Semi-gloss cloud white for the trim - 2 coats for both trim and chalkboard
*You are going to see a lot of textbooks in the next few posts - thank goodness for education!
We already did a chalkboard when we made the basement into an office - quite appropriate for a teacher! I thought that having one in the kitchen would be good as well. The basement I use for my "to-do" lists for house projects, but this one would be for groceries, and reminders for plans and just cute notes between married people. So when Matt was at Home Depot a few weeks ago, he bought a flat piece of wood, nothing fancy, and some trim, and the project began! The only "before" picture of the wood and trim, among other reno items Matt primed the board - very important with the chalkboard paint, even though it's black! Although the trim is sort of white to start, we still primed and painted them. It was raining, so I had to paint upstairs while Matt used the saw downstairs Semi-gloss cloud white for the trim - 2 coats for both trim and chalkboard Super strong glue to hold trim to board...held down overnight by textbooks *You are going to see a lot of textbooks in the next few posts - thank goodness for education! Finished product! Quite similar to the basement one but a bit smaller. Here's the trim on the basement board - a bit of a braided look to it ...and the kitchen chalkboard frame - see - they are slightly different! The finished product! Now to write my grocery list...
2 Comments
So here are some sneak previews of our three main projects going right now - all quite similar in some ways - they are all framed, and required a compound miter saw for the cuts (thanks, Dad!): the chalkboard for the kitchen, the mirror for the dining room, and the HBC point blanket painting. None of them are quite done, but close! I will go into detail about how these things came to be in another post, but I'm still sick, and tired, and don't feel like editing and uploading a lot of pictures...plus I need Matt to tell me a lot of the things he did himself! Here is the mirror - framed! The frame still needs to be painted and it needs to be hung in the dining room. Here the chalkboard - painted and frame! I did the painting and Matt framed, and it only needs to be hung in the kitchen. Here is the HBC painting (sort of) and frame.
This will eventually be a big post - the frame was the most tricky to assemble, and it has one coat of stain on it. It needs some more sanding and maybe staining (I like the darkness now, but it is a bit patchy in places), and needs to be hung with the picture. I will show more of the painting when it is all done! This past weekend was cooking light, and at least start of project heavy, plus some fun. Friday night went right out when Matt came home to see Breaking Dawn!!! Yes, I am a 13 year old girl...the movie was terrible and I loved every minute of it! Matt is a great husband for coming along with me, but I think he secretly likes the movies too! Saturday we started on the point blanket painting, which currently has one coat of paint on the striped section, and should be done by tomorrow. We are going to build the frame for it this weekend (maybe). We also rearranged some of the living room, which I posted about previously. Canvas and paint ready to go! I also cleaned out the spare bedroom so that my good friend, Caroline, who is visiting this weekend, will have a clean room and clean bedding (although no one ever sleeps in there, its nice to have fresh sheets anyway). One of my now more organized drawers in the spare bedroom - yep, all the girl stuff is hiding in the dresser! Sunday we decided to do some actual work, and it started with a trip out to Pickering to get some things from my parents, including the compound miter saw and the saw horses. With these we are going to do the railings (for real, we are actually going to get to it, I promise!), the frames for both the painting, the big mirror, and my kitchen chalkboard. Oh yeah, I have to prime and paint the wood for the kitchen chalkboard...By the way - my parents are redoing their master bedroom - stay tuned (as in, hopefully before Christmas?) for before and after pictures! Oh side note - we painted the basement hall baseboards - they were white, now they are Moonshine like the rest of the walls and frames. We did this so that instead of this small area looking all chopped up, it looks like one long hallway, even with three doors along the way. Here you can see the "stuff" that has piled up in our basement...meaning tools and wood. This is my life. Also you can see the baseboards drying... Oh yeah, and I saw my brother - he is doing Movember too, so of course I snapped a picture of the two boys and their scruffy Sunday look. Brothers-in-law with matching facial hair...gross... After that we ran errands - went to Home Sense and got only a few things - a Christmas hand towel (white with a piece of holly and ivy on it for the bathroom upstairs - I didn't go nuts), a wreath, and some holly to go in our wicker basket. I'm not going Christmas crazy yet - not at least until after American Thanksgiving, and even that's early - December 1st seems to be a good date. Did another Home Depot run for more materials (somehow we never have enough to do the projects), and came home to relax after hours of running around. Pretty productive, yet fun weekend. Hopefully we can keep this up! My Holly Berries...
