Summer Projects #2 & 3-Wagon Chairs & Pillows

Several years ago, I brought home two old chairs from my grandmother's garage. They belonged to my Great-grandmother and we think they were made by my Great-grandfather. I remember them sitting on her front porch. The chairs have short legs and the chair seats were made of some type of fabric strips that had rotted. I cut off the strips and stored the chairs in Bob's workshop.

I kinda forgot about them.....

Then a few summers ago, I took the boys to our local historical museum. Sitting in one of the rooms was a chair very similar to mine. The chair was called a Wagon Chair because the shorter legs would not tip over as easily in the back of horse-drawn wagon. I came home, dusted off the chairs and thought about refinishing them.

And then I kinda forgot about them....again....

Finally, I brought the chairs into the house, painted them black, and sat them by the piano. I wasn't sure what to do with the chair seats. So for the past year or so, I've had two Wagon Chairs sitting in my living room without any seat bottoms...

...and yes, more than one visitor to my house has given me a strange look as a result..

But I could not figure out what to do with the seat bottoms. I've tried and tried to find someone to cane the chairs for me. It seems that very few people are willing or know how to cane a chair anymore. I did find a gentleman in Kentucky who offered to re-do the chairs, but he's in Kentucky and I don't exactly visit Kentucky on a regular basis.

So the chairs sat neglected and forgotten...

A few weeks ago, I was in the fabric store and I happened to notice a roll of twill tape. Light bulbs went off (which is a very rare event these days), and I remembered my chairs.

I was tired of the black, so I repainted , dug around on the Internet for weaving tutorials, and finished the first chair. Summer project #2 is almost finished...the other chair is still waiting for me to paint it.

I also found some cute summer fabric for pillows. Summer project #3 was a piece of cake....compared to Summer project #1 :)

I think they turned out pretty well and I'm enjoying another piece of my family's history.