We have a seat in the garden. It’s a bit of a sorry seat as it gets a lot of use. Slats have broken and various parts are in disrepair. I would like to blame the boy for this as he spends a lot of time standing on this. However, I think it’s my fault for not really looking after it and the weather has just taken it’s toll.

We were thinking of chucking it out and replacing it but in a moment of desperation when children were needing occupied after school the decision was made to paint it. We have tons of paint samples lying about from a variety of decoration projects so we decided to use those. I sanded it down a bit afterwards to try and make it a bit less garish. I’m not sure that worked.

My wife was a little shocked with the end result but my son loves it and once the plants grow up around it it’ll look better… I hope.

Time – about 2 – 3 hours

Equipment – old paint samples, brushes and low expectations!

Cost – essentially free

Difficulty – Easy (especially if you don’t keep “inside the lines”)

Partner annoyance factor – the full force of this is yet to be determined.

Family – Anyone that can hold a brush can do this.

Rewards – We had a great time doing this and at least we still have our seat. It also resulted in a bit of reorganisation of the patio and it looks a lot better now.