Hand Painted Child’s Rocking Chair Peter Rabbit Inspired

Hand Painted Child’s Rocking Chair

Welcome back friends.  Today I’m tackling this little wooden child’s rocker I picked up from an online auction.  It was in a lot with 2  other small chairs and a child’s table.  The chairs and table caught my eye after I tackled the table and chairs from a couple weeks ago.  The rocker just came along for the ride.

I’m always up for another project.

What I couldn’t see from the online pictures of the rocking chair was this nice little split in the arm of the chair.

 

But more importantly, was this big ol’ crack in the rocker of the chair.  A rocking chair is not a rocker if this slat is broken.  That’s an issue. 😕

The rocking chair just sat in my basement for a few weeks while I contemplated his fate.  Is it trash?  I didn’t think so.

On the bright side, the rocker slat was super easy to remove, only being held in place by a couple of screws.

My idea was to remove the rocker and use that as a template on a piece of hardwood.

That would work, I just needed to find a piece of wood the right thickness and be able to cut a straight line.

Fate intervened before I found my perfect piece of wood.  I found this part of an old rocker in a dump pile.

Have you ever had something occur when you put it out to the universe?  I’ve had it happen a few times.  Is it divine intervention? Guardian angels?  Hmmmmmm…. Maybe, I don’t think in all my years of scavenging I’ve ever found a piece of a rocker…just sayin.

That rocker piece I found was exactly twice the width of my current rocker board.  It was just a matter of feeding it thru my table saw.  Now I had 2 matching rocker boards once again.

I still had to  cut off and round the ends, which I did with a jigsaw, and of course, sand the edges.

The hole that I patched above was from a dowel that held this rocker onto it’s former chair.

I repaired the arm of the chair with this Loctite super glue.  This is the liquid, not the gel.  It just flows right into tight spaces.  Clamp in place until dry.

Use this same glue if you have any loose spindles.  It gets right into those tiny nooks and crannies.

Sand down all that shiny paint, hopefully with an orbital sander and not by hand, and get your piece ready for painting.

Now is the time to choose what you would like to paint on your chair.  I’ve painted Peter Rabbit before as he is one of my favorite characters, and I’m painting him once again.

Choose whatever appeals to your child, or your inner child.  Print out your character on a full sized sheet of paper.

I’ve painted the entire chair with 2 coats of a sage green chalk paint.  I’m now ready for my hand painting.

If you’re good at sketching, you can skip this step.  If you like a little assistance transferring your image to your chair, scribble on the back of your image with pencil, pastel or, as in this case, charcoal.

Tape your image to your chair and trace along the outline and any other details with a pen thereby transferring the image to your chair.

You’re now ready for painting.

Most of the paints I’m using for Peter are inexpensive acrylic paints found in 2 oz bottles at your local craft store.

For the outline of Peter, I’m breaking out my black Micron  drawing pen.  Also available at craft stores.

I didn’t want Peter to be standing all alone in the middle of my chair seat, so I gave him a fun little meadow with flowers and carrots.

Much of the meadow was painted with the same paint markers I used for painting rocks a few weeks ago. I am loving their versatility.

More carrots are lined up on the back of the chair.

Coat your final project with a paint on or spray polyurethane.

This was my first rocking chair and I will definitely be on the lookout for another rocker the next time I’m at the thrift.

As for the table and chairs that were also purchased at the auction, I hope to share those with you next week.

Until next time, stay inspired.