For the longest time I've wanted to paint the front door.  It's a nice solid oak, and I love the knots and veins, and I didn't want to lose them.  We decided to go for it, and here are the pictures:

Next project - remove the screen door permanently and fix the door frame.  Also re-paint all the trim around the door and window.  Next Spring we'll also strip the paint from the porch and stain it well, as the brown paint that's on it from the old owners is majorly chipping.  I also need to get some Fall mums, though the geraniums in the planter are still growing like crazy and I never remember to water them.  

Just a little project I did with some extra wood from the basement.  I designed it, Matt made it, and I painted it!  I just wanted to put a little bit more of that turquoise from the butcher block and stool into the kitchen.

So remember THIS POST when it was all about our basement storage project from the beginning?  Well our basement sat like it was at the end of that post for a LONG time.  Part of that was Mat travelling and the rest just not knowing exactly how we wanted it.  Well in May we finally came up with a plan and in June we bought the wood.  Matt honestly did all of the purchases, building, sanding, priming, and painting in 3 weeks.  He worked really fast so there are a few instagram pics along with my DSLR.  I just couldn't get down there enough to capture every moment (probably to his relief!).

Next step is to do a few touch-ups, put the doors back on, and put everything away.  Touch-ups tonight, doors tomorrow, and next week will be organization central.  Thank goodness for summer holidays!!!  I'll do a complete before and after once it's all done.  Stay tuned!

Each year I have a few March Break goals.  Last year it was mainly to paint the kitchen and redo the grout.  Well this year I took a more relaxing approach.  It was much more enjoyable!

Many people lately have commented "Wow!  Do you guys ever just relax?"  I know it seems like we never rest and are constantly doing projects, but really, the last time we did anything major was December 2012, when we did the upstairs stair guard and stairs.  Matt travelled a lot this past year and I'm not versed well enough in tools to do a reno on my own.  Plus we love doing projects together.  This was the first Christmas where we didn't have any new home project to "show off" to our family which got us itching to do some projects in the new year.

So, we just finished the stairs on Family Day last Monday, and we decided yesterday (Saturday) to start on the storage, was the second half of the basement project.  The first thing we had to do was unpack all the cupboards.  We also went through everything and threw out stuff we didn't need, moved a few things to new locations, and found temporary spots for everything else.

Our second step to this project was to actually remove the cupboards from the wall and take them apart.  This actually only took just over an hour.  As long as you have a power drill it makes life easier.  By hand would be very annoying, but still possible.  We had three big shelving cupboards and one closet system.  Who knows what the walls would be like behind them!  I was hoping for the original exposed brick!!!

The next step will decide how exactly we want to organize the new system.  Roughly we will have cupboards on the bottom half, similar to the sideboard in the dining room.  The top half will be open shelving.  The triangle under the stairs will be all shelves.  It will all probably be painted white, and we'll use Ikea doors on the bottom half, but build the cupboards ourselves.  We want to make sure we will have a long closet on the end for all our extra coats and shoes (as we don't have a main floor closet), and we also have to be able to store our suitcases, golf clubs, snowboard, Matt's guitar, all our Christmas and holiday decorations, and all the random house stuff you've seen spread around my basement!!!

Matt and I don't really do a lot usually for Valentine's Day.  We don't do cards or gifts.  In the past we've gone to Leaf games, but mostly we just cook a good meal and enjoy each other's company.  That's exactly what we did this year.  I did a bit of prep work this time - I made a chocolate terrine  for dessert (since I failed on New Years) on Thursday evening - it has to set 12-24 hours.  I also made one for my work wife, Marta! Other than that, I just set the table when I got home on Friday, made a little garland (honestly took me 10 minutes) and Matt cooked dinner (pomegranate balsamic glazed sirloin steak with kale and tricolour quinoa).

So the ??? was actually until about Day 21.  But really there were some drying time days in there too, but so far I've really only included days where we (who am I kidding, Matt) did work.  Not all of them were full days, but again, with painting and staining, patience is key.  Also balance and flexibility so you can take stairs two at a time holding a giant basket of laundry without falling down.

Okay so I could go through all the painting and staining progress pictures FIRST, but we all know you just want to see the final product, so here's one for you before I launch into the details:

See Day 1-2 HERE, Day 3-5 HERE, and day 6-9 HERE.

