last week was not a great one for Wood & Cloth.  Especially for Cloth.  I was so looking forward to last weekend as we had some really warm spring temperatures and abundant sun shine....or so the husband tells me.  I spent the entire weekend in bed with a stupid stomach bug.  I haven't been so wiped out in a long time.  All of my plans had to be put aside as I couldn't even sit upright for more than a few minutes without having to lay back down.  I guess if you are going to be sick over a weekend it is nice if that weekend has one less hour.  I usually bemoan the loss of my hour going to daylight savings time but this year I didn't even miss it...good riddance.

The hits kept coming as the week started.  I had to peal myself out of bed on Monday morning as I had something scheduled at work that I couldn't miss.  In my other non-blog-non-Cloth life....my I-work-hard-for-my-money life I had to fire an employee.  It is always a really hard decision and one aspect of my job that I will probably never be able to do without getting myself worked up.  I often worry that the firing will be the beginning of a downhill slide for the person that will end up with them homeless on the streets.  I don't want to be the cause of that.  I do pull myself back and realize that everyone is responsible for their actions and if the work is not up to par a change needs to be made.


So I went to work still ill, took care of business, went home and crawled back into bed for the rest of the day.


Time for a redo.


While I can't redo last week I can bust open the Wood & Cloth project archive and show the craft room redo we did.  While the bulk of the remodel took place a couple of years ago we have been adding furniture over the years and I recently redid all of my fabric and notion storage just a few weeks ago.

The craft room was one of the first rooms we remodeled in the new house.  I always wanted a room to be able to spread out all of my projects but not have to pick them up every day if I didn't want to.  It is nice being able to hide craft-explosion with a closed door.


Phase 1

I wanted the craft room to have a bit of a country feel with some bright cheery colors.  We put put bead board and a chair rail and painted the room a fun yellow.  The yellow is a story in itself...and why I always buy paint testers now.  The original yellow in the room is now referred to in our house as "retina searing yellow." 

The husband also framed in the window adding to the country feel.

The craft table is one of the first pieces of furniture the husband made for the new house.  It is extra long so that I can lay out a bunch of fabric or crafts and still have room for my laptop and sewing machine.  We actually found the table legs at an antique store.  I almost didn't want to sand them down because they had so much character but in the end I knew I wanted a red table so the old paint and history had to go.

Phase 2

The next big project was a window seat and cabinet/shelf tower furniture set.  This was a really fun project.  Wood got to make the furniture and I got to sew my first box cover and learn how to make pillow cording!  While I did have visions of spending numerous hours sitting at the window reading it is typically occupied by pugs.  I will confess that the husband and I have found that it is a good vantage point for spying on the neighbors.  (Don't act like you don't do it too!)

Phase 3

For the longest time the shelves sat bare except for a few random in process projects here and there.  Oh and of course the TV!  The husband in a move of shear genius got the wife a TV for Christmas one year.  It was a well played move designed to cut down on the complaints about NFL Sunday ticket and the fact the wife wanted to be able to watch Lifetime movies during her Sunday crafting. 


Sneaky.


I finally got around to organizing my fabric and putting to use a few things I had been picking up over the years at garage and antique sales.

The craft room has come a long way from the beginning.  It is truly a room I enjoy spending time in. 


Now I just need to get another project going so I can put last week behind me even if I can't redo it!

Wood & Cloth - Completion - Wood Headboard with Tufted Panel

After having to do all of the button setting and tufting twice (once with the stupidly weak upholstery thread and once with the amazing polycord) I was extremely ready to be done with the headboard project.  If you remember this headboard wasn’t even something we were keeping for ourselves!

Step 1: Checking the Fit

You will want to see how your tufted panel fits into the space you left in your wood frame.  Hopefully you left yourself enough space and it fits in flush to the sides of your opening!

If your panel is smaller than your gap (like ours was with the 1 inch clearance on all sides) and there is space between the inner edge of your frame and your tufted panel you have some options.  The gap may not bother you and you may decide to leave it.  The gap bothered us a bit as we had envisioned the wood frame butting right up against the tufted panel and didn’t like the way it looked to have the frame-gap-panel.  We ended up cutting an additional piece of wood and attaching it to the frame to fill the gap. 

If your panel is bigger than your gap…that stinks!  Unfortunately we don’t have a fix for that.  If it is off by a smidge you may be able to pull your fabric/batting/foam a bit tighter and nudge it in.

