About a month ago I won an auction for this really cool, vintage, rocking chair.  It's so old it's TINY (BEFORE the age of Lazyboys) and does not recline at ALL!!!  It came with a matching footstool.  



It was a nice little footstool, but as cross stitch stuff piled higher and higher on top of it I couldnt help but think of how much COOLER it'd be if it had hidden storage in it.  What it NEEDED was a box!!!!

So first I pulled the cover off carefully.  I don't plan on recovering my rocking chair anytime soon, since it's already an acceptable crushed red velvet, and I like the foot stool to match.



After I got all the fabric, and cushioning off, I unscrewed the legs and had this ....



Just two pieces of plywood held together by 4 strips of lumber.  It was all stapled together.

I measured the space and got 23 1/2 X 14 and made a box this size outta 1 X 8's.  I used a brad gun to connect everything since I couldn't find my drill chuck.  (the chuck holder broke off the cord)  I then attached the bottom board that came with the footstool.



I carefully put the bottom cover back on, stapled it, and put the legs back on.



I attached the padding to the lid plywood, but I couldn't get it to stretch as far as it was supposed to go so I sewed gold blanket edging to the top cover, and attached it by stapling it to the bottom of the lid.  (It was warped from being sat on for the last 60 years, so I flipped it over to get warped flat again.



Then I attached two brass hinges to the box and then attached the lid to the hinges while someone held it up for me.  After that I realized that even when the box was closed, you can see the lip of the wood box, so I took the staples holding the top of cover to the box out, restretched it higher and restapled it.  Then I painted the lip if the box hold to match the blanket binding so it's not as obvious.  



After the paint dried, I threw everything in!!!



Here's Maddy chillin on the new footstool.  



It was a LOT easier than I thought it would be!!!!  It didn't take very long at all.  I'm sure it would have taken even less time if I hadn't run outta staples, or didn't have kids and puppies to keep up with while doing this, but still a VERY quick project and I'm VERY happy with the result!!!  The only thing missing is every time I open it I expect it to be a antivampire weapon chest straight outta Buffy!!! lol    *thumbs up*  

I had seen an old phone (one of the bedside touch tone phone that they switched to when they didnt want us using rotary phones anymore) turned into a slick looking iphone home on the web somewhere.  When I saw this challenge I wanted to try making one.  I found this challenge pretty late and couldn't find the kind of phone I wanted in any local resale shops, and I didnt have time to wait for ebay so I went up in my mom's barn loft and found this ....



I found two unlikely candidates....



I chose the princess phone on the left.  

First I gutted the phone, which other than a LOT of dust was OMG *really* easier than I thought it would be.  I expected it to all be riveted together, but it was mostly flathead screws.  It made going alot easier than I expected. I then had to scrub the phone with nail polish remover.  My little sister had tried to paint the phone with pink nail polish back in the 80s.

Second I painted the body of the phone and the body of the handset glossy black, and the little screw parts of the handset brass like the one I had seen online.  Then I decided that I hated it.  *thumbs up*  It just didnt LOOK steampunk at ALL!!!  It LOOKED vintage Hollywood, which while GORGEOUS in its own right, was NOT what I was going for.  

So I then painted the body of the phone and the body of the handset hammered copper, the screw on parts of the handset shiny copper.  I peeled the old leather off the bottom piece of the phone and painted it brass.  I also took apart the button assembly, cleaned all the buttons with fingernail polish to get any nail polish splatter off them, and spray painted the button carriage brass.

I had a lot of trouble painting the phone. I tried to spray shellac is and it ate the paint off and I had to start over.    It was a LEARNING process!!!

While everything was drying I took apart a cell phone headset.  I had to get a converter piece to make it work for an iphone.  That piece is purple in the picture.  When the handset was dry I threaded the headset through it.  I glued the black cord in place so it couldn't get pulled too hard and shift everything inside, then I stuffed the inside with pillow stuffing and carefully screwed the handset screw pieces into place.  I tried to glue the parts of the headset to screw parts, but then realized I couldn't screw them on after that.  giggle.  So I had to unglue them and rely on the stuffing to hold them up to the little holes in the screw parts.  

I had SO much fun calling everyone I knew to try the handset out!!! It works AWESOME!!!!  *thumbs up*

While waiting for everything to dry I also cut three identical pieces of black felt.  One piece of felt I glued to the bottom of the phone to protect whatever surface I put the phone down on.  The other two I glued together and then glued to the inside of the bottom of the phone to protect my iphone when I put it inside.  

I put the push button assembly back together and glued it to the top inside of the phone.  Now I can push the buttons.  They even pop back up after I push them down because I put the springs and everything back together.    They don't *DO* anything.  I just like pushing the buttons.  

After all the glue was dry I laid the iphone in the bottom of the phone and plugged it into the charger and closed it.  It *does* ring while inside the phone, but I cant answer it without taking the top off.  But once I answer it I can put the top back on and talk through the handset all I want.  Its not what I really wanted, but its *really* cool for what I had to work with!!!  

The little buttons in the cradle, and the little plastic for over the number place are missing.  They were misplaced during the disassembly.  

Doing this challenge I learned how to sprat paint plastic, how NOT to spray paint plastic, how to disassemble a phone, how to put a phone button assembly apart and together, how to take apart a headset (in this case I had to use a hammer), and how to solder (a wire came loose while I was threading the headset through the handset).  I ALSO learned that it WILL be okay if I take things apart (it was discouraged in our house growing up), and that I CAN finish things and they *work*!!!  I have disabilities that made it emotionally and mentally hard for me to finish this project, but I pushed through them and finished, and ENTERED!!!!    I couldn't have done this a year ago.  I am *very* proud, even if its not exactly how I wanted it to be!!!  







Next time I make an vintage iphone home I'll try wiring an actual hand set to a iphone head set plug like in this tutorial .... http://steampunkworkshop.com/articles/phone so I can use the cool curly cord.  But Im happy with my first effort.  It WORKS!!!

I found a picture/collage/mat free floating at a resale shop.  The mat was dark forest green and the ribbon was a dark green and tan check.  Very 80's country kitchen ugly.  I bought it and a country blue frame with a 80s folksy country verse in it.  I carefully pried it all apart and cut a pink mat out of an old file folder with an xacto knife.  Then I replaced the ugly ribbon with a pale loopy pink ribbon.  I spray painted the frame with brass spray paint and put it all back together with elmer's glue & double sided tape, and framed it.  What was ugly, horrible, outdated, & country before is now very sweetly, delicately, Victorian.    Im SO excited!!!  I LOVE it!!!