12 Jul Inspired Inspirational Inspiration? or Craft Junkie?

Hear that photo up there? It's the Thonet, in that rough, male accent that is a pithy cross between a Bostonite and New Yorker calling out: "Pppst — it's your old new pal — you picked me up on the street corner remember?  You recovered me in this luxurious burned-out, mod velvet to match the lamps shades you made from old sheet plastic and corset boning — it may be time to stain my arms pretty with one-uh-dem sponges and then wipe me down with teak oil."

Awww-yeah.  Then again, it could be the whooshing of my sanity fleeing the scene and my family complaining that the furniture has been reconfigured for the fifth time. I am my own Makerfaire it seems, and I've even managed to make the dogs fools. 

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It seems that I have reached that time in every good woman's life where I am experienced enough to have figured out that if "it" is something that has been made, than someone had to make it — and with the current state of the world, that someone may as well be me. In the past year +, I've steam bent poplar into submission, almost finished a solar trailer for kids (that managed to not fall apart after the third incarnation), dressed and undressed my windows, and replaced my Eurway couch with several versions of 'couch-de-rene' where the first seemed to redefine how one interacts with a couch.

Yes, with enough gusto you too can make your very own couch!  These are my first: The top one was made from a free couch that I stripped, gutted, reshaped, and put back together and you couldn't sit on the sides or it would pop apart.   The bottom one was made on an old Ikea futon frame and I designed the coushions shorter than the platform and inset a table.

This may beg the question — when does upcycling stop being 'Eco' and start becoming an obsession?  I bought my 1959 "starter home" in South Austin in 2006 — I love small houses, and it's in excellent shape – but it's an odd layout, and was built by someone that apparently missed living in an apartment so much that they built one in a yard and called it my house.

Frustrations aside until I can remodel, here is my latest living room incarnation (and yes, I refuddeled the couch to make it my own), that I happened to finish this afternoon:

Where I can spend time roaming the web through sites like Atomic Ranch, Inhabitat, and my current favorite –  this blog! — One couple, four kids, and two dogs renovating a Fred Bassetti home (whom has a great article on how to make money on Etsy).

I long to live vicariously through you, dear readers, and am jonsing to see what you've done with yourselves, your living spaces, and in your shop/craft/laboratories. Email me with your pictures at modernmakergal@gmail.com and you may see them posted here in the weeks to come!