Because nothing can ever just be *easy* with me.

So, about those bedroom curtains.

I ordered a swatch of the fabric I posted last week, only to find that it really has an olive undertone that makes the bedroom paint read really minty.  It was disappointing.  I was holding up different swatches to the wall and *all* of them were making the paint read mint, actually.

The boy was like, "Why don't you just paint your bedroom?"  Oh Greg, you can't put ideas like that in my head or it riles up the home improvement demons!  So yeah, now I want to paint my bedroom.  Again.

Now, the path of least resistence would be to paint the room something that goes with the curtains I currently have but no, goddamn it, I love this fabric and I want to waste my time and money sewing new curtains. And the fabric looks really nice with the paint in the spare bedroom!

Effing home improvement demons.

The big picture

I've never storyboarded (is that even what it's called?) before, but this is sort of the master plan for the living room.  Until, you know, I change my mind again.

And I think I agree with the majority below: the fireplace should be white, even if it will show smoke and soot.  Hey, my fireplace doesn't work anyway!

Help me pick a paint color.

I like to paint a large area when I'm waffling over color choices but I think the color swatches, combined with the 6 existing paint colors, skidded right past "helpful" and right into "confusing." The walls will be the olive green you see on the lower half of the wall.

It looks sort of awesome the way it is, no?  *Sigh.*

But seriously, which looks better? Dark gray or white? Or something completely different?

poll by twiigs.com

Update!

Rachel makes me realize that I haven't specified what the color scheme will be in this room.  This is the inspiration photo for the room:

The rug will get swapped out for a light blue one and there will be pops of red.  So I'd like the fireplace to have some drama  . . . but more of the black-white spectrum kind. And of course I'll put a bird on it. :)

My crazy is showing

Summer was incredibly short this year.  I had to really hustle to get some of my outdoor projects done.  I have a couple of projects that have been weighing heavily on my mind.  I don't know if other people do this, but I worry that something will happen to me and my family will get stuck trying to sell my house and they won't be able to because the back of my garage looks like this.

It's fun being tightly wound.  It's also fun realizing you left a trowel on the roof when you were cleaning your gutters. *Sigh.*

The back of the garage was really dirty so I had to scrub it down with a brush and some TSP.  That part sucked but painting the cedar shake with a brush was so meditative I *almost* stopped crying over the fact that I'm having to evict my housemate.  It's a long story.

After washing it down I slapped on the only neutral paint I had in a flat finish.  This is my kitchen color.  It really doesn't go well with the mint green.

But! The back of my garage is ONE color that doesn't go with the mint green.  And some day I'll replace that light fixture that's hanging by the wires.  Baby steps.

We'll call it shabby chic.

Outer beauty

Remember that realtor who told me house was ugly?  Every time I pull into my driveway I wish I could repaint the exterior and pull out those awful rhododendron.  Some day.

I got my newsletter from This Old House recently and they had a bit on painting your house for $500.  It's a TON of work, sanding, caulking, scraping, and powerwashing, but it beats the three to six grand it costs to have a professional do it.  It got me thinking about next summer and how that might be the time to tackle this.

And then? And then! And then I saw this article on Lifehacker about a site called ColorJive.  You can upload a picture of a room and "paint" the walls using Sherman Williams or Benjamin Moore colors.  It's really fun--instant gratification!

Too brown!

Too green!

Too grey!

Hmmm.  That's nice.  I was curious what kind of paint colors were used when my house was built so I checked out Sherman Williams' historical color palettes.  They had the orange color I already picked out!  I tried on the combination for size.

Oh, ick.  No brown for me.  But I liked the green.  So I made a mash-up!

Of course, who knows what I'll pick when I actually get around to doing this.  But I love plotting..  I've been thinking about painting the slab in the backyard.  Why not use ColorJive?  My first instinct was to paint it robin's egg blue, since that is the color you see the least in the garden.  And I've planted a LOT of pink flowers.  But I also tried a bunch of other colors because, hey, you never know what's going to look great.  And I put in some pink and green dots that are supposed to represent plants.  Just go with it.

Purple:

Maybe too bright?

Pretty, but maybe too muted?

And red, a more intense version of what is already there:

This one is called Blue Shoes!

What do you think?  Is there a color I overlooked that I should mock up?  Which blue do you like?  Or should I skip the blue and pull that color in with pots and furniture?

(And go waste some time on ColorJive!  It's fun.)