Step 2: Attaching the Panel

Position your tufted panel fabric/front side down on the floor and lay your wood frame down on top of it.   You will need to choose screws that are long enough to go through the plywood of your wood frame as well as part of the plywood of your tufted panel. 

NOTE: Make sure that you do not get screws that are too long and go through both layers of plywood and into your foam on your tufted panel.  That would probably mess-up your tufts!

Take note where your buttons are and place 6-8 screws across the back in between buttons.
That’s it you now have a Wood Headboard with Tufted Panel.

Packing Up

Unfortunately for us we did not get to bask in the glow of the project for long.  The brother was waiting for the headboard so the husband immediately began to pack it up for a trip across town.  As much as I didn’t love the design of the headboard in the first place, the look grew on me and I was hesitant to give it away, after all I did risk needles to the heart and sacrificed my thumb in its creation.

We picked one of the worst days possible to transport a fabric headboard across town.  After a relatively mild few months of winter a wet/snowy weather pattern decided to settle in.  The husband assured me that the plastic-wrap/tarps/blankets/etc. would keep the headboard dry…

I was unable to go on the delivery run so I sent my camera with the husband and instructions on how to take one final super picture that would display how amazing the bed frame looked with the bed all made up.   A picture that would make everyone want to drop what they were doing and make their own headboard...this is what I got.

Crumpled pillows, weird lighting and shadows…

Never send a man to take a picture of a “staged” bed. 

Lesson learned.

Wood & Cloth-Update-Tufted Panel

As promised the saga of the tufted panel….  While this wasn’t a complete nightmare, I still don't have the feeling back in my thumb.  Hopefully we can save someone unnecessary frustration, time, and their thumbs with a few tips we learned along the way.  Bottom line is that the end product came out great so if you are thinking about doing a tufted panel headboard go for it.

I was not sure how to start the tufted panel so I Googled “Tufted Headboard Tutorials.”  There were a few of them out there and none of them really seemed to follow the same instructions so we combo'd some of them and ventured out on our own in some places.

Materials:

Fabric of choice

½ inch plywood

Tapestry/Upholstery Needles (2 sizes – one small and one long)

Polycord (must be thin enough to pass through the eye of your needle, we found ours in the upholstery section of Joann Fabric, they sell it in packs or you can buy it by the yard)

*NOTE:  I cannot recommend polycord enough.  We initially used upholstery thread as suggested in the tutorial link.  You will have to read through the rest of the post to find out why upholstery thread is the devil.

Pliers

Button covers (we used these Button Covers )

Batting

Foam (at least 2 inches thick)

Spray Adhesive

Nail/Staple Gun

Step 1: Cut Your Plywood

First we cut the plywood panel to size out of ½ inch thick plywood.  We didn’t want to go any thicker as not only would it cost more but it would also make the overall headboard heavier.

*NOTE:  Technically this note should go into the wood frame portion of the headboard but I forgot!  You will want to give yourself a bit of extra room in your wood frame portion to account for some bulk once you pull your batting and fabric around the edges of your tufted foam panel.  How much you need to leave will depend a bit on the thickness of your batting as well as your fabric.  We planned for 1 inch around all sides….that ended up being too much….. our advice is to plan about ¼ inch to ½ inch on all sides.

Step 2:  Hole Drilling

Next you will need to decide on the pattern you want for your tufts.  We did a diamond pattern verses just a square pattern.  Your spacing is up to you but remember closer you space your buttons the more buttons you will need.  Below is what we ended up doing for spacing.

First row (long row) = 4 inches down from the top of the plywood panel and 4 inches in from the side of the plywood panel.  Buttons were placed every 12 inches.

Second row (short row) = 12 inches down from the first row.  The first button was placed 10 inches from the side of the plywood panel (the original 4 inches from the side plus half of the distance between the first 2 buttons on the first row…4+6=10)

Repeat pattern.  We had 3 long rows and 2 short rows.

NOTE:  We just x’d the spots for where the buttons were going directly on the plywood.  You absolutely want to double check your spacing to make sure everything lines up vertically, horizontally, and diagonally before you drill the holes.  The husband had made a slight error on the first pass and we would have ended up with miss-spaced holes if the wife hadn’t requested a sanity check….just saying!

NOTE:  For the holes you will want to drill a big enough hole to pass through 2 upholstery needles at a time. 

Step 3:  Buttons, Buttons, Buttons

With no possibility of power tool usable the husband quickly found other things to do while I struggled with covering the buttons with fabric. I think the size of the button worked out well but you do have options to go bigger or smaller depending on the type of look you want for your headboard.  Our pattern ended up needing 38 buttons total. 

