At the end of May, I had new floors installed in my house. For a month before that, the house was a whirlwind of moving EVERYTHING into the basement, culminating in about two weeks of painting.
The living room and half of the kitchen (the half involving the wall behind the fridge — there was some strategy involved) were painted before the floors were installed on the theory that it was better to drip paint on the carpets that were being removed than on the new floors. Time ran out however and most of the painting was done with a great deal of caution so as to avoid any spills.
By mid-June, the entire house had been painted except for some touch up work in two of the bedrooms and the upstairs hallway, and that pesky other half of the kitchen. That’s when the procrastination set in. Fast forward through June, July, August, September, October and the first week of November.
This past weekend, I decided to stay home on Saturday and did all the touch up painting. The upstairs bedrooms and hallway are painted, and I even put an area rug in the master bedroom. Sunday evening, I put the curtains back up for the first time since May. (This is about as “domestic” as I get.)
All that remained to be done was to finish painting the darn kitchen.
Tuesday was Veterans Day and I had the day off from work. Here’s how the kitchen looked by mid-afternoon. Everything off the counter, painters tape on all the edges.
The paint had dried by Wednesday evening, so I took down all the tape and put up the curtains. This evening I put the various wallplates back on the outlets and switches. Here’s how the kitchen looks now.
I still have stuff to do — it’s a house after all, so the TODO list never ends — but at this point, I’m ready to declare this particular project complete.
Tag Archives: renovation
Foot Warmer
In the past month or so, I’ve discovered that one of the downsides to the wooden floors is that as the temperatures drop, wood isn’t nearly as warm as carpet. This makes getting out of bed just that much more difficult. (Wylie’s perspective is that because it’s more slippery, wood floors make it more difficult to launch yourself onto the bed. He gets stuck halfway about once a week.)
Last night, instead of dancing, I stayed home, and after some minor prep work, touched up the paint in two of the bedrooms. (When I took down the masking tape a few months ago, some of the new paint came with it.)
This afternoon, with the paint dry, I put the furniture back, and at long last put down my first area rug.
I think it looks pretty darn good, but now I’ll have to find a new excuse for oversleeping.
Putting It Back Together
It’s been a while since the last update on putting the house back together. Part of that’s because when it comes to putting things off, there’s nothing amateur about it, I’m a pro-crastinator. But I have been making some progress lately.
One of the big changes is that the home office is somewhat back together, albeit in a different room.
In addition to the desk, the bookcases have made their way out of the basement along with a large percentage of my books and the big bulletin board. There’s even space for a chair for a second person!
For the first time in the nine-plus years I’ve lived in this house, none of my houseplants are on a tem-permanent card table!
A few months before the big renovation project started, the house started falling apart when the railing going to upper floor pulled out of the wall. The railing needed to come down anyhow so I could paint, so it went into the basement for a while. As of this evening, the railing’s back on the wall.
And now for the next project:
