Bedroom 2 Update (with lots of pointless pictures)

It's incredible to me how long a little thing like a closet can take. It sounds like removing an old closet system, replacing the closet door, putting up new shelving, and painting everything should be pretty simple to accomplish lickety split, doesn't it? But there's this little thing called Life that has a say in where our time goes, too, and I need to step back and look at the big picture... and be thankful for all we've gotten done! I can be so driven inside my head. I really need to (prayerfully!) rein myself in to keep balance.



I made a little goal for myself to have everything in this room, except for the overhead lighting, done by Mother's Day. Is it going to happen? The verdict isn't in on that one, yet. Goodness knows I gave it my all today :) And Sam is upstairs working on more baseboards at this very moment. We're going to be cutting it close on that self-inflicted deadline... it's a maybe. The doors may not get painted by then, for instance, but I think we may be able to get the rest done if we really push it.

"If we really push it", I said. What was that about balance, again?

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Okay, so I wrote that first part a little while ago. I realized I had just about nothing in the way of photos for you, so I went up and took a few. I should warn you that I'm feeling very stream-of-consciousness-chatty-like, so if you've ever wondered what Sam and my friends have to put up with in the real life world when I'm all hyped up on Coke Zero, wonder no more ;)



Here's where we stand with the closet. Hmmm... sorry, I did a quick edit of the photos, but this guy is still a little green. I went crazy working in here today - painting the second coat on the walls, priming, and painting a first coat on the trim. I'm not sure if you can tell from the photos, but it is not a large closet. And I am not a small woman. It was a bit challenging at times. I also got a coat of primer on one of the two shelves and a coat of paint on both of them.



As you can see, the lowest shelf supports are actually quite low. My idea was to have baby clothes hanging on a rod beneath the top shelf, but no clothes hanging below the second one. I wanted the second shelf to be low enough to leave room to put baskets or tote bins on it without the upper clothes getting in the way. So, that's why the supports for the lower shelf are so very, very low.



This photo might show the placement better. This reminds me - was it you, Chelsea? or Rebecca? (nope... I checked! It was Renae) - someone asked how we paint our baseboard with that shaggy carpet around. Nothing fancy, we just use extra wide painter's tape.



Like, this wide.



And we try to get the edge of the tape a little bit under the baseboards. Sam got these closet baseboards so snug, I had to use a flathead screwdriver a few times to sort of gently encourage the tape into place.




By getting under the baseboard, the tape keeps all of the carpet out of the way. When we first begin placing it, we sort of leave 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch folded up onto the baseboard. That extra part is the part we shove beneath. Make sense? Hope so.



Here's the basecap Sam just put on. It's on the wall beneath the window. I wonder how much of the trim he'll be able to get up tonight? The wall with the closet door on it doesn't have any baseboards or basecap, yet. That register cover is getting switched out, by the way. We're thinking maybe next month (?). The beige outlets might get changed out for white ones this weekend.



You all have seen these nifty Handy Pail things, right? There in the red? They're just what they say they are... handy... pails. They have these great little plastic liners that make clean up super fast, and the handle on the pail is very kind to your wrist when you're cutting in or brush painting for long stretches of time. I first saw them at Sherwin Williams, but since then I've seen them at the big box stores, too. Both of 'em. Orange and blue. Somewhere along the line, I think it was in an old MS "Living", I learned about wrapping brushes and rollers in plastic wrap to keep them fresh between coats. I wouldn't leave them like that for days and days, but for the 4 hours that you're waiting between coats, it's a great way to avoid cleaning up several times a day. I hate not having a brush dry when I need it, and this way my brush is always ready for the next coat.

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I just checked on Sam's progress. He's working on the baseboards for the walls by the closet door now. A check mark on this room would make a fantastic Mother's Day gift! Woo hoo!



Peace out, homies :)

Rise Above It

Look at this man.

Defying the pain.

Laughing in its face.

Gritty. Tough as nails. Big nails.


