Side Driveway Entry Facelift

Last weekend I knocked another item off my list: cleaned, sanded and painted the side driveway entry railings. Despite what the image would have you believe, they actually weren't that rusty. No, my friend, someone, somewhere in the 70-year history of this house not only hatched the idea to paint these railings orange but actually acted on it. Not that many things about this house leave me befuddled anymore, but this did. Seriously, WTF. An orange wrought iron railing?

So obviously, it looked delightful. There was some rust, some orange, and mostly a lot of chalky old black. And some moss on the steps that I sprayed off with the hose.

Knowing that spray paint was absolutely the way to go for this project, I prepped the living daylights out of the side of the house and the steps. Black spray paint next to a white house is not the time to mess around.

Even so, the overspray was ridiculous. RIDICULOUS. Like, shot four or five feet ridiculous. Got all over my hands.

 

I've used this paint before and haven't had an issue, but apparently I got two dud cans because the one that made the mess was the can that actually worked. The sprayer in the other one was clogged, so I ended up using the messy one for both cans. (I pried the top off the first can and put it on the second. Sometimes spray paint acts up; it's not terribly uncommon that I end up having to swap out nozzles to get something to work.) Yay...

I'd probably use it again at some point but I'd want to test it in the store before going home with it. Not really fun to have to take a bath in mineral spirits to get the paint off your arms, hands and feet, and then have to scrub the side of the house with mineral spirits too. Five feet of overspray? Come ON. How was I supposed to prep for that?

But it did come out looking really nice. The black is crisp and because the finish has a little texture in it, it hides the unevenness where the paint partially flaked off the railing.

I'm still getting used to the shininess of it, too. It's been dull and awful for so many years. Still kind of a lot to tackle on that side of the house. Bit of white touch-up painting, paint door (white? Black? I feel like it should be something fun but I'm not sure what.), and I'd love to add a window box to brighten things up.

But there's always another project left, right? In the meantime, look, shiny! And not orange. And that's almost always a win.

Pool shack, patio projects and curtains

It's that time of year...the time when I turn my attentions outside and start doing all sorts of outside projects. Like spray painting pineapples on outdoor end tables. These turned out pretty well, although my stencil work was kind of sloppy. Sharp edges are hard :/

On my time off last week I built this table for the pool shack. I adore my Kreg Jig. The top and shelf are "salvaged" cedar. Does it count as salvaged if your neighbors call and offer you their old fence and pile it in your garden utility area and you use it several years later? I say yes.

I was on the fence (heh) about whether to stain it or just leave it natural and opted for the later for now. Can always go for stain later if I want. Pressure treated legs should last a good long time.

 So now this is what it looks like...

 Pretty good from where it started before I cleaned and vacuumed and cute-d it up! The pool shack is much less "scary" than it was before. (My dad referred to it as scary. Fair enough. There were a lot of spiders.)

Additionally, I added some additional fabric to the curtains my mom made for our Pasadena apartment years ago. They're the striped part on top. I also re-hung the rod so it's closer to the ceiling. Additional height really opens up the room.

The fabric is what I upholstered the ottoman with. It doesn't really look all that great in the pictures, but the extra seam isn't noticeable in person and they're much more billowy and full looking. It ended up being a bit of a time-consuming project, which involved an unplanned visit to Joann's for thread, but I'm glad it's now done and the curtains are back in place.

 Lastly, tune in next time for what I did to this table (it was much less pleasant in real life than this picture might lead one to believe).

The Golden Artichoke

I had what I'm going to call a stroke of brilliance a few days ago: fake artichoke + gold spray paint. I don't know why.

 Who can explain the elusive nature of genius?

I haven't decided where to put this one yet, but I have decided that I will be painting more of them. I think I'll fill one of my footed hurricanes with a bunch of them. I think it was a Rustoleum paint and it has a reflective gold lid. The paint has so much shine to it, it really looks metallic. I'm looking forward to trying the silver.

Also gratifying was doing my paint work directly on the floor of Todd's office (it's crappy linoleum and now there's a big gold spot on it, which will live on for eternity.)

Fine-Tuning the Downstairs Bathroom

As you may or may not remember, we gutted the downstairs bathroom four and a half years ago. It was one of the first projects we tackled (along with refinishing the floors downstairs and replacing some exterior doors. Since we moved back almost three months ago, I've been messing with it again. It went from ice blue to white since the blue hadn't worn very well in the three years we were gone. I framed the mirror last weekend and hung shelves the weekend before that.

I've been wanting to do this project since we first bought the light fixture years ago. I never liked the frosted glass sconce covers but all searches for milk glass turned up nothing. So after waffling on it for a while last Sunday, I decided to take a risk. I grabbed a can of white spray paint and a can of Rustoleum clear gloss spray from my collection and headed outside with my three shades.

After spraying the insides with a few thin coats of white, I sprayed the outsides with the clear gloss. Results are entirely satisfactory, if somewhat unimpressive when photographed. Makes a big difference in the way the light doesn't diffuse as much anymore. I'm really happy with it, and particularly pleased that I didn't ruin anything in the process.

 I also made one other minor but important addition: hand towel hook. You can see in the above picture we really don't have a great space for a bar or loop holder. The switches, floor thermostat and outlet are right in a row, and there's not really another good spot to hang a towel. Then...lightbulb...and now we have a towel hook. I even had a spare copper screw lying around, so the screw matches the hook.

Now, with the exception of some art, it's nearly finished. For now. I suppose.