The English Armchair Abroad

Sofa - Before and after - and now for sale

After the feather fiasco I thought I would cheer myself up and post a couple of pictures of a sofa I finished two weeks ago.

BEFORE:

I found this while out brocanting and as it fitted into the van how could I resist!  Anyway, it now looks a little cleaner!

AFTER:



All those buttons left my fingers raw and actually that is one of the hazards of buttoning.  The needles are so sharp that you have to pay attention to even the slightest prick otherwise you find blood suddenly dripping on the fabric. 

Anyway, this sofa is for sale.  If anyone is interested please leave me a comment and I'll get back to you!
 

Jamais deux sans trois...

Or "Things always happen in threes"

Today was going really well.  I slept for NINE HOURS last night which is pretty amazing for me.  My lovely husband called to wish me a happy anniversary (26 years and counting for anyone interested) before I called him (any wife will understand the significance of that statement!!).  I worked hard all day and finished the main body of this enormous armchair.  Then I started work on the  seat cushion.  That's when things stopped going according to plan.

First off I realised I was fresh out of raspberry coloured cotton (plenty of white, blue and black though).  The fabric is really lovely but there was no getting away with white.  And it was far too late for me to get to the shop before it closed.  So that was something that wasn't going to be finished tonight after all.  Never mind, I could cut out the fabric ready for some speedy sewing tomorrow. 

I had just finished cutting out the piping and was about to start on the body pieces when I picked up the cushion and noticed a tear in the white fabric.  Thinking how lucky I was that feathers weren't flying around I took it outside and investigated further.  There I discovered that in fact it was a cover covering the cover...if you see what I mean.  So I took it off:  BIG MISTAKE and problem number two.  The original cushion had just been given a quick cover and what I was holding was disintegrating in my hands.  Lucky I had gone outside as feathers were beginning to fly.

I very gingerly put it down out of the reach of the dogs and thanked God it wasn't windy at all;  then back inside to make up a new feather proof box cushion.  This is easily done but I have to admit it is just plain tedious and finickety.  Still, it is now done.

But have you ever had to stuff a cushion with feathers?  Even a small one is a messy business.  You know that expression "What goes up must come down" - well in my experience that is not the case with feathers.  They just go up, preferably into your mouth which ought to be covered with a cloth but of course it wasn't.  As I had put compartments into this cushion I also had to put my arm in up to my elbow and stuff the cushions beyond each of the compartments.  Feathers just everywhere and I was beginning to feel like the abominable featherman.

The third thing then happened.  Having stuffed the wretched thing I had to sew up the opening but of course I had forgotten to take the pins outside with me.  If I carried the cushion in it - well, that would have been REALLY stupid.  So I went inside to get the pins, shutting the door to stop loose feathers following me, and that is when I tripped and the pins went flying.  Oh well, that luckily was the end of the disasters.  I pinned and sewed and took the cushion outside for a thorough beating - therapeutic perhaps, but it was really to remove the remaining feathers and down.  Then the great moment...trying it on the chair for size.  It's slightly wide but that's good as it will be a firmer fit when I make up the cover tomorrow. 

My last job was to hoover up the workroom and the area outside where the feathers were still dancing around.  I have a bagless hoover and by the end of this exercise the thing needed emptying.  Out of habit and perhaps fatigue I went as usual to the large bin in the workshop.  That was close -  it would have been just great to have cleaned up all the feathers from the outside and empty them into the bin inside.  Total disaster was averted.

Off now to put my feather covered top into the machine and me in the shower.

Old Furniture - Not for the Skip

One of the unexpected things about blogging is "meeting" new people through their blogs.  I've mentioned  Rebecca over at Irish Sally Garden before - and incidentally she's started a great forum on her blog: just click the baby goat.  Recently I've been checking in to see BrainFoggles who has had to learn to deal and live with a scary spelling test list of ailments.  And finally (for today) there's Pollys Peri-Wrinkles & Piercings

It seems I spend too much time on the computer blogging but as I have a lot of chairs awaiting my attention in the workshop I have today managed to get a fair bit of work done.  I'm working on a large (very large!) English armchair.  Sadly the client doesn't want it to be totally reupholstered which means it won't be quite so satisfying to me at the end.   However, it will look lovely and she has chosen a beautiful fabric. 

