Tile & 2 Days to Move In

Good morning chickadees! How is everybody today? I am tired and stressed, thanks for asking! But, the end is in sight and that is a fabulous feeling!

Most of what I've been doing has been boring (cleaning the house and packing the apartment) so I won't bore you with that, other than to say that I am a packing rock star.

Yesterday I took a break from the boring stuff to work on pretty-fying the house again. Megan (who is awesome, no lie) came by to help me paint for a few hours!

Super Megan! She is the butt-saving hero.

This should be gorgeous when the walls are finished and the trim is actually painted instead of just primed!

Between the two of us, we got more trim and windows primed, the living room (mostly) painted green, and the bedroom (mostly) painted green as well! The mostly just means that I either A) couldn't get to a few spots due to furniture still being in the room and I couldn't move it by myself to paint behind or B) I just completely ran out of green paint... depending on which room we're talking about. However, the vast majority of each of these rooms is painted now!

Green!

So much better than the yellowed white that these walls used to be.

The color isn't really coming through in some of these pictures, it was way too bright outside when I took them. But this is the color the walls are...

What is even more exciting than the paint (which is exciting, don't get me wrong) is the fact that Joey is 99% of the way done with the tile! Remember this bathroom before? When it was stained old plastic tile stuff that looked horrible?

Here it is now...

It hasn't been caulked yet and the grout is drying so it looks darker right now... but seriously, how good is my hubby?

I want to die it's so pretty. Ok, then I couldn't take showers in it or stand and admire his handiwork... but you get the point.

The movers are coming on Wednesday morning and here's our list to do before they show up:

1. Clean up debris and construction material from floors of house.
2. Clean all floors in house.
3. Finish wiping down cabinets and counters in house.
4. Caulk and seal the bathtub.
5. Finish packing apartment.

Eeep. Not going to panic... not going to panic...

Painting and Tile

I think yesterday was the first day that someone could walk into the house and really see what we did without us having to tell them. We've been working on so many projects that just aren't as big and impressive, so it was nice to finally get to some big projects!

Joey put some more backer board up. He couldn't put it up on the side of the shower with the knobs and shower head... mostly because we didn't have those things and it would have been difficult to do! However, we were able to go buy new shower fixtures last night, so he can work on finishing the backer board soon!

He also started working on putting tile up! I'm really excited about this. I honestly was worried that this shower would never look good, but he proved me wrong!

I'm still amazed he knows how to do this stuff.

Pretty tile!

Yesterday's progress!

While he was doing that, I worked on emptying out the study as much as I could. Then I started painting!

Seriously in love with this color.

I finished painting the walls in the study! I still need to caulk around the trim, then prime, and paint the trim and door. And Joey needs to get the ceiling painted, but this room is looking so much closer to done!

I had enough time after that to begin painting the kitchen as well! I only have one picture from this progress, but the color looks amazing in here too!

Short Update

Sadly, I don't have any pictures today. I'm covered in paint and using the hubby's computer so I don't really have the desire or access to pictures. However, I am excited about the progress we've made!

1. Painted the first coat on the ceiling in the bedroom.
2. Primed the ceiling and walls in the bathroom.
3. Continued caulking the trim on walls and door frames.
4. Cleared out massive amounts of stuff from the house- got rid of most of the furniture (the rest will be in the garage sale) and got a number of boxes out of the house.
5. We removed the horribly stained, horribly smelly area rugs out of the house. And removed all curtains. The dog smell is starting to fade! Hallelujah!
6. We are just about ready for the garage sale! It's on Friday and Saturday from 7am-2pm if you know me, are in the area, and are interested. More details will be on Facebook tomorrow!

I said in a comment that all I really knew how to do so far was paint and unscrew things. But, today I learned how to caulk! Not a massive skill to learn... but my resume just increased in size by 33%. lol.

That's all for today, but I'll have another update (with pictures!) very soon!


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Small Changes

Please excuse the terrible photo quality. I'll be borrowing my brother's camera for awhile to fix this problem!

