Black (Walnut) Beauty

Last month, I finally made it to Rogue Pacific Lumber. I heard about it from the guy who owns Limestone Coffee in downtown Medford, because I chatted him up about the amazing slabs of wood they have for countertops at the coffee bar. He said they do a ton of reclaimed wood from all over the country. 

I adore reclaimed wood and quickly decided this was a place I needed to check out. After being taken around the lumber yard, I landed on this piece of black walnut (it's about twice as big as what you see on the countertop). Thought it'd make a great live-edge cutting board, and I was right. The grain is really beautiful, and the figuring in it doesn't come through well on "film" -- too bad. It's almost iridescent. 

All the oil is soaked in now so it's not shiny. I did about three heavy coats of mineral oil as a light finish, just a little something to protect against water soaking in. You can see how it's soaking in to the lighter wood on the right more than the darker stuff on the left.

I also had a little epiphany while I was looking at the $8 bottle of butcher block oil...I wonder if the mineral oil in the butcher block bottle in the woodworking section of Bimart is the same as the mineral oil in the pharmacy section of Bimart. A little googling indicated that it indeed was, so I picked up a $3 bottle of the other kind of mineral oil and used that. And that is just one of the many reasons I love Bimart. 

Transitions

I knocked out almost everything on my office list this month. One of the last items was making and installing a transition for my outside door. It looked like this since we had the "new" door put in ... over six years ago. It has driven me crazy. 

Argh. That's old "Great Stuff" foam filler, which, for the record, doesn't wear well as a threshold. Just in case you were wondering.

It was a bit of an undertaking; I had to rip one of the red fir floorboards I'd saved from upstairs at a 45-degree angle so it fit all nice and neat.

But now, finished :)

Fence, Flowers, Fireplace.

Yesterday, I crossed a few living room tasks off the old list. See that little vent cover? It used to just be a hole. And the panel it's screwed into used to be gross, chipped and not cut to match the fireplace. I don't know why vents are needed there, but it's just a hole into the mantel and it's all cobwebby and disgusting, so the vent is a good solution. I ordered them (there's another around the other side) a few months ago, but yesterday I trimmed the panel to fit against the hearth (only six and a half years after the hearth was installed) and did some touch-up paint so it looks all spiffy. CHECK. 

The downside is that it really highlights how badly the mantle needs to be painted. I'm just starting to think about what that project will entail, since it's almost definitely lead-based paint, and there's probably oil in the mix too. I found a stripper that's made of soybeans (who knew?) that neutralizes the lead, so maybe we'll go that route. The other option is a heat gun, because I am NOT interested in sanding 70 years of paint off the mantle. It's made it a long time with a little bit of touching up, but it looks really crappy up close and will definitely need to be done at some point.

I also threw together this crate yesterday evening. It's not on "the list" but it was on my list to make a wood box (hey, just in time for summer!) for the fireplace. We had the wood sitting in a messy little pile next to the hearth all winter, and all I could think about were the black widows I was certain were lurking within. Turns out, no spiders, but this does look a lot tidier. I'm going to get a bin pull and stick it on the front for decoration. Brass, maybe, to contrast with the cedar.

 I'm calling this "birthday bouquet remix." The fluffy green things are from a bouquet Kate brought me for my birthday a few weeks ago, and I added some clippings from our magnolia bush out front for some contrast. LOVE!

Ok, next, the fence!! Todd's dad has been adding this fence addition to close off the back yard from the road. This is what it looks like from the back...

And from the front. The goal was to make it even with the existing fence, so we'll add lattice to the top, add 2x12s to the bottom to close the gap from the declining grade and then landscape around it so the whole thing looks nice and finished. Those really tall 4x4s will be trimmed down when we're finishing things up. Obviously, the gate will go in the middle.

A Little Pool Update

Now admittedly, these aren't the greatest pictures, but the pool is still looking pretty dreadful. But now the new tile is in! So at least that part looks nice. In the following picture, you can see the blue around the top of the pool. That's new. It used to be a very worn aqua, and this is a great improvement. 

Here's one more up closer. The white jagged area below the tile is plaster that came off in the course of removing the old tile. No matter! It'll just be covered up with Pebble Tec soon!

Fun little nugget: the pool was drained a couple of weeks ago, pumped all the way dry. The tile guy then drilled holes in the bottom of it, so it wouldn't "float," or pop out of the ground and crack, due to pressure from the ground water. Normally the weight of a pool filled with water is enough to counteract the pressure from any water underneath, but when the pool's empty, it weighs a lot less.

The holes let the water move in and out of the basin so we don't have any unfortunate incidences of pool crackage. Considering the pool filled up with about five feet of rainwater at the deepest point, it's a good thing we have those holes!

Goodbye, Antique White

Years ago, shortly after we moved into the house, we needed to do some touch up painting on existing off-white trim and built-ins. I evidently didn't know you could get a custom color match and used my own high-tech method of eyeballing paint chips next to said trim. (All things considered, it didn't work too bad.)

