When I posted about the Mansard Victorian’s nursery, I left off wondering if the William Clinger rocking chair was a good fit for this room.

I’ve had my eye on this comfy-looking JBM rocking chair, but it’s expensive. It seemed like it would go well with the nursery furniture, but I didn’t want to buy it and then find the colors weren’t a good match. (Photo is from Miniature Designs.)

Since I’m on a quest to furnish this house with Bauder-Pine and Cassidy Creations furniture, I decided to try bashing a Cassidy Creations Sheraton wing chair into a rocking chair.

For the bottom, I’m using the bottom of a Shenandoah rocking chair. I have a few of these lying around so I didn’t mind destroying one of them.

It was pretty easy to wiggle out the leg pieces. Some of the pieces came unattached in the process but they all stick into little holes, so gluing them back together was also easy. And the top of the chair won’t go to waste — I can add different legs to make it a regular chair.

The Sheraton chair’s back legs are part of the side pieces, so I had to cut these off. I saved the pieces since I might be able to use them on another chair someday.

To mark where the legs go, I drew on the tips with Sharpie and then pressed the legs into the seat.

Then I drilled holes with the micro drill. (Sorry for the fuzzy picture.)

The two holes at the back are at a 45-degree(ish) angle since the back legs are slanted.

I painted the bottom with the same off-white paint and tan wash I used on the crib slats. Here it is next to the sample piece I made when I was working on the crib.

After I redid the nursery fabric a couple weeks ago, I placed a new order for Restoration Hardware swatches. The Ultra-Fine Organic Cotton swatch is the same fabric I used on the crib and changing table. For some reason the website would only let me put one of these in my cart, but I was able to order multiples of the same color in Washed Linen-Cotton.

I decided to use the Washed Linen-Cotton this time since 1) it’s thicker and would (theoretically) be easier to work with, and 2) I had two of them, so I wouldn’t risk running out.

This was my first time assembling a Cassidy Creations upholstered chair, and actually one of my only experiences making upholstered furniture. When I made sofas for the Victorianna, I used suede scrapbook paper, which is much easier to cut than fabric, and doesn’t fray.

I won’t bore you with step-by-step pictures, but this kit was challenging for me. One problem I had is that the fabric templates in the instructions are much too big, so I had to wing it (no pun intended).

I don’t think I did this wrong, but I ended up with seams that don’t get covered up where two pieces of fabric meet on the insides of the wings.

Also, the foam that came with the kit is very flat. (Partly, I’m sure, because it’s decades old — I have more than one of this kit and the foam has crumbled in some of them.) I should have replaced it, but I didn’t, and as a result my chair is a lot less comfy looking than the JBM chair.

And while the fabric is heartier than the ultra-fine I used for the crib and changing table, it’s still delicate and frays easily, as you can see… well, everywhere.

At least its tendency to fray allowed me to pick at it and expose the holes I’d drilled.

When I decided to use the Shenandoah rocking chair for this project, I did so because the seat of the Cassidy Creations chair and the Shenandoah chair were essentially the same size. I didn’t consider how much bulk the side pieces add. Now I’m waffling between thinking it looks okay and thinking it’s comically top-heavy.

Adding piping helps with the messy seams. I used three strands of DMC 414. A different thread that doesn’t separate into strands like this would probably look better.

Definitely not perfect, but I think it’s decent for a first attempt. I thought about adding a lace skirt to make it less top-heavy, but I do like the legs, so I’m not sure I want to cover them up. Thoughts?

This side of the chair looks neater, so I rearranged the furniture to display it this way.

I’m going to cross stitch some pieces from the June Grigg pamphlet Miniature Designs for the Nursery (designed by Clarice Elder). These are 1:12 patterns but hopefully I can make them work by stitching on higher count fabric. I thought I had this pamphlet but if so, I can’t find it, so I just bought one off eBay.

I want to do the pillow for the chair (hoping it’ll hide those seams on the insides of the wings), a shortened version of the blanket for the bottom of the crib (to replace the ugly yellow one), the rug, and maybe also the crib bumpers (but they’d be very hard to see, so maybe not).