So I finally went through the spare room and organized the closet today. Here is a photo story of the progress! This was left by the old owners...it was not very practical as the sides of the closet were mostly useless... See? Hard to get stuff in there without squishing it. Once it was out, we desperately needed to patch the walls, so we did. That's a lot of spackle. One coat of primer and 2 coats of paint, and it started to look good! And then there were shelves - pine board for the supports and cedar for the actual shelves (It smelled like a sauna in here - still does a bit!) A month later, nothing else was done...so I painted the shelves ...and this happened. (PS - embarrassingly enough, my hair stylist still found paint in my hair 2 weeks from when this was done...) And today....view of the left (shallower) side View of the right (deeper) side Closer up - bottom left - bathroom stuff Closer up - top left - cleaning stuff, sewing kit, shoe polish - the random stuff Closer up - bottom right - dining room linens and accessories, cleaning towels, and even our little suitcases! Closer up - top right - bedroom linens and extra pillows From straight on, it looks like nothing is in there, really. Lots of storage space yet! The iron will stay, but the vacuum and Swiffer will not. I'm also planning on adding some hooks for extra towels along the back wall.
Now that we are home for the weekend for a few weeks, we are back to work on the house. Since the upstairs linen closet was still in limbo in terms Matt getting it painted, I bit the bullet and pulled out the primer today and did it myself. I will miss the beautiful cedar smell of the wood (I should find some good air freshener that smells like it), but I'm glad to have a coat of primer on it. The wood soaked it up, so it will definitely need at least two coats of paint. Matt also says "you know that you need to be careful not to get the paint on the walls, right?" Does he think I'm stupid? Well I am. It's all over the walls. It's hard to paint shelves that go right to the walls without getting it ON the walls without tape. I'm okay with it, because the shelves will be the same colour as the wall, so when I go over all the places tomorrow with paint, the colour should balance out, right? We already know I was never good at painting inside the lines, so really Matt should have expected it! Primer done! I wiped off most of the paint on my face before I took this... Before all that work happened, Matt was heading to Home Depot, and since they take old painted, I wanted to clear out the numerous paint cans left by previous owners in the basement. Between indoor and outdoor paint, there were a LOT to go, and now our shelves are much more organized! All the empty or half-used old paint to be recycled at Home Depot This was full just this morning - much more storage room now! So Matt's job this weekend is to do some wiring, so we can put a light on the shelf heading down to the basement. We want to put a painting there along with some decor, and it needs to be well lit. I'm going to put the first coat of paint on the shelves tomorrow, and definitely do some cleaning. Lastly, an Ikea trip is needed. We are looking for end tables for bedroom, a nice bench for the front hallway, and who knows what else - ohhhhh Ikea - there are always surprises to discover and screaming children for me to complain about! Good times. Tonight heading to dinner to check out JOEY downtown, and perhaps see a movie or just enjoy a nice evening in the city. More progress pictures to come tomorrow! So the upstairs hall linen closet is still not done...remember a few weeks ago when Matt had a few days off? He patched and painted it, but never actually built the shelves. Well, yesterday he did. They are not yet painted, or even completely assembled, but the hard part is done! Here are some pictures of how it looks so far... Before - closet organizer left from previous owners Original wood trim, never-before painted Step 1 - Patch up the holes! Left side Right side is much deeper - almost double the depth! Step 2 - Prime! Step 3 - Paint! Guess what colour? Of course - Cloud White! Step 4 - Matt building the shelves Pine for the support, cedar for the shelves - smells so good in there now! He worked right up until sunset...perhaps not the smartest thing to do with a saw... Left-side shelving for small towels and toiletries Right-side shelves for bedding and larger storage So much storage space still left - can't even see the shelves head-on! So what's left? Well the shelves need to be attached to the supports, the wood needs to be primed and painted, and we need to add some hooks and storage to the center of the closet as well. All that will have to wait, however, since we are leaving for our trim TOMORROW! YAY! I know it's been all week, but nothing much has been going on this week! Taught summer school all week, and it's the last day tomorrow for a half day. I'm doing the second session now as well, so I still really have 2 weeks to go! It's horribly boring and long days with students who are lacking motivation, and so I am exhausted! Matt has been off since Tuesday and has started work on our hallway linen closet upstairs. He has prepped it (which took a lot of work as it has never been touched, painted, or cared for), primed it, and painted it. We went to Home Depot yesterday to get wood for the built-in shelving, which we'll get to next week. It already looks so much better and Matt has done a really great job. It's all him, this project, except for me bossing him around occasionally! Pictures to come when its complete! Cottage weekend tomorrow - just the two of us. It will be nice and relaxing and quiet - I can't wait to sleep in and enjoy the beautiful weather! Last Fall at the cottage
So this post is mainly to show off what we have done so far. Nothing is ever complete, but the basement is pretty much done, the master bedroom is mostly done, and our living and dining room are at least painted. So I looked through some of the pictures from when we moved in, and then compared them to how they look now - wow - so different! Project # 1: The Basement (Den/Home Office) |
KathleenAdventures in married life, cooking, teaching science and new home renovations in the city! LinksArchives
June 2015
Categories
All
|