Awwww, yee-uh.

note: this saturday marked day 7 of sam's shoulder injury. he was, at all times, very careful and sensible while caulking. he speaks with a physical therapist tomorrow. in the meantime, he got the job done and i'm free to paint. might have this room down by friday after all. he's a rock :)

Bedroom 3 Progress

I was looking through some recent posts tonight, and was surprised to find that our last real "progress" post was the chalkboard door... in early December! Yikes. I knew that we had been laying low for a little while in terms of projects, but I didn't realize it had been quite that long. Really, though, Sam continued to work on the trim from then until mid-January or thereabouts, so he took a smaller project vacation than I did. Still!

I think it's been good to take a break, though... in lots of ways. We had been going like crazy since March 2009, and we knew we'd be gearing up for some significant projects here in a few weeks, so I think we subconsciously called a halt. The fridge sucking up all of our money was a definite factor, too. Really, our wintertime breather was helpful in getting us rested up and ready to get back at it this spring. I'm not sure if we'll plan on doing the same thing after the holidays this coming winter or not - sure seems like a nice way to prevent burnout, though.

Besides giving us time to rest up, our few months of little-to-no-projects also gave us a renewed perspective. We had parts of the house all torn up, trim still missing for weeks, piles waiting to be returned to their proper homes as to-do lists went undone, and - guess what. We were still happy. The children still smiled. They still slept soundly. We were just fine. Revelation. We tore through our first year living here at breakneck speed with a loooong list of goals and hopes. It really was encouraging to see something change, and to realize that our ideas were going to be more than ideas. But, it has also been encouraging to see that things don't have to happen at that pace in order to get done. We still have goals and plans, of course, but we're not afraid now to call it quits for a little while when more important things need our time. The lists will get done... but sometimes they have to give way to bigger priorities.

So, enough of all that. What you really care about is seeing what we've been up to housewise, right? Well, if you've paid attention to my newly revamped sidebar, you would've seen that we've been working in Bedroom 3...



You might remember from waaaaay back in the day, that we had started putting in the baseboards in this room. A search for the proper basecap ensued, and months later, it finally went in. At first, we started to prime and paint the baseboards before we (Sam) installed them, but when we realized that we'd be caulking everything and filling nail holes after installation, we decided to prime and paint after they were on the wall. Here's a peek.

And here is a shot of the baseboard and basecap all painted :) I just looooove the way these look once they're finished. I thought I had a pretty good visual of what they would wind up looking like painted, but they turned out even better than I had imagined. Yay!

Sam and I decided to put curtains on the closet door in this bedroom instead of replacing the sliding doors. The layout of the room pretty much requires sliding doors on this closet, but neither of us liked that option much. So, we hung these curtains up last August. (They don't usually have tiebacks - that was for the photo). The closet system, although useful for a time, was of cheap quality and not what we were needing most in this closet, so it had to go.


You know me well enough by now to know that I ripped it out one Friday afternoon during naptime :)


Tah dah! The closet system is removed. But, wait. What's that?


Navy. Blue. Carpet.

Or should I say... Navy? Blue? Carpet?

Didn't see that one coming. Apparently, the closet system was installed when the room had navy carpet. Oh, well. No harm done, really. Next month's project has an answer for this little snafoo.

I had a few more photos for you, but Blogger is taking a small eternity to load photos tonight, so I'll show them to you in the next post. See you soon :)

Our New Trim Reveal

It might be a little silly sounding, but I'm a tad nervous to show you guys what we've been up to. Remember now, I warned you that the new trim doesn't really look like it fits in with the rest of the house, yet. That's because it's the first part to really get changed in a way that takes the house in a completely new direction. For it all to make more sense, try to imagine a hallway light like this one...





...doorknobs something like these but with oil-rubbed bronze backplates...



and 5" wide planked wood floors - a versatile medium/darkish wood tone :) Got that? Okay, now the trim will make more sense. Quickly... here are the best shots I have of the hallway before...






And......here's our progress as of Saturday evening......