At this point you can also cut your polycord and thread your buttons.  We cut 18 inch pieces for each button, threaded it through, folded it in half, and tied it with 2 knots.

NOTE:  Covering the buttons was not my favorite part of this project, it was also not my least favorite part.  It is a bit tricky to get all of your fabric edges crammed into the button without them popping back out before you can get the stupid backing cover in place.  The first few are tricky no doubt about it.  Stick with it, by the end I was a button covering fool (emphasis on the fool).  This step could be a real bugger if you have thick or stiff fabric….just something to keep in mind as you are making your selections.

Step 4: Foam

With the buttons covered (no thanks to Wood) we were ready to cut and stick the foam to the drilled out plywood panel.

We used 2 inch foam.  I would not recommend going smaller as you may not get the dramatic indents on the tufts if you go skinnier on the foam.  You could go thicker, but as foam seems to be priced like liquid gold these days and we didn’t want to take out a second mortgage just to buy 3 inch foam, we stuck to the 2 inch variety.

Cut your foam to cover your plywood panel and using spray adhesive tack down your foam to the wood.  Don’t worry if you have to piece together the foam between the spray and the battling (next step) it will stay in place and you won’t even know you have multiple pieces stuck together.

NOTE:  I did find that spraying the adhesive to the edges of the smaller foam pieces as well as the board helped them all stick together nicely.

Step 5: Batting

Get out your nail gun! Now you are ready to lay your batting over the foam, pulling it tight around the edges of the plywood and stapling it to the back.  Try to fold the edges over the corners so they lay somewhat flat.  You don’t want a big goober of batting poking out on all of your corners.

Step 6: Fabric preparation 

The fabric we selected was a microfiber with a bit of a crinkle texture.  I wanted something that would wear well, had a nice feel to it, and wasn’t too thick or stiff.  I wasn’t completely sold on the crinkle texture as I was a bit concerned it would just look “messy” but it was the fabric selected by the brother and it was his headboard. 

Iron out any creases in your fabric before you lay it over the batting.  Make sure you have extra fabric along all of the edges as you will need to be able to pull it around the sides.

Step 7: Positioning the buttons 

We ended up positioning our headboard against our coffee table so that we could work on both sides of the panel.  If possible recruit a helper for the tufting process as it really did make it easier with 2 people.

Be warned this part is a hot mess.  It takes a long time and a lot of muscling through.

**Starting with one of your long rows in the middle of your panel poke your long upholstery needle through from the back of the panel (side without the fabric) through to the front of the panel until you see the needle poke out through the fabric on the other side.  It is helpful to have a second person on the front side making sure the fabric is somewhat taut and lying flat in addition to guiding the needle out.

**Thread the button through the smaller needle.  Both polycord threads should be threaded through the needle. 

From the front of the panel using the large needle that is poking out through the fabric as a guide, poke the smaller needle through to the back of the panel.  The person at the back of the panel can watch for the tip of the needle coming out the hole in the back.  As soon as you can see the needle coming out the backside pull out the longer needle as it is no longer needed as a guide for the hole and it is easier to get the small needle with the polycord through to the back if the placement needle is no longer in the hole.  Because the polycord is rather thick the person on the backside of the panel will most likely need to grip the smaller needle using a pliers and pull through.

NOTE:  Be careful here not to stab yourself as you are pulling the needle with the polycord through to the back.  I had multiple times when I was seriously concerned I was going to impale myself in the heart.  Thankfully that did not happen, but all the same be careful.  At this point you may be asking yourself why not use a thinner thread so that it is easier to pull through…why indeed?  Because it breaks!  We may or may not (MAY) have done the entire panel twice.  Once using the tutorial recommended upholstery thread and once using the polycord.  The thread was a complete nightmare.  We not only had things break while we were setting the tufts but we woke up to find that 4 buttons had busted during the night sending the small projectiles across the room.  After much swearing, and maybe a little crying on my part, we decided to not only redo the ones that had broken but the entire panel.  We were concerned that as soon as someone leaned against the headboard additional buttons would let fly and potentially someone could lose an eye.  (If you hadn’t noticed by now I have pretty good fear of bodily harm…impaling myself in the heart, having a button shoot my eye out…etc.)  Even though the polycord is a bit of a pain to get pulled through we didn’t have any breaks and I never once feared for my eyes.