Could that possibly be real paint? Why yes, yes it is! We haven't done much  painting, just a swatch on a couple of walls, but I am in LOVE with this color. We can't get the paint on the walls until we've painted the ceilings. And we can't paint the ceilings until we've removed all of the previous owner's belongings, which is not something we thought we were going to be responsible for and it's slowing down the process considerably. However, this weekend we did get some work done!

Yesterday we got tired of sorting and packing, so we worked around everything to get some more of our remodeling done! 

Here's the back door before we did anything to it. We will be replacing this door entirely, but we want to paint it to match the house for now so that it isn't an eyesore when nothing else is that color! We won't be replacing the doors for awhile because we have more pressing items to purchase first (new flooring for the kitchen and bathroom, new kitchen sink, complete remodel of bathroom, etc) so this will keep things looking nice until that time! So far we've only primed the door, but it should get its first coat of paint tomorrow.

Joey got to work on caulking some spaces that needed it. I really didn't think it'd make that much of a visual difference, but I was stunned when he finished!

Before

And voila! This wall is going to look amazing after we paint it. I can't wait!

After

Here's Joey hard at work...

The trim looks so much better now too. I took a before/after picture to show the difference! It looks so much better without that gap!

Before: Left, After: Right

While Joey was being super productive, I was also hard at work. I went to work painting trim and door frames here and there all over the house. I did some in the kitchen, some in the living room, all of the bathroom, and most of the hallway!

My high tech painting gadgets.

 
Here's your first look at the hallway (and mine too, that's the first time there has been a lamp so I could actually see it!). This picture was taken from the living room looking toward the bathroom. The first two doors are both closets and the farthest back doors are each bedrooms. This hallway is wired for light fixtures, but there isn't currently one in there, so I improvised with the lamp! The paint for this area will be that pretty blue!

That's all for now. We've made a time line for the rest of our progress for the next few weeks, because move-in is rapidly approaching! We move in 23 days on July 20th and have so much to do before then!

Leave me a comment, if you wouldn't mind! They make me happy! ;)
 

Memorial Day Weekend

Since the last time I've posted Joey has put a couple more coats of joint compound on the ceiling and the wall. The initial area of the wall he started on is now ready to be primed! It is finally nice and smooth and looks like a normal wall. I'll post a picture after it's been primed, but here he is finishing it up:

The ceiling still needs a coat or two, but it is getting close.

We did find another spot on the ceiling and one on the wall that also need fixed, so he put the first coat on those spots today. Here is what he did on the wall...

Step 1: Have a patch of wall that is damaged. Like so.

Step 2: Cover with fiber glass mesh tape.

Step 3: Apply joint compound. Repeat until smooth, allowing for 24 hours between coats.

Step 4, as I learned today, is to NOT stick your figure in the middle of the joint compound that your husband just finished smoothing out. Oops.

 I said the other day that Megan pulled a bunch of cabinets and drawers out and removed all the hardware. I really meant she pulled a ton off... seriously....

That is 6 drawers and around 8 or so doors. Megan is a rockstar.

One of the backs of the drawers was originally made out of a tomato carton. I think that this is awesome.

All of the drawers had liner in them. So, I pulled it out of all of them (to be replaced or painted later, or both until I make up my mind). I went ahead and primed the drawers today because Joey had time to sand most of the doors and drawers! I also primed the edges of all of the doors that were sanded today. Yay teamwork!

I also had time to get a bit more priming done on the walls in the kitchen. I started priming the trim as well. I left this board untouched for now, because Joey's height was marked on here when he was 7, 8, 9, and 10 years old. It's too cute to cover up until I've at least transferred it to paper. But, all of the other trim around this door is now primed and ready for paint!

I'll make a post soon about some of the treasures I found while going to garage sales and antique stores this weekend. I found some great stuff that will go great in the kitchen when it's finished! 

I hope everyone had a great holiday weekend!