My fatal flaw was that I didn't consider the fact that I strongly disliked that ivory color, and considering we were, you know, redoing the entire house, it was in my power to decide to paint it a different color. Live and learn. It borders on tan with the amount of brown mixed in, and it really doesn't do the bolder wall colors many favors.

I can pretty much tolerate it in the living room, and the bedroom is next on my hit list, but it was driving me redneck crazy in the office where everything else is white. It was all very incohesive, which bothered me because the office is otherwise the most-finished room in the house. It's decorated and accessorized just how I want, so this one massive, glaring "detail" really needed to change. There were a handful of other issues that were grating on me, too. They're noted in this marked-up picture.

 Window casing painted. See how the crown and chair rail is so much darker? Not anymore!

 Closet doors, for contrast. BLEH.

 And after, with their cute little coral Anthropologie hardware. Anthro has the best hardware.

Removed tiny bits of wallpaper that we left on the wall when we removed wallpaper about five years ago and replaced scratched screws on outlet and switch plates, which makes a surprising difference in my little OCD brain. I also slapped a bit of paint on the old ivory outlet (the actual plugs). If you go fast enough with the roller, the paint doesn't get into the holes, which I'm guessing most electricians would say might be a bad thing.

 Mmm...that crisp white against the navy makes my heart happy.

What else... painted the nuts and bolts on the light fixture so they blend better and finally touched up the ceiling where the old fixture was. We put this in almost two years ago. Sometimes I move slow on the things that annoy me the most. What you'll notice from this picture is that there is no dirt halo around the base of the fixture and that you don't see two silver bolts sticking out on either side of the base. It just looks normal.

 Painted the white wall with a fresh coat of more-scrubbable eggshell finish, instead of the primer (possibly just a dead flat paint) that was there (again, from five years ago). It was in rough shape, whatever it was. Lots of holes, some bad, unsanded spackling...it just needed a fresh coat of white.

Not fully put back together, but looking so much crisper.

I've felt thankful every day that I've had this time to knock out all these projects (and there are more to come I'll be posting in the next few days). I'm actually kind of excited now to start working again in my finally finished, not-annoying, cohesive office.

Painting tips for lazy painters

I hate painting. I think it's my least favorite of all the home renovation tasks I've had to tackle. It's tedious and takes forever because we either chose super-saturated colors or have to paint large spaces. The tedium inclines me toward cutting corners (hence the "lazy" part), which produces a result I'm then unhappy with.

So today while I primed the entire stairwell, upstairs landing and ceiling, I had plenty of time to think about how I've gotten better and made painting a bit more palatable over the six or seven years I've been working on this house. Hopefully they make your life a little easier. This isn't at all a comprehensive list of painting tips, just my own takeaways that I haven't seen elsewhere.

Prep

1. Think of prep as part of painting. I always think of painting as the bulk of the work, and for some rooms or projects that really is the case, but it helps me to reorient my project mindset to 60% prep, 40% painting. Or something like that. Otherwise I do a sloppy job prepping and end up with messes that need cleanup later.

2. Frog Tape. The trick with this stuff is to wipe it with a damp rag/sponge before going to town with the paint. While the water in latex paint theoretically activates the tape's barrier, my experience is that without the water, I've just spent twice as much on tape that performs like blue painter's tape. When it's wet, it's pretty incredible how well it works.

3. Remove outlet and light switch plates. Do it while you're prepping so you won't be tempted to paint over them. Not that I know anyone who's ever done that.

Tools/Gear

1. Hat. As you know, I have curly brown hair. When there is white paint, or especially primer (primer is my hair's FAVORITE) my hair will dive into the freshly painted surface. Getting primer out of hair is no picnic. Wear a hat.

2. Safety glasses. My dad is usually right about things. I keep learning that. Just last week, I cut my tongue a little while licking a butter knife and scowled when I heard his voice in my head saying "don't lick knives." Another thing he told me a while back was to find a pair of safety glasses that were comfortable (that is important) and actually wear them. I'm not as diligent about the safety glasses as I should be around power tools, but with painting a ceiling, I can't not. There's just something about looking up at the roller that feels like eyeballing the inside of a gun barrel.

I know. They are super fashionable. Whatever... you know what's even less fashionable? Getting paint in your eye. (Another Dad-ism: it's not a fashion show, Joanna.) Also please note the HAT. I primed all day and have none in my hair. I think. 

3. Spatter guard roller. Even when you're pretty careful and not slopping paint all over, like I was for most of today, you still end up with a bit of splatter from the force of rolling the wall. This thing cuts down dramatically on that. They're like $5. Well worth it to avoid drop-clothing everything (or ending up covered in spatter).

4. Trim guard. I don't always use this thing, but sometimes it's handy. Don't expect it to be as crisp as what Frog Tape will do for you, but it can be the right tool for semi-detailed work.

5. Assorted accessories:

• Paper towels and some water, good to have nearby
• Quality brush. Bite the bullet, buy one and then treat it nicely. This Wooster is my favorite. I have an equivalent Purdy and don't like the handle feel as much, so I use it less frequently. Brushes make an enormous difference in the finish you get. 
• Paint pourer of some type. There are tons out there, just get something that goes on your paint can to keep it from getting paint crusted in the rim. 
• Mini roller. Two types: sponge for untextured surfaces that you'll follow with a brush and a normal one, but mini-size, for small textured areas

General

1. Don't cheat. It took me a long time to realize cheating actually made my life more difficult and resulted in more work and crappier results. If you're lazy and you hate painting, do a good job the first time.

