Rocking Chair Rehab

My parents offloaded a lot of their old house to our new one. A fantastic maple dining table and chairs, a chest of drawers, most of my dad's tools (a lot of which were actually my grandfathers' tools...which makes them even more awesome).

And this.

It's a child-sized rocking chair. It was my dad's, when he was a kid. The seat cover is crocheted, we don't quite remember which relative made it (either my Gram, or my great-grandmother), we only know that it was very dingy from years spent languishing in a Michigan basement. 

See what I mean? 

As much as I love crochet items, I thought it was time to bring this little rocking chair into the 21st century. 

This was one of the easiest projects I've done. All it took was a bit of patience, some batting, some fabric, and a staple gun. And the patience was truly optional, it took about 20 minutes altogether. But sometimes you get interrupted by a toddler. 

(Bad lighting, had to use the flash, but...you see? Sometimes you just have to stop.)

So, first step was pulling all the old staples:

Someone has done this before.

And then pulling off the old padding:

And then I forgot to take a picture, but I replaced the padding with a double-layer of quilt batting, and a piece of plain muslin on top. And stapled everything to the underside of the seat.

No one sees the underside, anyway.

Notice how that munchkin has a different shirt on? That's one of those interruptions I mentioned.

And now for the top layer:

 This is not an exact science.

And, as I said, no one sees the bottom.

 See how pretty it looks from the right side?

Yes, that is Dr. Who fabric. I found it on Spoonflower. 

And that's it. Less than 20 minutes of hands-on time, under an hour with toddler interruptions. Pretty awesome! Added a bit of furniture polish, and you'd never know this chair is older than the television show that inspired the fabric.