Day 13/14 - We had to attach the stairs over two days because we wanted the glue (construction adhesive) to be completely dry before stepping on them.  It was weird to step on them because with and without the stairs they were different levels - it really throws you off when walking down them!

Day 15-21.  Since laundry and storage were in the basement, we had to do every other stair like we did upstairs when painting and staining.  The stairs started with pre-stain to help the stain soak in, then we did 2 coats on stain using Minwax "Golden Pecan" and followed by 3 coats of glossy Minwax oil-modified (more water-based) polyurethane.  There were some days where Matt did a coat in the morning and a coat at night, so it took 3 days for each half set of stairs, plus 24 hours to dry between.  After the 24 hours we pulled off the tape and did some touch-ups on the paint.

See Day 1-2 HERE, Day 3-5 HERE, and day 6-9 HERE.

Project Done.  So Next Up?
- take everything out of storage cupboards (actually did this this morning!)
- tear down the cupboards (may do that later today or tomorrow - excited!!!)
- paint (may possibly need to prime) the brick wall behind the stairs
- plan the storage cupboards and open shelving system
- build the storage system (and a million more details go into this)

Another of my January Cure projects was to (finally) paint and stain our butcher block island in the kitchen.  I have a few Pins saved with stain on the top and paint on the rest in various colours.  Took me a while to decide on what I wanted to do, but here is what I decided:

Ahhhhh it makes me so happy to see the bright colours all done!  This is the Bekvam Kitchen Cart from Ikea by the way. I decided that I would also do the step stool (Bekvam from Ikea as well) I had yet to assemble as well:

So here's the project, in pictures, of course!

Those are my shelf plans, from my engineer husband!  We will use some of the extra wood from the stair project.  There will be a few hooks on the bottom half.

Last weekend Matt worked on building the stair guard and we left off with this photo:

This week was all about touch-ups.  Using wood-filler and poly-fill to fill gaps, sanding, cleaning, etc.  I assigned that as "Day 6", though it was probably done over 2-3 days just for an hour each evening getting things perfect.  At the end of last weekend

Day 7 - I'm using the term "risers" for the vertical parts of the stairs.  We bought riser and stair kits (stair refinishing kit?) from Lowes that go right over plywood.  You only need to cut to size.  The good thing about them is that they have a lip that goes in the front. These pieces are also thin and have a good finish.  Also the biggest thing?  WAYYYY cheaper than buying oak and cutting it to size.

Day 7/8 - The flat pieces to the stairs I'm just calling "stairs".  If I called them "risers" for the vertical, does that make these the "runs?"  That's a little math humour for you...yes I am a geek.  You should already know that.  The reason that cutting to size and assembly are not lumped into one is because we are going to paint all the risers and wood at once and stain the stairs separately before attaching.

Next Steps?
- Prime and paint the risers and all the stair guard - using our go-to trim white - Benjamin Moore's "White Dove".  It's the colour of the risers and balusters upstairs too.
- Touch ups to the wall paint where any filler went.  The basement colour is BM's "Moonshine."  It's more from moving the lighting than the stairs, but it will be done while we are painting everything else.
- Pre-stain, stain (x 2), and verathane (x 3) the stair pieces
- Attach the stair pieces to the, well, stairs.
- Touch ups (there is always touch-ups)
- Admire briefly before starting the basement storage project!!!

When we last left off, we had removed the basement stair carpet, sawed off the sides that stuck out, and reinforced the top to the joist.  Last weekend (and one weekday this week) we tackled sawing off the fronts that stuck out, building the stair guard, including the newel post and balusters.  Here's what it looked like shortly before that:

Matt hasn't done any work on the stairs since Tuesday, though he did spend two hours at home depot today getting a few things he needed.  The light switch for the basement is going to be moved higher (right now it is about half-way down the stairs), plus we got a nest thermostat (!!!!) that he's going to install, and switch out a few of the un-matching light switches.

Next Stair Project Goals?
- Wood filler where needed
- Cut and install the rise pieces - vertical parts to the stairs
- Paint the rise pieces
- Cut and stain the flat stair pieces
- Paint the stair guard
- Install the flat stair pieces

We'll probably get this project done by the end of next week because I can help with all the painting.  And don't think I've been doing nothing!  I've stained the tops of the butcher block island and started painting the sides.  Still have one more coat, then I'll assemble.  Can't wait to share this project!!!