Assorted Doings

Today was a fairly random workday. Not many pictures to show, but here's what was done!

1. Joey did another layer of joint compound on the ceiling and wall.
2. Megan pulled the rest of the cabinets off and removed the hinges and handles. She also took most of the drawers out and removed the hardware on them too.
3. I did a couple more coats of Vermont Cream on all of the cabinet doors that I've been working on. 
4. I filled a few old nail holes.
5. I removed the baby gate hardware off of two door frames.

Now for a couple of pictures! This is the reason why I want to paint the ceiling in the kitchen so badly! Just a coat of white paint will brighten up that room so much!

So, without further ado, the "before" pictures of the ceiling!

The "after" pictures will be up in a few days. Each layer of the joint compound takes 24 hours to dry before the next layer. It still needs at least two more layers to fix the damage, so it'll be at least three days before I can begin painting the ceiling.

Corner Cabinet Before and After

I have my very first completed before and after project! I put the very last coat of paint on the corner cabinet today. I only had had a little bit of time to work today, but I'm glad to have finished my first project!

Before- Sea foam green, brown, and off-white

After- The beautiful Vermont Cream!

Real Paint and Beginning the Ceiling

I haven't updated in awhile, but I have been working! Not much of it has been interesting enough to take pictures of though! I don't want to put pictures up of the real paint that I'm putting on until all the coats are finished. I don't want to bore anyone with multiple pictures of basically the same thing.

This is the closest match that I could find to the white I'm using. It's called Vermont Cream and it's perfect! It's hard to see on here, but it's the best I can do for now!

And these are the other two colors we're using in the house:

For the bedroom, living room, and bathroom.

This is called Spring Hill.

For the kitchen, study, and hallway.

And this one is Yacht Harbor.

Here's a list of what has been done that does not yet have pictorial proof:

1. Coats of paint on all the cabinet doors that have been sanded. (Some cabinet doors are still unsanded and some are still attached with the hinges.)
2. Coats of paint on the corner cabinet shelf.

 And here is what has been going on in pictures!

My sweet peas are popping up! No sign of my wildflowers yet, but I'm pretty excited about the sweet peas.

The strawberries died a tragic death in a mowing related accident, but we did get some sugar baby melons and zucchinis planted today.

I forgot to take a "before" picture of the ceiling, but here is a during picture! The ceiling was not flat and we needed to redo the joint on the dry wall. Here is the mess Joey made while doing the first coat of joint compound!

And here is Joey (finally doing some work!) As you can see, the ceiling is a delightful (not) shade of gray. We have to fix this joint problem before we can paint it, but I've purchased the paint and I should be able to paint it this week after the joint compound dries and the other layers have been applied and dried!

The first coat of joint compound is up and working on drying! We'll do the next coat tomorrow!

 Here is the before picture of this wall. Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of it after I primed it, but use your imagination! You can't see all the damage on this wall from this picture, but Joey is working on patching all that up too!

This is right next to the stove. The same thing was happening here... the joint in the drywall was separating. I haven't primed behind the stove yet, but to the left of the stove to the door is all primed!

Right next to the light switch there was a hole in the wall. Joey patched this up too! The first coat is on, but it still needs several coats and some sanding.

This is the long awaited picture of the kitchen without the dated scalloped hanging above the sink! Yay modernization! It looks so much better in here without the scallops!

This doesn't technically have anything to do with the house, but I will be hanging it up in the house when we move in! It's a rose I made out of book pages. I'm making a wreath out of a couple hundred of these. It's going to be beautiful!












Some people have asked me if I'm really doing all of this work... the answer is yes, pretty much! I have time during the day while Joey is at work so until today I've been doing almost everything myself. My brother helped take cabinet doors down and remove some hardware and Megan helped me prime the cabinet doors, the corner cabinet, and a wall. Other than that though, it's all been me! Luckily Joey is done with school for the summer now and can help me in the evenings and on weekends again!
Thanks to everyone who has helped so far! It's been greatly appreciated!