I Have a New Tip!

I have a great tip I have not seen in Blogland.

I revolves around my next project.  You will see a glimpse of it here.

I have these chairs.....

As you can see one needed some glueing.  A couple of them had holes in the Caning....That would not do so I was going to do what Miss Mustard Seed did here.

BUT I got to thinking that was going to be a lot of work and material.....Could I do anything else?   hmm 
Then I thought of the way I redid these chairs.

If I could get my new chairs from this:

To looking like this all open and happy and free....

I could then Upholster them with a lot less material and I think,  work....

Well while I was pondering this Mr. Sensible was as well. We both came up with the same idea if we could get the caning out we would be where we wanted to be.  First we tried to pry the reed out of the channel that holds the caning.  That didn't work, it was wedged in there REALLY well. Then we thought if we could cut off the caning  using a razor blade knife and sand down the reed that might work. 

THEN we thought of this baby.....

the tool we got for Christmas last year.  (I believe a few bloggers have been giving this away and I must say it is so worth getting.)  I have not been compensated by Dremel for this blog, but let me say its handy!

Our Dremel with the really thin blade...  Have you guessed what we did yet?

We put that chair up on the work bench, got out the Dremel and .....

Went to town on that chair....We cut down both sides of the reed.  It cut really well.  Although you did have to use a bit of pressure,  that is why Mr. Sensible is doing it instead of me, plus he does not exactly trust me with power tools I have no idea why?  (can you say cut electrical cords?  But that is mostly with the outdoor hedge trimmer ;)

Notice the picture is blurry he never stops not even for a picture :)

Then we popped that reed right out, where we could, cut it down level with the chair where it wouldn't come out. Took the caning out for sure.

Then sanded off the rough parts.  There is a channel left but when the fabric gets stapled on it will cover it quite nicely and you won't see it.

 Here it is finished.. notice the caning in the background?  I will use that for a pattern for my fabric.

Now I can move forward with this project... Stay tuned.


Have a great week.