When my husband and I got married we had big dreams, big dreams of a big wedding, big house, fashionably furnished and decorated and hopefully at some point a big family. The wedding was huge, I mean everything I ever wanted, our first house, fair enough it's a little on the small side, not exactly what I wanted but bearable, the dreams on that can wait I guess.

After these two we definitely found ourselves a little strapped for cash, which made furnishing this lovely new home a little hard, having both of us moving from shared rental with friends. We only had random bits and bobs of furniture, no standard items such as sofas and coffee tables, just beds and lamps etc. useful but not everything that we will need in this new house. Fortunately one of my husbands uncles got in contact after hearing about our lack of funds and furniture and offered us an old one of his that was just collecting dust in the spare room.

Now I know that in our situation beggars can't be choosers and I probably sound really ungrateful, but a second hand dusty sofa doesn't exactly fit in with my idea of a chic fashionable pad, but I had no other choice. When it arrived it was as if someone had taken all of the horrible ideas I had about what this sofa was going to look like and created it. It was so old fashioned I was surprised that anyone would let it live on this long, the colour and print was garish and faded, the cushions had rips with the stuffing showing at some parts. I was grateful for the offer however didn't want this monstrosity living in my home!

As my husband is a man and consequently has no idea of fashion or taste or what goes with what he had no idea what I was making such a fuss over. Sure he doesn't mind it, these are heavenly compared to what adorned his previous flat, but he clearly didn't realize that he wasn't in his dirty man flat anymore, it's our home.

As we couldn't afford a whole new sofa, I had to look for other avenues to make the one we had less offensive. I looked at throws and new cushions but nothing seemed to take away just how bad it was. Finally I looked at re up-holstering and found that a sofa could be completely rejuvenated just by simply getting new covers for it. It also worked out a lot cheaper than a completely new sofa, and I could choose the fabric!

I chose the exact material and colour's that I wanted, so I wasn't constricted to simply what the manufactures offered. It matched the rest of the room perfectly once it was re done and I'm safe in the knowledge that now it is completely unique, which is something that is very important to me.

Now I have the perfect sofa, which is fashionable and in keeps with the vision that I have for my first home. It feels like a completely new sofa and a far cry away from the disheveled mess that it was delivered as. I just need to work on the rest of the house now, and I definitely need to work on creating the perfect husband!