Painting the fireplace, for reals this time

I scraped up all the vinyl tiles from the basement floor and it looked like there was nothing else left for me to remove from the space, so I could finally paint the fireplace.

There's no unpainting a fireplace, so you have to be really really sure you want to do it.  I was sure.  But first I had to remove Hall and Oates. I was terrified there would be dead animals or something sinister (like SPIDERS!) in the grate.  I removed the screws and got my prybar and popped Hall off.  Then I scurried back super fast.

There wasn't anything terrible in there.  There was something pretty good, actually: one of the missing bricks from the right side of the fireplace!  Sweet.

 

I vacuumed the bricks really thoroughly to get any loose grit or mortar out.  I used a little TSP to clean the front bricks that were looking charred, though it didn't seem to do much.  Then I just grabbed plain old white latex paint and started painting from the top down.

I used a regular brush instead of a roller because the fireplace is made of clinker bricks and what looks like pumice stone.  The surface is very porous and uneven.  According to classicbungalows.com, "Clinker bricks were the result of wet bricks being placed to close to the fire in the kiln, resulting in bricks that were darker-coloured and in either ‘melted’ or ‘exploded’ shapes. The surface texture of the bricks could range from glassy to pock-marked from the uneven heat. Richer, darker colours of the ‘clinker’ bricks were another welcome result from the extra heat."

The funny thing is that I was absolutely sure I wanted to paint the fireplace.  When I posted the pictures on Facebook a friend told me they were clinker bricks, something I didn't know previously.  All of the sudden I felt despair over what I had done.  They were historical! Used in the Arts and Crafts movement! Now the only thing that could restore them was a sandblaster.

Drat.

But I think it's going to be okay.  Next weekend we are installing the laminate and hopefully it will start to feel less like a basement and more like another room in the house.  I want to do something like this over the fireplace to warm up the space.  

 

Source: Young House Love

And of course I'll hang Hall and Oates.  And the disco ball.  Too much?

How to paint your fireplace

Do you want to update your grimy old fireplace?  A coat of paint is a good option, particularly if you're never going to use the fireplace for fire.  These bricks would look lovely with a coat of white paint.

Before you start you'll want to make sure that you put all the paint cans you've ever used (empty or full) in the basement, regardless of whether you'll need them. You'll want to trip over these later, especially since you'll be wearing contacts that are the wrong prescription, making walking a little tricky.  That's just the price you pay so your glasses aren't fogging up constantly with a ventilator mask on your face.

You'll also want to plan a dinner party for the evening.  Decide that morning to make homemade bread, despite the fact that you've *never* made an edible loaf of yeasted bread before.  Tonight will be different.

You'll want to remove the tack strips that surround the fireplace hearth, lest you accidentally kneel on one of those upward facing nails.  They were left from when you removed the carpeting.  Grab your handy floor scraper and start to loosen the rotting wood.

Accidentally take out half of a hearth stone with the floor scraper.  Whoops. 

You know what?  You never liked those that much and they aren't original to the house, so let's just get rid of all of them.

Some of the vinyl glue-down tiles popped off when you were scraping, so just scrape a few off around the fireplace.  You'll want to leave the rest alone because scraping up all the tile in the basement would be crazy.  

Shhhh . . . did you hear that? That was your friend Carrie, screaming "ASBESTOS IN THE VINYL TILE!" from a mile down the road.  But it's okay; you're wearing a mask and you're only removing a couple of tiles.

 

Crap.  That looks like water. Just a little bit, but water nonetheless.  Decide to switch to pulling up the tack strips that run along every wall.  

But first, run upstairs to do the first kneading of the bread. Finally read the recipe in full and realize that it requires FOUR rises and the bread won't be ready to go into the oven until 8 pm, never mind that you need to cook the chicken and the veggies too, all at different tempuratures.

Add "baguette" to your shopping list and return to the basement.

VERY IMPORTANT: put on the grimiest pair of work gloves you own so that you're sure to leave the highest number of smudges and smears on your freshly painted walls.  If something is worth doing, it's worth doing three times because you couldn't be bothered to be careful.

 

Wedge your prybar under the rotting wood and try to wrench it free from the basement floor.  Ding the drywall you so painstakingly mudded and sanded and primed and sanded and painted as many times as possible.  Once you finally have all the tack strips up, scrape some more tile from the SW corner of the basement, realizing that there's water in other areas, too.  

