I finally got my little green bedroom chair finished the other day.
It was a relief to get it done, I felt like I was going round in circles, so many 'sides' to it and three coats of green paint on each one, but it was worth it, and as Ginger is currently sleeping on the table on his new favourite cushion I think he's glad to see the back of it too and have Mother, the Christmas cacti back for company. He's fickle that cat, the wigwam on the freezer is now deserted and he loves the table ... he moves from pillar to post and of course because he's just so gorgeous we let him :-)
This chair has history. It's one of a pair that was my Nana's (my Dad's Mum) wedding present off her Dad. He also made her and three of her five sisters a full suite of bedroom furniture as the rest of the gift. He was a Master Cabinet Maker but as he didn't make chairs he bought my Nana two pairs of bedroom chairs. You can see from the seat that it has been replaced, many years ago the fancy rattan that made up the seat fell to bits and was replaced with a punched out piece of plywood.
Great Grandad had his workshop above a couple of blokes starting out in the motor car trade, whenever he made a large piece of furniture he would lower it through a trapdoor into their garage space rather than struggle down the stairs and they would help him move it out. The guys were called Mr Rolls and Mr Royce, they got a little bit more famous than my Great Grandad ever did .... but back in the day they all shared a building and no doubt a lot of laughs.
I used this chair to stand on while I did all the painting when we first moved into this house, I don't do ladders and find a chair a much sturdier and safer option. I'm sure it's not the use my Great Grandad had in mind for it when it was bought, but I'm also sure that he would have approved of it still being used and loved to this day.
More freebies arrived the other day. A copy of a sister magazine to the one I got as a subscription to for Christmas and ten packets of seeds to add to my free seed stash tin.
I'm not taking them up on the other 'free' offers as each one only comes free if you pay rather a lot of postage!!
But not a bad little haul.
A folder to keep the magazines in, a free magazine, a wall chart of when to plant what and £19.28 worth of seeds. Of course all through the year the magazine will also come with free gifts so it will be interesting to see what it all adds up to over the course of the year.
I have kept a record of my Kitchen Garden freebies all through last year, that subscription runs out with the March issue so I will be seeing what that total adds up with that one as well.
Sue xx
How lovely to keep that old chair going Sue. If only it could talk.
ReplyDeleteWhat a wonderful thing to have. I had no idea there really was a Mr. Rolls and a Mr. Royce.
ReplyDeleteChair looks good Sue in your favourite colour green. The freebies are well worth having. 10 packets of seeds, that's a good start to this years' seed collection. What I think would be really handy is the wall chart of when to plant - must look out for this mag! Regards, Louise S. Cheshire.
ReplyDeleteI enjoy reading Kitchen Garden which I read online from the e magazines from the library. No free seeds but no subscription either. Love the chair, I prefer a chair to a ladder for jobs any day, people say it is dangerous but I find it more sturdy and the back is a useful hand hold.
ReplyDeleteWell done on the chair it looks great. That darn postage is what always spoils the offer.
ReplyDeleteThe chair has a new lease of life! I'd struggle to get anything done with that view to distract me though :) I have a beautiful Georgian chair my brother refurbished for me in my bedroom, but it certainly wouldn't cope with me standing on it!! I will need to recover the seat pad when we move as the cats have ruined it :(
ReplyDeleteLovely chair and the colour is fab. I am thinking what to grow this spring. Definitely runner beans and sweet peas, they did so well last year.
ReplyDeleteA lovely chair - my Grandad had one in the bedroom with a punched ply seat like that. I wounder where his went?
ReplyDeleteIt's always fun to have one of those treasures in the family, all refinished and usable. Good job!
ReplyDeleteHow wonderful to own a chair with so much history. I'm sure your grandfather would be proud to think its still being useful and loved.
ReplyDeleteThat's a lovely history and now, you're adding to it. Love the color, too.
ReplyDeleteWhat an elegant chair and what an interesting story, fascinating.
ReplyDeleteI was given a rocking chair that once belonged to my great-uncle. It was quite basic really, like an old fashioned kitchen rocker. It had engraving on both the wooden back panel and seat panel. Unfortunately someone had painted it white before it came to me so we had it professionally stripped of paint. When we got it back the panels were missing and we were told that they'd been damaged in the stripping process. We then found an upholsterer who managed to make it good by covering other wooden panels in a green moquette material. He did express his doubts about the original panels being damaged saying that the panels would have been valuable. Anyway the rocker looked really good after he'd finished it and our daughter who had always expressed an interest in it now has it in her bedroom in Devon.
ReplyDeleteJoan (Wales)
Sorry, it wasn't moquette, it was a finely scrolled velveteen material with small flowers on it.
DeleteJoan (Wales)
I love the color of the chair, and happy your kitty has the perch back.
ReplyDeleteThat was a cute story with the garage, I'd like to see people letting down furniture like that nowadays!
oohh I love the chair and what a wonderful story about your grandfather to go with it he would indeed be proud and pleased that it was still going strong and being loved. I have never seen that magazine Sue and I would love to have look through it can you get on the highstreet ie WH smiths? dee x
ReplyDeleteI've never seen this magazine in the shops either, it was part of the free gift package that came with my new subscription to Grow Your Own magazine. But I guess WH Smiths would be the best place to look for it :-)
DeleteWill you be giving blow-by-blow updates when you start planting the veg seeds? I'd like to follow along?
ReplyDeleteI love the story about your chair. I have a table and 4 chairs made by my great-grandfather for my grandmother's wedding present about the time of the outbreak of WW1. He was a chairmaker by trade and made chairs for Queen Victoria - my family's claim to fame. I love the history behind them.
ReplyDeleteGood freebies and a fantastic chair!! xx
ReplyDelete