Let me tell you about these chairs...!
Entry posted by rbytsdy
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But first, the banjo clock and upholstered chairs for the living room, that I made from Kris' tutorials. This is the first time that I've tried a sofa (I expanded Kris' patterns for the chairs), but they all turned out well. I lowered all the seats by one thickness of foam board, as I had done for the Calico Critters hedgehog family in the Shadybrook Cabin build.
This is the first time that I have put piping all the way around the cushion (top), but I figured that I had to with the couch cushions, and the others would look funny if I didn't. I'm pleased with how these turned out-- the fabric was a good weight for this.
I had measured that left wall to see how long to make the couch!
Then I turned to another of Kris' tutorials, "bed with faux caning", which is unfortunately not on her blog anymore (but I had printed out this tut to pdf). The mattresses are from her shabby chic bed tutorial. This is the first time I've tried the buttons; they turned out OK, but I might look for some tiny nail art for buttons next time. This is the first time I've tried this bed tutorial; I used Kris' general directions, but I fit the height and width dimensions to what I actually needed for the mice (so I ended up making my own templates). I gessoed them then spray-painted them with the Krylon Chalky Finish spray paint that I've been using (which is actually a slight satin sheen) and I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out.
I got the rugs cheap on amazon.
Now let me tell you about these chairs; I have made the parson's chair quite a few times and they have turned out moderately well, which is why I keep making them...! 
Well these guys fought me the whole way, and it took me a while to figure out why. First of all, the backs were too bendy-- looked like Dr. Seuss curlicue chair backs, so I ended up gluing tongue depressors on the back and dremeling them down (after they'd dried pretty well) so there wouldn't be too much thickness on the back.
So that turned out pretty well. Then I got to the part where I was upholstering the chair backs, and I started to figure out that this fabric was too heavy of a weight for this design. There is some "fabric sculpting" that has to take place on the chair back and the cushion; I have always had difficulty with it, but never had wrinkles like this happening:
So these chairs all had to have boxing to hide all that massive wrinkle, which is the first time I've done this on a parson's chair, but actually I like the way it looks.
I abandoned the original cushions because I couldn't get them to look nice (fabric too thick) and they would make the mice sit too high anyway. Went for a simple pad.
Found some cheap-ish 1mm waxed cotton cord on amazon; I sanded it down a bit with sandpaper before applying so it would stick in place, but it is growing on me-- the cord that I had been getting is a bit bigger, so this looks more in scale.
Finally, some of the little odds and ends that my aunt sent me-- thanks, Aunt J! 
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