Happy Birthday, "Charlie"!

This is the part of my blog that I refer to as "Therapies". I love to paint children's furniture...particularly rocking chairs. My daughter-in-law, Katie, called me; her sister-in-law was looking for a very feminine rocking chair for her little girl, "Charlie's", first birthday. She had looked and looked but

everything had a theme! And she was NOT interested in a princess rocker. I was asked to paint little Charlie a rocker, and I was delighted! I happened to have the rocker shown on hand - sanded, primed, and ready to go. She wanted lavender (and a touch of purple) so I began creating a pretty rocking chair. This is so easy to do and makes a precious gift. I try to keep my cost of the rocker to around $15; paints are usually on-hand (except for special requested colors which are around $.75-$.99 a bottle) and spray varnish which is also on-hand. I began painting little white flowers with dark purple centers in the round on the seat, as well as green vines.


Next, I painted flowers and vines around the flat front of the chair's back, extending flowers down the right arm. On the back of the chair, at the top, I painted a small spray of flowers.


The rockers of these chairs are my favorite thing to paint. Polka dots are our signature! Most linings of items we sew are polka dots. The basis of these rockers are also polka dots. In this case, I used several colors of light purple. But, every time I used the dark purple (used in the center of the flowers) I painted another white flower! A lot of work, but I loved the final product.


And here's "Charlie"...rocking away in her new rocking chair. Mom, Dad, and Charlie love it! And again, I was honored to be a part of her first birthday. (And by the way, little/big brother Jack is jealous. He wants a Red Sox rocker so the search is on for
a compatible rocker!)

Happy Birthday, "Charlie"!