Every few years, the furniture in our house seems to cry out for renewal. This year, the windows did too.

I started out just planning to replace the living room curtains (I had always disliked them). But one thing led to another and we ended up reupholstering the living room sofa and one chair as well.

That was a saga. Every time I have had it done before, the guy would tell me to bring 20 meters of cloth. Then he would come with a team of two or three men, drag the furniture out on the lawn and camp there for a minimum of four days. The entire crew would frequently disappear and there was always foam, nails, scraps of cloth and bits of thread everywhere. The cost was astronomical and the results, while pleasing, never quite seemed to justify the money or the chaos of the four-day caravan.

This time, I went to a new store for the cloth because they were having a sale. They had an in-house upholsterer and he offered to come and measure the furniture before I bought my usual 20 meters. At the house he told me I would need only 11.

Not possible, I insisted. He was adamant. OK, I agreed, figuring I could always get more if he ran short. When can you begin? He said he would come the next day and finish by evening. I laughed out loud. “Say WHAT?” He looked confused.

Sure enough, he arrived the next morning at ten with one helper and by five, he was done! Eleven meters. Not a centimeter more. And since he had so much energy and since I had some spare cloth from an earlier project, I asked him to ALSO cover three dining chairs, which he did for no extra charge.

My sister thinks the first guy, the one who always told me to get twice the material and took twice as long, probably re-did his own furniture every time we did (which would explain those long tea breaks he used to take). Hmmm. . .