Stairway Reveal

June 2012

After we had fulled bead boarded the stairwell we had to think about the finishing touches.  We needed to patch, sand and paint the space as well as install new lighting.  Due to the height of the space and the large amount of work needed we decided that we would hire out the painting.  This was a tough call for us.  On principle alone, I refuse to hire out any work that I believe we can do as good or better then the professional. There is not many tasks that fit that description, so we really try to utilize our skills when we can.  The issue was timing.  We wanted to get the house refinanced, we wanted to get the room done and we had other 'life things' that needed to get accomplished. 

So we hired a painter,  I will say now, I regret it but I would not take it back.  It had to be done to get the refinance moving.  The fact is there is no one who will do as good of job on the details as you would.  You're more invested.  The room looks 'fine' but I see lots of spaces that were not sanded as smooth, or where you can still see a nail hole, caulk in the bead lines and other issues.  However, I cannot discount the fact they did the space in three days, which would have easily have taken us several weeks to complete. 

So, happy faces.  All I can say is the stairwell is completely transformed. The space is so bright and clean it's almost too perfect!   We chose to paint the entire space our Bone White. I know you just gasped, Taylor actually painted an entire space white! I know I can hardly believe it myself, but in the end I wanted to keep the stairwell light and airy and there was really no color that I felt would do that except for our trusty Bone White.  We have plans to eventually strip and stain the banister, which will make the space more dramatic. Since I haven't completely lost my technicolor obsession I did paint the stairwell window the same red as our doors and windows (not in the pictures because I haven't taken new ones yet).  This was to copy what we also did in the mudroom since that space was also bead board.

For the lights we went to our favorite Schoolhouse Electric and ordered some very delicate glass and bronze pendants.  They are small and simple, possibly too small and too simple.  But I figured if I was going white I should make all the components match the same aesthetic. I eventually see the entire space covered in art and objects and I want that to be the show stopper not our lights or wall color. The room is bare for now, it still needs the art and new rugs and potentially down the line a better cabinet at the top of the stairs.  But for now it remains the lightest and brightest place in the house.

Before 2010:

 After 2012:

Round Up:

Paneling materials and installation: $1,435, Paint materials and application: $600, Two custom built lights: $420, installation- free we installed them ourselves, New window-$700, Paint for window- free- used old paint, applied ourselves. Total: $3,155

This was our least DIY room in the whole house, but it was probably in the worst shape with the most challenging access so I think everything was required.

Before:

After:

A Christmas Miracle, Mudroom Vortex Part Deux

December 2011

This year we decided to spend Christmas in Portland, which was super exciting.  It was our first time staying home and would be our first opportunity to really celebrate in the house.  Of course, we could not just sit back and relax?  Apparently working on your house 24/7 doesn't end for the holiday season.  So, Josh and I decided to host a small Christmas party of desserts and drinks.  Then as luck would have it, we offered to be part of our neighborhood progressive dinner party which happened to land the following night December 26.  Yup, that's two parties, two different menus, in two days, gulp.

 

As if this wasn't enough, this would be the first time many of our friends and neighbors had ever seen the house.  Which put the pressure on to finally deal with a lingering project to nowhere: the mudroom.  As you may remember, back in July we installed beadboard in the entire space.  In August, we rented a belt sander and sanded the floor boards.... then nothing happened for a while. Then we sanded the ceiling, only to realize we had to skim coat it again, so we sanded it again.  Are you seeing where I am going?

Well it was a little over a week to Christmas and we needed to at least make the room presentable.  We primed the entire room and set about painting all the walls, trim and ceiling a nice fresh white semi-gloss.  One coat went up, then two, the wood was soaking all the paint up like sponge, I seriously didn't know if I could keep painting the same space every night like this.  Finally, we tried a third coat, it had to be deemed good enough and we stopped at four coats of paint.  This made a huge difference in the room!  So bright and so fresh.  We were excited and couldn't wait to paint the french doors. Except we soon realized they had to be open to painted?!? Since it was about 30 degrees and rainy in Portland these doors were not getting painted anytime soon.  Total fail on our part.  We had three months of perfect weather in which to paint the doors and well... it looks like it would be almost a whole year before it happened.  So please ignore the ugly preprimed beige doors.

 

I will take a break from this failure to show you a picture of our amazingly cute sconce we added to the mudroom.  Prior to this addition there was no light in the space, not one.  Making trips to the basement or outside at night was an 'at your own risk' adventure.  Then I saw this little guy and decided he should come home with me (I am glossing over the fact we had to bring in a electrician to actually make it light up). But that aside, its adorable and I love him every time I go down to the basement without tripping and dying.

 

With the door failure looming we decided to paint the floor.  I primed the bare floor boards, which kinda gave it a fun whitewash effect and then Josh painted the floor with crisp porch paint. Two coats, one of which was done on Christmas Eve.  Yes, we painted the mudroom floor on Christmas Eve, Josh was at until 9pm.  Fumes be damned this would be our Christmas miracle! We pulled it off and shared a glass of wine before passing out.  Now I just needed to start contemplating two parties to cook for. 

Best House Project Ever- Porch Light

September 2011

I am sure you have a few questions already... what happened to August 2011? Why aren't you talking about the mud room...  etc. ?  We took August off from house work, we worked on the garden, went to some concerts, volunteered, celebrated my birthday and planned some September trips. We did manage to take a few hours out of the one of the weekends to install our 'new' outdoor porch light.  I am putting 'new' in quotes because my parents bought this light for us as a house warming gift.  That's right... when we moved in, in May 2010.  It sat in our basement for over a year looking pretty and doing not much else. 

There is multiple excuses of why it did not get installed, the biggest being we knew we were going to remodel the outside and did not want it to get damaged.  The real reason is we put in the basement and then it kinda moved off our to-do list.  But, we had no more excuses, the exterior had been done for two months and the bare light bulb was definitely lowering our curb appeal.

For those of you who are wondering, it is a pottery barn light, my parents got in on sale for memorial day, it is a beautiful moravian star light with speckled clear glass and an oil rub bronze finish.  We pulled it out of the box, shortened the chain, and turned off the breaker. Project light was off and running 16 months in the making.

 

Josh quickly got the old bare bulb socket off the ceiling and we realized the new light base had a much smaller circumference.  For the record, this has happened every time we have installed a new light... what gives?  So, we had to sand the area down and then quickly apply two coats of yellow paint to the area.  Two hours later we came back. The biggest issue we had was that the old wiring in the house is not color coded.  It's hard to know which wire is the positive and which is the negative.   Josh held the fixture and I hooked it up, and I took a shot in the dark.  We ran a test (involving running down to the breaker and flipping the switch), which proved I had guessed wrong.... urgh!  50/50 never works for me.  We uninstalled it and swapped the wires (since this time we have bought an electrical meter to avoid this).
 

The best part was when we flipped the light on... something amazing happened, the barrel vault in our front porch immediately reflected a lattice work of triangles from the star.  It was pretty freaking amazing and a total unexpected win!  I love this light.  This is probably the cheapest and most satisfying house project ever.  It look us about 4 hours (painting included) cost under $100 and transformed our entire porch.  If I had known this I would have installed it ages ago.