Kate Schmitt is Better Than Fire, Fabric Paint & Glue,

I once used red duct tape to cover an entire kitchen counter that I hated. It actually worked out well for a couple of years, but cleaning the counter at move-out was one of the thirty worst things I've ever had to do. Duct taping a couch, or cloth taping it, might have been fun if the couch was in a stinky dive bar.

Reupholstering is too expensive & or time consuming, though we got this pile of great material from some lady giving things away out of her garage. Most people like me who decided to reuholster a couch on their own write bitterly about the costs they incurred via money & time. My friends K8 & Kayte are both artistic and detail oriented and could swing it; I'm artistic and sloppy and studying for a major exam to get my Phd and have a little baby who makes spending three or four days on a couch a silly idea.

My favorite idea was to sew, or somehow glue or stick patches all over the couch. I still like that idea, but also found it too overwhelming given my time constraints.

Raj's friend Laura said she saw people riding a couch down a hill, which reminds me of an old friend who, during a Minnesota winter, set his couch on fire and rode it down the hill with this girl he always had a crush on but who never loved him back. I always thought that was symbolic of something or other.

My solution, though?

Freecycle it!

Because why?

Because Kate Schmitt is giving us her old couch! Or, at least, we're going to buy it from her for cheaper than it would cost to paint our old one. Which means I spent months thinking of creative solutions and in the end I'm sacking the old fellow. Kate's couch needs a little patching on the sides, which seems like nothing compared to revamping an entire couch.

What I did discover on the internet: if some entreprising young soul thinks of a cheap, nice-looking way to revamp old couches, she would be rich.