Meg vs. the Vanity: TileDOC Makeover

The vanity top in our bathroom has been the bane of my existence for some time. It was stained and yellowish and unattractive, but in a size that is no longer standard (aka expensive to replace). I finally found an affordable one, and it arrived all smashed to pieces (just like my dreams of an easy bathroom makeover).

Enter TileDOC. I actually found out about this product from the Giani Granite Paint website. I had considered using their products to re-do the vanity, but it can't be used in the sink, and I was short on time, so it didn't help me much. They recommended using TileDOC for the sink, so I thought, "Why not use it to spray the whole stinkin' thing?" And that is what I did. I sprayed and sprayed, coat after coat, two whole cans' worth of TileDOC.

Behold!

Here is the sink before; beige and stained.

After, in my makeshift spray booth.

Ta-da!

It is a little grainier than I would like, surely because I didn't do it right (I am too impatient for following instructions to the letter, though I tried), but it is much, much better than it was before. It doesn't clash with the tile anymore! And I am a happy camper.

Meg vs. The Bathroom: A new coat of paint.

I spent my last couple of days in Vallejo doing this, among other things. I wish I would have done this so much earlier! I think we bough the paint for it a year ago... I am so in love with this bathroom now; it makes me want to move back =).

Before: '80's peach. It almost came back in style, but not quite.

After: Cool grey. We used the same Behr Silver Drop that we used in the bedroom, but asked them to make it 50% darker than the original, so it is just a little bit more noticeably grey.

What a difference some paint makes! The only really annoying part of this job was that a little bit of the silicone caulking I did last year stayed on the wall around the shower (way to go, Meg), so of course the paint wouldn't stick and kept beading up. Finally I got desperate, and stood there and smeared the paint back and forth with my finger until it started getting tacky and dry, and what do you know? It mostly covered up the silicone. It was a small miracle, because I didn't have time to go hunt down some other product to remove or cover up the silicone.

Meg vs. The Walls: Removing Wood Paneling

I did this to the front bedroom today:

Before. This doesn't quite portray the ugliness of the painted-over,

falling-off-the-wall wood paneling.

After: Yikes! It always gets worse before it gets better, right?

Right?

So before Thursday when two more girls come to see the house, we hope to patch the walls, sand everything down, do a coat of primer, spray texture on the walls, and do a second coat of primer.  Then paint and moulding... Phew! I am tired already, and I need to clean out the garage before the contractor comes to measure for the new door on Wednesday.

As I was attacking the paneling, I was thinking about how nice it would have been to have done this earlier and been able to enjoy living in the finished house. But then I thought about how busy and preoccupied I have been these last couple of weeks trying to get everything done, and I am glad that I wasn't crazy focused on the house so that I could focus on these guys, who were relegated to the tent today:

Meg vs. The Bathroom: Paint Sneak Peek

I managed to throw two coats of paint on the bathroom walls before our Christmas trip began. I may or may not have gone to bed at 2am a couple of nights in a row. But I am really excited about the results!

We'll be back in action on the bathroom after the new year.

Meg vs. Thanksgiving: Fall Handprint Garland

I love handprint crafts. If you search "handprint" on Pinterest you will find seven kajillion (of course that is a number!) amazing, creative, super fun handprint crafts to do with your kiddos. My three-year-old has been dying to do a footprint with paint ever since he saw the kids on Barney make Halloween ghost footprints, so when I saw turkeys on Pinterest that had handprints AND a footprint, I knew we were golden. (Oddly, none of the links to the actual turkeys worked, so I won't link back to any originals. We started out the fun by looking at some pictures of real turkeys online, then got to work.

Now as much as I love a cute handprint, I am not really into making extraneous messes, so my kids aren't really well trained with hand painting/stamping activities. More specifically, my almost-two-year-old cannot hold still for more than about two seconds, so I didn't think that doing all the prints right onto the turkey would work for us. I decided to just have the boys do a whole bunch of prints onto a paper bag (since I am too cheap to buy real craft paper) and then assemble the turkeys later. I have these Crayola Washable Kids' Paints, and we have really liked them and haven't had any problems with staining, which is good since I neglected to strip my kids down this time before we got going.

I had them stamp their feet twice just in case, which worked out because at the last second I thought to take advantage of the extra paint on their hands and make a little tree canopy so we would have some fall foliage to add to our decor as well.

Then when the paint dried, Big Brother and I cut out the hands and feet and glued them together, added some googly eyes and a couple spots of paint, and behold:

Handprint/footprint turkeys!

We taped them on to some yard with our fall trees, then hung them up in the living room.

Big brother and I also redecorated our branches for fall, since our spring buds (cut out from paint chips) were in poor shape. Here's the before & after:

Blech.

Much more festive!

And I cut out two leaves to cover the tape we used to hang up our garland.

Super easy, the boys love it, and I think it's decor the grandparents will appreciate, as they are all coming to visit around Thanksgiving time.

I have to admit, I couldn't decorate for Thanksgiving without starting to get excited for Christmas. Growing up we always put up our tree and all of our decorations the day after Thanksgiving, so the two are intertwined for me. We may or may not have tuned in to Christmas Radio on Pandora. Don't judge me.

Here's to the start of the Holiday Season!

