Happy New Year and New Ottoman!

Happy New Year everyone! I did not manage to stay up past midnight CST, however, I did watch the ball drop in NY on tv. Instead I was more focused on reupholstering our beloved ottoman. It is something we use everyday to put our feet up while we're sitting on the couch. It came from Steve's grandma and was originally a sea foamy green velvety material. The cats have gotten some good scratches out of that thing, though they were not encouraged to do so. (Click on the photo to see more.) It was time for a change.

Steve has been eyeballing some leather ottomans from Crate & Barrel for some time now. So I decided to go with some nice looking vinyl and that I found at Vogue Fabrics about a week or two ago. It is an espresso color with cocoa colored areas between the "scales".

I had expected this project to take a while, but I was armed with a staple gun and finished it within a couple of hours. I did use an upholstery needle to stitch the corner edges where the fabric overlaps. I might need to put a few more staples in as time goes by. I also removed the skirt around the bottom to make it look cleaner and more modern. This really feels like a new piece of furniture!!!

Hopefully the cats will not destroy it, but so far they have not shown any interest in it. I also started spraying it with Feliway every now and then to discourage them from marking it with their claws.

Before & After

And after all that I fell asleep watching Elf. We didn't even pop open our bottle of champagne.... oh well. I'm not a big New Years Eve person. I think I had trouble staying up last year, too. It's better to go to bed and then wake up early to start the year off fresh.

Tomorrow, my vacation ends. But then I still have the weekend!