Wait! First I need to give some serious credit to Humphrey House, a blog we found via HouseBlogs dot net. They have been lovingly restoring a 1912 Craftsman since 2004, and have done such beautiful work. We referenced their trim, a few books on the subject, as well as stalked a few original 1920s Craftsman homes in the area (Open House from 2-4, here we come) while making our choices. Thanks to Humphrey House for such great photos of their trim and for answering questions in how to find things like "bullnose". Now...

















Sam has also finished the trim in Bedroom 3 (baseboards, basecap, and headers above the doors) and he's done all of the trim around both sides of each hallway door (hall side and room side) except for the master bedroom. He needs to borrow a table saw for that door because the dimensions are wonky.

But, doesn't it look soooooo different? Sam will continue installing this trim upstairs throughout the next two months and then we hope to caulk, prime, and paint when we begin getting warm days. We'll be painting all of the trim in Benjamin Moore's Dove White. I was skipping around the kitchen today and gave Sam a big hug & kiss and sang "Thank you for making our house so pretty!" :) And I mean it. It's really pretty in the hallway now. Oh, thank You, Lord.



And thanks to all of you for sharing our excitement and encouraging us along the way.

Lumberyard and a Movie

That's probably what all of you do for a date these days, isn't it? Lumberyard, dinner, movie - pretty standard, I'd say.

Tuesday night, my dear parents came down to watch the children while Sam and I hit the local Carter's lumber looking for trim. We're replacing it in the children's bedrooms, and whatever we decide on is planned for the entire house. It's a fairly major expense overall and an important one, too, considering that this trim will be in every single room.

Although Lowe's is undoubtedly our go-to shop for late night home improvement runs, we like to support the little guy when we can. We decided to try Carter's Lumber first, just to see if we could find what we needed. They looked at us a little strangely when we walked in dressed for dinner...

... and sportin' a camera.

In the end, Carter's didn't have anything like what we wanted. Well, we tried. Sam works close to a Home Depot and he had scoped out their selection on his lunch hour. He thought there were possibly a few options to think about. So, it was off to Home Depot.

Great date so far! :)

We spent what seemed like a very long time deliberating about this and that trim. See, we're trying to choose wordwork and trim that add character to the house without making it feel completely contrived and like something just doesn't fit in. One of our biggest non-negotiables was a wider baseboard - something between 4 and 5 inches wide. The pickin's were slim. Beyond that, we're totally replacing all of the trim around the doors as well, and we needed to choose door trim that would gel with the new baseboards. Sounds simple, but it wasn't. We decided that we really needed to get a more concrete idea of what we wanted, and also some food. Wifey was getting hungry.

At Olive Garden, Sam busted out some scrap paper and we started drawing more or less what we were envisioning.

Sam was a very good sport about my camera :)

He humors me.

He even poses, too :) Isn't he a looker? Anyway, we drew it up and agreed on what we wanted. Now, making it happen? That often proves to be a different story.

At our beloved Lowe's, we decided to take advantage of the great reference books available (for sale, technically, but we just flipped through a few). Well, actually, no we didn't. We sat on the floor in an out of the way aisle and studied them like college kids. They were very useful :)

Still, after all of that, we couldn't quite make it all work with the lumber available. It eventually became clear that we were going to need a table saw to do this thing right. Sam's in the market for one now. We're also looking for crown moulding that is less than 2" wide. We were surprised that it's not readily available. The Lowe's Man recommended that we contact the cabinet department about a special order for decorative cabinet crown. That just sounds pricey, doesn't it? We're thinking we might need to head back over to Carter's and check out the crown there.

So, we didn't buy a thing - not even the book. We did head over to late showing of Julie & Julia, though. Loved the "Julia" parts, not so much the "Julie" parts. And there really was some very unnecessary crude language. We were hoping it was a good, clean fun movie. It easily could have been, but that's Hollywood for ya. Merrill Streep was great, but the overall movie was so-so in my opinion. Sam and I had a great night, though, even without buying trim. We used to joke that even our fanciest dates always ended up with a quick run to Wal-Mart. Maybe we've entered a new stage - maybe now our dates will always have that quick-run-into-Lowe's element.