2. Paint trim and walls the same color with different sheens. This is almost as good as cheating and you don't really get caught unless you are super sloppy. It mostly works if you're going with whites or maybe grays if you're doing gray molding. I did an eggshell wall and semigloss trim in Behr Swiss Coffee last week and didn't tape anything. It's not perfect, but you can't really tell where.

3. Music. I'm not a big music-listener in general. I only sometimes have something on in the car and probably go days without listening to anything. But for painting, I've found it helps me a TON to listen to something, and that something for me is country.

I'm not sure what "the holler" is, but from what I can tell, there are trucks and beer and swimmin holes and biscuits. I love two of those things, so that's good enough for me. I also pick up gems like "idle hands are devil's handiwork," so I get good, everyday lessons out of it too.

4. Paint quality. Buy good paint. Like a good brush, good paint makes life easier. Cheap paint is infuriating to deal with, because you put just as much work in and end up with something that looks awful, and the $10 you saved will not be enough to buy the amount of beer you will need to make yourself feel better about it.

I ended up with a gallon of Behr's Ultra Premium Plus (or something, there are so many fancy words on it I can't even remember) and have been very pleased with how it's performing. Behr Premium Plus has also treated us well; most of our house is painted with it.

5. When you get tired, stop for a while. The wall will still be there later. If you don't stop, you know what else will be there later? The bad job you did because you were tired or sore.

Cleanup

1. Drips. If you get a paint drip on the floor, leave it (assuming your floors are wood). They scrape off very easily once dry, as long as you leave it in an undisturbed gloob (technical term) on the floor. Also, these are fun to use to mess with people. Try putting a few dried ones on your significant other's cell phone screen.

2. WD-40. I've discovered that a bit of this on a rag will remove smaller dried spatters from a polyurethane-finished wood floor.

Coming Summer 2015: Pebble Tec!

Oh, yeah. In case you've ever wondered what a 50-year-old pool looks like when nobody winterizes it or cleans it for 6 months...

Now you know.

The word you're looking for right here is yum.

Anyway, the reason it's drained (and it's actually empty and no more leaves right now as I'm typing this) is because this is the first step to pool resurfacing. I thought I'd mentioned this before but apparently didn't get to it. We're getting the pool resurfaced in May with Pebbletec. We didn't think we were going to be able to afford it, but it fell right within the budget. So exciting, because the warranty is way longer than plaster AND because it looks...fancy. See?

 It'll look JUST like this.

Mostly. Maybe more like our pool but with this finish, since the waterfall/hot tub/lagoon shape aren't exactly included. I don't *think* it should look that greenish but want to make sure. In any case, it will be a wild improvement over the current situation.

The First of Many

So I quit my job last week. I guess I quit early in February, but my last day was last Friday, and I find myself with a generous amount of free time in my current state (on sabbatical, as I've termed it). On my way out the door, I was threatened by at least three of my coworkers that I better make good use of my time and provide them with reading material. Here we go... 

As it happens, this month is devoted to me knocking out a TON of projects. I don't have afters yet, but I have some befores. To qualify for the lists (one for each of the following rooms: my office, living room, downstairs bathroom, kitchen, powder room/entry) it has to be a project I can tackle by myself and it has to fix a problem that annoys the crap out of me whenever I'm in the given room. Lot of painting (bleh). 

Here's an in-progress of the hallway that connects the bathroom, living room, our bedroom and my office. All the trim and cabinetry is going from Antique White (left) to Swiss Coffee (right). The Antique White is more ivory and the other one is off white but much crisper. I wasn't exactly planning on painting all the trim (just my office), but once I started, it just looked right. UGH. There are so many great things I have coming in the next few weeks. 

Another thing I dealt with on Sunday was this lampshade. I got the shade on clearance a few months ago, but it didn't have a spider...the metal thing you use to connect it to a lamp. So I solved two problems: Using bolt cutters, I chopped up a shade that I've kept because it's "nice" but I dislike very much and used the spider from that to make a shade I do like! I also got my toes wet with the blogger favorite Rub'n'Buff and rubnbuff'd the base of that lamp.

Side note: I love that lamp. I got it at a thrift store last year with the intention of just using it for its parts. It's ceramic, so I figured it'd be easy and fun to bust up with a hammer. It had this weird gold floral applique and the white was dingy. I had a passing thought that some stripper would probably dissolve the applique and turned out to be right. Once that was gone, I hit it with a coat of glossy white and now I have this great mod lamp!

In the four days I've been hard at work, I pretty much ripped apart my office. There are five cans of paint and so much assorted project stuff lying around... it makes me happy. Right now. Probably less so when I have to clean it all up. There are a few already-completed projects in this shot, and I am super excited to post more about them soon!!

Oh, one more thing. Pretty sure I've picked a dining room light fixture. IT'S FEATHERS!!!!!