The cost of upholstery is prohibitive for a lot of people.  It's been pointed out to me more than once that you can buy a new armchair for less than the cost of reupholstering an old one.  In fact, if you factor in the fabric you could probably buy two.  However, nothing replaces the quality of the old furniture construction.  Nothing comes close to traditional upholstery techniques (as opposed to foam).  I have two armchairs and a sofa here that my mother-in-law remembers sitting in when she was a child and she won't mind me mentioning that she's no spring chicken!  When we arranged the transport from England to France the transporter actually telephoned my husband to ask if he would like them put into an English or a French dustbin.  But they arrived safely and after repair to the frame of the sofa and complete reupholstery they look great. 

So my advice to readers is this.  If you have a lovely old armchair or sofa that is looking tired and neglected and ready for the skip - DON'T be so hasty!  If you can't afford to have it reupholstered now, put it in the attic and buy something cheap and cheerful.  But one day when you've got enough money together take it out again and get it redone.   Insist on a proper job - ie stripping down to the bare wood, reglueing the joints if necessary - and I promise you won't regret it.
who always brings a smile to my face with her crazy life!

Varroa

I have just spent a fascinating three hours in a class room full of beekeepers at all stages - those who have been doing it for years, those hoping to start this year and others like me who started last year and have so much more to learn.  We were unable to go to Rucher Ecole last year as the dates always coincided with family coming to stay and so I was determined that this year we would do better - well, we can't really do worse than last year!  I must admit that I was just a little worried about the language - my French is good but the vocabulary surrounding beekeeping is not something I am used to talking about in French!  As it happened I needn't have worried.

Today covered three topics:  setting up your hive, varroa and the annual beekeeping schedule (which starts curiously enough in September when you effectively put them to bed for the winter, but still.)

Varroa is a nasty little mite that has the ability to reduce your colonies to zilch in a fairly short period of time.  It's a parasite that feeds off the blood of both the larvae and the bee, weakening and deforming it.  The bee is therefore able to work less effectively and consequently brings less into the hive for the young bees to eat.  The weaker the colony is, the more susceptible to disease it becomes until finally it can no longer survive and dies.  All colonies have varroa (there's a sweeping statement but it's 99% true!) and the survival of the colony rests in the control of the parasite - if you only have a few in the hive (say, less than 50) you'll probably be ok. 


You can see the nasty little bloodsuckers very clearly on the larvae in this picture

I learnt today that varroa are just like nits;  they can transfer from one bee to another even whilst the bees are pollinating the flowers.  So if you are lucky enough to have a varroa free colony there's a good chance your bees will pick it up anyway when they pollinate in areas where there are bees from other colonies.

There are several treatments available and our Beekeeping Association emphasised the importance of treating every year without fail:  prevention (in this case of it developing into a bad infestation) is definitely better than cure.  They have also done tests in France that show that if every single hive in one area is treated at the same time then the results are much more efficient.  Unfortunately, not all beekeepers treat their bees believing perhaps that the problem is small so what's the point or perhaps simply because they just don't want to put chemicals into their hives.

As Varroa has been a problem in Europe for a relatively short period of time (I think it's about 20 years) it's the older beekeepers who seem to be more attentive to the problem.  They have seen their apiaries devastated by Varroasis (the disease from the Varroa mite) and their honey production suffer accordingly.  They have seen the development of this problem from its early years and know that if something isn't done quickly there will be very few bees left. 

The next Rucher Ecole is at the end of March when we visit the school's apiary for the spring visit.  I'm hoping to open mine up before then to get an idea of what has been going on.

PayPerPost

Life is hopefully going to be very productive for a few days.  I am on my own for the week and have many good intentions (where have I heard that before?!).  The house WILL be cleaned from top to bottom, windows included, and the kitchen floor WILL be scrubbed - I'm sure the tiles used to be terracotta.  I have three chairs in the workshop waiting to be started and I hope finished as well as another one which is waiting for the fabric to be delivered.  Tomorrow I'm off the to the first Rucher Ecole (Beekeepers' Association Meeting, French style) of the season and have a list of questions;  as they all concern our two hives I just hope the answers are encouraging.

I've also decided to sign up for payperpost and try to earn a few extra pennies from my blog. I know a lot of people consider blogging for money on a level with selling your soul but I already have Google Ads (who doesn't these day!) and if I can put a few extra pennies in the bank via my blog I'll be glad.