**Continue placing the buttons for your long rows (just get the polycord pulled through, don’t nail or pull to tuft) until you get them all ready to pull and tuft.  Don’t work on the short rows yet.  Do those after you have your long rows completed so that you can really set the pleats on the tufts.

Step 8: Tufting

Once all of your long row buttons have been pulled through you are ready to set the button and staple it in place.  The husband and I found the best way to do this is again to have one person on the front of the panel pushing the button hard against the board while the other is behind the panel pulling the polycord tight and placing the staples. 

The stapler will make at least 4 zigzags with the polycord and staples to make sure that the cord doesn’t just slip out.  If I had to do this over I would volunteer for the stapling job verses the pusher as this is the step that has the potential to make your thumb go numb.  In order to really get a deep tuft you need to apply a pretty good amount of force to the button.  Don’t let up on pushing the button after the first staple is placed as it will most likely still slip until at least 2 of the staples are inserted. 

After you have your long rows set you are ready to pull through the buttons for the short rows and then the fun of tufting begins! 

You will set your short row buttons in the same manner, however you will want to pay attention to how the fabric gathers as you push in the button.  Work the fabric with your fingers in order to get it to bunch-up how you want it.  Once you get it tufted how you want you will set the staples in the same manner as before.

Homestretch….

Step 9: Attach the fabric to the back

After all of the pulling, pushing, stapling and tufting you are now ready to flip your panel over and pull the extra fabric around to the back.  Just like with the battling you will want to pay special attention to the corners.  Try to make it pretty and reduce the bulk at the corners so that your panel will lay flat inside your wood frame.  You don’t have to worry too much about bulk as the screws you will be using to attach the panel to the wood frame will help pull the 2 pieces together nicely.

Place your staples and cut the excess fabric.

You now have a tufted panel!

Next up....securing the tufted panel to the wood frame....

Wood & Cloth –Update– Wood Headboard

This past weekend was a 3 day weekend for Wood & Cloth.  That meant we went full crazy on the headboard project.

The wood portion of the headboard went together with relatively few issues.  The same cannot be said for the tufted panel (more on that tomorrow.)

First the plywood for the back was cut to size and additional plywood pieces were placed along the edges to create the basic frame for the tufted panel.  This step is to give the frame a bit more chunk/depth but keep the costs low by using cheaper wood. 

Next step was to miter and cut out popular pieces (prettier than the plywood) to create the outside “visible to the eye” part of the frame.   As the husband has figured out it is always a good idea to spend a little time on the miters so they line up nicely but you can always do a bit of “fill” work with wood filler if they are not perfect. 

TIP:  If you plan on staining your frame it has been our experience that wood filler (even the stainable kind) never looks quite right.  If you are painting no problem…paint hides a multitude of sins!

Next the molding was mitered and attached to create the front part of the frame.  The picture is not the best to show the detail on the molding (as the wood shop/garage door had to be closed due to the hurricane strength wind gusts we were having) but we selected a bulbous design....again we were trying to get a “beefy” frame to really contrast with the tufted panel.



To make the legs for the headboard poplar was used on the outside edge (for look) and a 2x2 was notched into the inner side for additional support.  Because this headboard will be attached to the wall for stability we didn't need the legs to be able to support the headboard as a free-standing item.  If you are not planning on attaching your headboard to the wall you will most likely need to build chunkier legs with a bigger footprint or plan on attaching rails for stability. 

One final piece of poplar was attached to the front of the legs to hid the 2x2.  This addition also brings the leg flush up to the molding on the frame piece.

On to painting!

We used our favorite black (Black (Forever) from Behr) to paint all of the parts of the headboard that would not be covered by the tufted panel in our "paint room."  This is the only room in the house that the pugs and sawdust are not allowed.  Nothing messes up your painting like dog hair!

At this point in the project we were feeling pretty good about how things were coming together.  

Then we started on the tufted panel.... 

Wood & Cloth – Beginning – Wood Headboard with Tufted Panel

The husband’s brother made a birthday gift request this year that was just too fun/challenging to turn down.  He wanted us to make a custom headboard for the new king size bed he had just purchased.  This is the first project that we are undertaking that will be for someone else based off of their idea inspiration.  We have made things for others in the past but we are the ones that select the pattern.  While this would not be my first choice for a headboard design for our home it matches his style perfectly.  The inspiration photo is shown below.  Thankfully there are a bunch of tufted headboard tutorials on the web (thanks Pinterest) so we hopefully won't have to figure that out from scratch.

The first steps are to figure out the dimensions needed (the husband), do some recon on fabric options (the wife) and come up with a pattern design and cut list.