As long as I'm with my man, it's all the same :)

Before Pics and Removing Trim: SweetP Edition

One week after removing the trim in Shug and Punkin's room, I got down to business taking down the trim in SweetP's bedroom, too. This time it was evening, Sam was subbing in an indoor soccer game, and a Pooh Bear video was my strategy. Here are the before pics... self explanatory. Thanks for looking!

The view as you come in the door.

The headboard wall (or lack thereof)

Immediately to the right as you enter (and Little Dude trying to smile)

Closet (and toad cage) across from the headboard wall

Entryway

First piece off!

See my paint swatches by the doorway? It always takes me a few tries before I decide on a color.

The longest piece, yet. A little tricky to maneuver, but I got it in the garage!

Proof of the previous owner's amazing painting skills. What's funny is that this blue on the baseboards is from the 1st owner's son, who wanted his room painted Michigan Blue (I met the couple that built this house - they're lovely people). That means two additional owners lived here without do something about the very noticeable blue smears on the baseboards. We're the 4th family to live in the house. Props to the first owner for letting her kids help with the painting, but note to self - if the children help, have them help in the middle of the wall, not the edges.

Total time to finish most of the room - a little over an hour

Rrrrrrrip... Trim Removal (and Children)

Last weekend, Sam was able to go on a backpacking trip with his best pal from college - in Colorado. I was truly glad he had such a fantastic time to catch up with Edwin and enjoy the Rockies, again. He went to school out there at Mines, and it's always good when he gets to reconnect with his inner Mountain Man.

Meanwhile... what's the Little Wife to do back at home while her man hikes through treacherous terrain at high altitudes? Why, rip out trim, of course! It's helpful for me to keep track of how long certain projects take, so I can plan well for similar future projects. Mostly for me, but it might entertain you if you're a touch bored or just happen to be interested in the DIY projects of a stay-at-home-mother-of-many ;)

Here's the play by play of a *very* profitable day of DIY with four kiddos in tow.

11:25 AM - begin. The plan is to rip out all of the existing trimwork in Shug and Punkin's Bedroom before lunchtime so I can get to painting ASAP.

We move the beds out of the way. Oh, dear. Punkin! Tidy under that bed, child. See that under the bed bin lid? She has a little bin for all that junk...er... all of those "treasures".

I grab my little crowbar. Not sure I've used one of these before. I know enough to pry a little at a time and gradually loosen the board. Ripping one spot all at once would likely tear out a chunk of drywall underneath. I'm surprised to see the closet door trim coming off all in one piece.

Good thing the kiddos were sequestered in the corner ;) Aren't they great? They had a good time cuddled together, watching their crazy mom rip things off the wall.

About ten minutes later, the closet trim is down. All nails are accounted for.

About ten minutes after that, the door trim has bit the dust, too. The children are tired of watching now. It was only entertaining while it was novel. After the first few big pieces came down, things started to get a little rowdy on that bed in the corner.

11:50AM - Time to give the children something else to do. SweetP (age 8) and Little Man (almost 2 and a half), go into SweetP's room to play with some toys. My girls are a huge help!

Shug (age 7) and Punkin (4 and a half) move to Little Dude's room to play with Little People and pretend the bed is something other than a bed.

11:58 AM - I'm back at it in the bedroom. I get the first whole wall done. Easy does it. I wanted to get the entire length off in one piece to make it easier to carry out to the garage and then out to the trash on pick up day.

12:06 PM - The other wall comes off fairly easily, too. As I go, my crowbar leaves little indentations in the sheetrock. Good thing our new baseboards are much wider than the ones we're replacing. If they weren't it would've been a good idea to use a piece of scrap plywood or even cardboard between the crowbar and the drywall to prevent the denting.

12:35 PM - Finish cleaning up, including vacuuming just in case there were little bits of splintery wood lying about. Take final pictures. Time for lunch! This is how I leave the room. Plan to start cutting in with the new paint once I get Little Dude and Punkin down for nap.

Total time to get the trim off: about 1 hour and 15 minutes