I'm so new to blogging that quite frankly I don't know how it will work out.  One always supposes that advertisers want only positive publicity but I will always call a spade a spade and announce to whoever you all are that I'm being paid for some posts.  I've read blogs which are only publicity and frankly they bore me to tears and so I imagine the same would be true if I started doing it.

Mind you, it's taken me nearly all the evening to work out how to get started!  Luckily they have a great support team who must be in front of their computers even more than I am, waiting for total tech-ignorant bloggers who can't figure out the most basic of things - if only I had a five year old I could probably ask him/her!

It will be interesting to see what "opportunities" I'm offered.  Any comments are welcome!

Restaurant celebration

Sadly next week we won't be together to celebrate our 26th Wedding Anniversary - he's going on a boys only holiday for the week with our youngest son - so last night we went out to a local restaurant to celebrate.  Just occasionally you come across a translation that is great fun for those reading the language into which it has been translated.  So if you want some fun follow the link.

Le Martin Pecheur  is the restaurant attached to the golf club at Sable-sur-Sarthe and very nice it is too.  Mid-week isn't their busiest time but we were not alone in the restaurant.  I had the fish and he had the rabbit.  Both were delicious and we finished with a slightly dry but otherwise very nice banana fritter in a caramel sauce full of cinnamon. 

My only gripe was that the ostrich offered was from "either South Africa or Australia, Madame".  This is ridiculous when there is an ostrich farm less than 30 kilometres away.  Why offer ostrich at all if it isn't local.  Very ostrichtatious in my mind.  The fish and the rabbit were local.

For those golfers amongst you I'm told by people who are in a better position to judge these things (I don't play myself)that the course is very good but the green fees are getting a little high.

The Weather!

After a week of lovely sunny weather today was mostly overcast although still warm.  A little rain overnight but this is an area on drought watch and we could do with a whole lot more during the winter.  There are many Brits in this area who simply don't believe this.  All the rain we had last summer has persuaded them that there couldn't possibly be a drought risk.  But the fact is we could have that amount of rain for about five years and only then be anywhere close to the normal Anjou level.  I admit though that I'd rather it came in the winter and spring than in the summer though!

Last year we bought two small parcels of land adjoining our existing land.  I say "land" and it sounds grand:  we had a big garden and a field;  now we have a big garden and two fields plus a small plot.  Anyway, we want to plant out the two fields with trees and were hoping to do so this spring.  However, once again the rain has not come and we are worried about planting before a potentially dry summer.  The alternative of course is to wait until the autumn. 

Someone said the other day that people will only believe in the changing weather pattern when it affects them.  Surely it is affecting them already?  Surely people notice that fruit trees are blossoming early, that flies are appearing from nowhere in the middle of winter.  Well, we are certainly noticing it here!

How much does it cost to eat?

Well, I must admit I don't know the precise answer to that question.  I do know how much I spend at the supermarket each week but a lot of that is cleaning things, loo paper and other odds and ends.  I came across the $2 a day challenge  this morning and thought I would give it a go.  Unfortunately the week of the challenge is a week when I will be on my own so it will be fairly simple to achieve.  So I thought I would extend it to two weeks - a week on my own followed by a week with husband and fourteen year old son.  Little do they know...!  Note that the $2 per day is only food, not fuel, cleaning items, etc.

We decided that this year we would try to produce as much of our food as possible.  One small part of this of course is the chickens (who are still giving us just the one egg per day).  The veggie plot is well prepared with beds layed out and manure spread in appropriate places.  The potatoes will be going in soon, the first of this year's lettuce is coming up in the greenhouse and I am hoping to see the broad beans poke their noses up any day.  Other seeds are sitting in the seed box waiting for the weather to warm up.  We are rich in fruit trees (figs, pears, cherry, plum, mirabelle, peach/apricot, apple) and they all give generously - although we have to fight the birds for the cherries and they usually win.  Later on in the spring we will be taking delivery of our very first weaners - more when the time comes.  And of course we have our two beehives.