 

Realize that you really should scrape up all the vinyl tiles and put down some sort of sealant before you install the laminate flooring.  Sweep up as much of the vinyl tiles as you can and get them outside because they probably contain ASBESTOS, OH MY GOD, ASBESTOS and then use your shop vac to clean up all the debris you left.  Try to clog the shop vac as many times as possible.  

Hint: it's more times than you'd ever think possible.

Spray a bleach solution on the exposed concrete in the worthless hope that this might take care of any mold issues in the basement.  The hallmark of good home improvement is a smelly house, especially if you have guests coming over that night.  

Marvel at your updated fireplace.  Isn't it lovely?

The baguette?  It was delicious.

More progress on the basement

I'm finally at the point in the basement where I can paint. Huzzah!  The previous owner installed ceiling boards that remind me of carriage doors.

There's a lot of molding, all of which needs to be painted with a brush. As a result it takes five times as long. You probably did something fun for your three-day weekend, like go to the coast.  I did what I always do on long weekends: I covered myself in paint and went to the Home Depot without brushing my teeth or hair first.  It's just how I celebrate.

Have you really looked at the artwork on the fireplace?  It's amazing!  People have a lot of opinions on who it is--Beavis and Butthead, Hall & Oates . . .

I'm still trying to figure out what they were saying to each other.  I'm hoping it's something along the lines of, "Isn't this a lovely home, Daryl Hall?" and, "Rightly so, John Oates! Nary a ghost or critter here!"

I recently won a $25 credit at CanvasPop from Apartment Therapy.  CanvasPop takes your digital image and renders it on canvas, like a real painting.  I decided to have Hall & Oates committed to canvas.  I think they're worth it (though just barely--shipping was an unholy $14 for one rolled up canvas).

But back to painting, I had heard you want to use a saturated color in low-light areas like a basement because you won't have natural light to play it up.  My friend Mary has recently finished out her basement and used a lovely saturated seafoam color in her laundry room.  I loved the color so much she gave me the paint can so I could have it recreated at the paint store.  When I called the place where she had it mixed they told me it was $55 per gallon.

I just about fainted.  $55 per gallon?  I needed two gallons!  No way, nuh uh.  I firmly believe you get what you pay for in paint, but for $55 a gallon it should paint itself onto the wall AND mix me a martini while I watch.

I went down to Miller Paint instead and asked if they could color match it using Acro Pure as a base.  Acro Pure is zero VOC, low odor, and has an anti-microbial built into it.  Basically it's perfect for painting a basement with minimal ventilation.  The guys at Miller Paint were great and I'm happy to say that I didn't have another color-match mishap like I did with the dining room.  Lesson learned: get your color matching done at Miller Paint, NOT the Home Depot.  I had a coupon from my Chinook Book that was buy one get one free.  So I got two gallons of custom color paint for $31.

The coverage is great and the color is richly saturated.  The photos really don't do it justice.  I would absolutely use this paint again.  Two coats and I was good to go.

 

 

I'm still trying to figure out what color to paint the inside of the alcove.  It's presently white, but I think I want to do a chocolate color.  Then I just have to scrape the glue down padding, install the laminate my amazing parents bought me for Christmas, and this room might be usable.  Then I can move onto outdoor projects like the fence that's falling down in my backyard.  If good fences are an indicator of good neighbors, I am that homeowner with all the junkers on the lawn and the constant visits from the police.  But more on that later.

I felt terrible about this

I'm so sorry, Rick and Andy.

Rita and Anders?

Rico and Aaden?

Whatever your names, I painted over you.

But I felt really, really bad about it.  I hope you kept growing, Rick and Axle.

Painting the kitchen

My kitchen was really grimy when I bought it.  A reminder:

It was also pretty matchy-matchy.  Yellow paint to match the yellow tile.  I wasn't crazy about how it played off the new Marmoleum.  The wall color and tile were very cool and the flooring was warm.  I felt like it needed to be bridged better.

There were a lot of holes in the wood trim to be filled.  I used a wood filler that has the annoying habit of drying out almost immediately, making sanding it afterward more difficult.

I have to use the spackle that goes on pink and dries to white or I try to sand it too soon.  I'm not good at waiting.

Once I got the walls painted a warm off-white I felt like the counters looked too cool.

I grabbed the leftover paint from the failed first painting of the dining room and painted the soffit.  I think it balances the warmth and coolness, even if I'm not totally crazy about the color.  I still think it needs to be more saturated.

The final product:

The funny thing is that now the soffit paint is now pretty matchy-matchy with the tile.  I CAN'T WIN.