Salvaging is saving, in a manner of speaking

Never one to pass up the opportunity for free stuff, I insisted we stop at a house we passed on the way back from the gym that looked vacant and had two mountains of stuff out front. (Transcript: Me: Look at all that stuff! Todd: That looks like a huge pile of trash. Me: FREE trash! Pull over!)

From the piles, I snagged a curtain rod and a nifty little table (with a broken leg, which someone had taped to the body for future repair). I wanted to go back for the shutters, but couldn't think of where to put them.Though it's a rather unworkable color of pistachio, I have a can of spray paint and I know how to use it. I glued the leg back on with my construction-grade adhesive, and it's currently drying in the kitchen. I'm pretty jazzed about it. Has a lot of character, with the cool metal feet and musical instrument-looking midsection. Also, you know, FREE.

We kicked off the new year on the right food, house-wise. I suggested painting the dining room ceiling, which you may remember from earlier posts was looking especially crappy due to the freshly painted trim. I'd also gotten dining room curtains that I was eager to put up, but that first required painting the curtain rod and finials, so we just went for it.

As usual, this turned out to be a much bigger pain than I anticipated. There were a few spots where the grayish paint was flaking off, and it was nearly a 1/16" thick, if not more, so I thought we'd just sand it down to match. Wrong. In addition to making a mess, I'm pretty sure it looked worse after than before (for those keeping track, that's the opposite of the desired effect). I then decided to spackle it, which kind of worked, except that the infernal gray paint was texturized, to the textures didn't match.

At this point, I was irritated, so I just painted the ceiling (using glossy paint, another mistake). As the ceiling dried, I could see another coat would be in order, and opted for flat paint this time, which helped a lot in hiding the texture issues. I only took one picture of the whole mess...and it looks a lot better in person. The funny section around the light fixture is the old color, then the bright white was the first coat. The final color is slightly creamier. It really helps brighten the dining room, though. and that's what the curtains look like. I'm going to dye them navy blue; you can see the tester swatch almost in the middle of the picture hanging from the top of the cabinet. Todd and I are both big fans of the curtains. It's great to not feel like you're being watched whenever you're in the kitchen or dining room.

Last few things to do in the dining room:
1. Put up crown molding
2. Re-upholster dining room chairs
3. Replace horrific light fixture