Today is such a beautiful day.  It started off incredibly cold but this afternoon has been gloriously warm.  I went and stood by the hives for a while and the bees are also thrilled with the warmer weather.  Both colonies were out today looking for the early pollen - mostly willow I think but also snowdrops.  You can see the pollen clearly on their back legs when they land on the hive.  They take it inside and pack it into the comb ready to be fed to the young larvae who need the protein to develop.  Bringing in pollen is often a sign that the queen has started laying.  They also took the opportunity to throw out a few of the bees that had died in the hive during winter - spring cleaning I guess!  No prizes for guessing where the expression "hive of activity" comes from.  They are only flying for about two hours at the moment - usually between 3pm and 5pm.  Less if it is cold and not at all if the sun hasn't come out.   It's wonderful to hear them out in the garden again.

I am well aware that any food production we achieve is not even a drop in the ocean. It is also the case that if the weather is not kind, or if we just get it wrong, we can and will put the missing vegetables into the trolley at the supermarket.  But given a halfway decent spring and summer and a reasonable amount of good luck I'm hoping that this year at least we will see the supermarket/garden ratio change significantly.

Let me know if you decide to try the $2 a day challenge and let me know how you get on.

Stripping Down Chairs

The two dining chairs have been safely delivered and two more are in the workshop.  This morning I took all the old upholstery off them and will now take them to the local carpenter who does my regluing for me.

It's extraordinary what you can gather from stripping down chairs.  The first one was a joy.  I suspect it had been done by its owner:  all the holes had been filled, all the previous tacks removed and everything was put on using tacks.  They hadn't been hammered home totally but although that's not a good thing it was a bonus for me today - they came out very easily!

The second one had definitely been done by a professional.  None of the holes had been filled.  Staples had been used and whilst it wasn't as bad as it can be he'd obviously got "stapler happy";  there was no calico   and finally there were still tacks from the previous upholstery for me to remove.  Not fun!

Why don't  I like staples?  Well, straight off I must own up to not only owning a pneumatic stapler but also to using it occasionally.  The problem is that over-used staples seem to just eat into the wood.  They are often a nightmare to remove, damaging the wood still further.  When you remove tacks you should try to knock the tack remover along the grain of the wood.  If staples have been used you obviously can't do that so once again the wood is likely to be damaged.  And finally, if the compressor is set wrong staples also have a tendency to rip the fabric - not too bad if it's the calico but a shame if it's the top fabric and worse still if it belongs to a customer!  Of course they save time - heaps of time in fact - which is why professionals use them. 

In my opinion, for what it's worth, there is a call for staples where the wood is simply too narrow to get the tacks in - for example on the back of a Louis XVI chair (or any other Louis for that matter!);  or if the wood has become very brittle and simply snaps away when you try to tack it.   I also use them when I am upholstering footstools or ottomans - but these are plywood based and hardly antique!

What else did I gather from these two chairs?  Not much, but I did gain two upholsterer's pins (the 10cms long ones!) which had been left in the seats!  In previous chairs I've found loose change, sweet wrappers, children's crayons, rotten peanuts.  Nothing (sadly) of any great value.  For fun I tend to put it into an envelope and hide it back in the chair with an explanation of when it was found.

We have chickens!

Last Thursday I drove to market very early (for me that is!) and came back with two hens and a cockerel.  The previous week my wonderful husband had made a coop for them out of an old display table, begged a piece of corrugated iron for the roof and finally on Wednesday we put a fence around it to give them some night time protection from M. Renard (who took our two very old ducks during the cold spell - see previous post.)

We have been told to keep them in the pen for a week to give them the idea that this is home and all meals (in the form of grain ) will be served here, together with fresh water, but I have to admit I am looking forward to opening the gate for them to come out tomorrow.  I'm also sure that within five minutes I'll be swearing blue murder as they dig up the garden, but I'll deal with that when the time comes!  They've certainly made short work of scratching the grass in the pen.

Anyway, in gratitude for our hospitality the cockerel doesn't crow before 4.15am and is then considerate enough to crow only on the quarter hour - give or take five minues;  usually give! - and the hens, who are only just coming into lay, have paid us with four delicious eggs.  I've only managed to eat half of one as my son eats a cooked breakfast before school and always manages to get there first.  All the same, the egg which I shared with my husband for lunch today was amazing.  Whiter than white, yellower than yellow, tastier than...well, you get the idea!

Just one thing - if anyone can help me out and tell me what breed our chickens are I'd be most grateful! 

   
The very proud cockerel


They are not camera trained yet!