Meg vs. The Exterior: Our first quote...

Tonight we had a couple of fellas come over to give us a quote on coating our house with some fancy Coolwall stuff. The whole shebang would include fixing all of the dry rot, cracks, and every imaginable problem with the house's exterior, sealing it, coating it with some kind of superpaint that reflects heat, and pretty much making our house invincible (against water, anyway). It lasts way longer than paint and has a lifetime warranty. I would have loved to have it done; they said they could schedule us in four days and have it done a week after that. The only catch? It would have cost FOURTEEN THOUSAND DOLLARS. Sigh.

I guess it's time to roll up our sleeves, get to work, and prioritize what we will contract out!

In other news, I spent all of 15 minutes over the course of the day putting two coats of chalkboard paint on our board. I also ate too many chocolate chip cookies (John has been making them almost every Sunday--so good, and so bad!) and spent a while hanging upside-down from my couch trying to get the baby to flip, then spent too much time on the internet. I think it's time to go to sleep and and then get a new day started!

Meg vs. The Hallway: Paint and Prep

Tuesday: Paint the front hallway. Start stripping the bathroom door.

The hall is painted, but I'll wait until we've touched it up and taken down the tape before I photograph it for posterity. The door is out on the deck soaking up paint stripper overnight. And I even mulched up a giant pile of leaves (the curse of the magnolia tree; we are the only people raking in June), then cleaned the house and cooked dinner (udon with veggies) while I was babysitting. Bam! I seriously stink, though, so I'm off to do my whale workout (i.e. pregnancy fitness video) and then to de-stinkify myself. Because these are the kinds of things you want to know about my day ;).

Meg vs. Miscellany: Ambitious day - check!

Monday: Re-fill that green waste bin. Paint a coat on the changing table attachment. Tape the front hallway. Hang the mirror in the living room above the bench.

We managed to get it all done! I filled up the can with lots more cuttings from our giant overgrown rose bush (tree) and a branch from the yucca tree next to it. I just finished painting the first coat on the attachment (John started, but I had to intervene because I'm anal about the brush strokes), I taped the hallway this afternoon, and John helped me hang the mirror just before bedtime. Phew!

I think the mirror makes this corner look much more complete, but I still feel like it's missing something. We are both leaning toward painting the mirror, a la this look (but not this color; maybe coral):

Source here.

Whaddya think?

Meg vs. The Nursery Dresser: Back to priming.

Wednesday: Prep the nursery dresser's changing table attachment for painting.

I forgot that I had already applied liquid sandpaper to the parts, so all I needed to do was prime today. They are done except for the part touching the floor, which I'll have to roll over quickly tomorrow. I'm just glad I actually did something I intended to do this week!

 Also, I still need to get the garage junk under control. It's like a catch-22; I can't clean the garage with the furniture and stuff in there that needs addressing, but I can't address them while the garage isn't clean. Sigh. John suggested I just take the kids to my mom's for a week or more while he and a friend tackle the big house projects. Maybe I'll have to take him up on that. First I have to get him to go to the doctor so he can stop being sick and I can put him back to work!  =)

Meg vs. The Hallway: Trim Cleaning

Monday: Sand and clean the trim in the front hall. Paint the trim.

The hubs is sick and we also had a few visitors, so we took it easy today. I am a little tempted to go work some more right now, but the hall is just outside the boys' rooms, and they have not been great sleepers lately. Not worth it. Maybe I'll do something else to get ahead on the rest of this week's projects, since this delay will prevent me from meeting tomorrow's goals, too. I am not sure how we are going to pack in all the needed work this summer! That's life I guess.

Meg & John vs. The Halls: Painting

Saturday: Paint at least one of the hallways. 

Lucky for me, John took care of this the other night. Here is the hall outside our room:

I taped the other hall in preparation for painting the trim, but that's as far as we managed to get today. I told the hubs to take things easy since it's Father's Day weekend.

Meg vs. The Nursery: Painted dresser.

My apologies for dropping off the planet for a few days. There was really no reason for it, except I was in survival mode while John took his last exams of the year, and I also made the mistake of starting to read Anna Karenina. But I did my jobs! Here is the dresser after the first coat of paint (I forgot to take pictures after I primed).

I thought the brush lines would bother me a lot, but I actually kind of like the look. Here it is after the second coat. I may still put on a third before I finish it off. And of course tonight my husband is bringing home another whole furniture set that needs painting. Oh, the fun!

Monday: Prime the dresser! Do a quick sanding.

Tuesday: Paint the first coat on the dresser!

Wednesday: Paint the second coat on the dresser.

Meg vs. The Nursery Dresser: Liquid Sandpaper

Tuesday: Finish cleaning and coating baby dresser with liquid sandpaper.

As it turns out, the cleaning was significantly more difficult than the liquid sandpaper. That was due to the horrid tape that the previous owners used to hold the drawers shut when moving it. There was still a lot of residue left even though I had worked on it for a significant amount of time last week.

This is what I broke out to attack the goo one last time:

The dryer helped to soften up the adhesive, and I suppose it's obvious how the blade helped... It didn't end up perfect, but it was significantly better when I was done.

Next it was time for my Liquid Sander Deglosser! My other tools were: (1) rubber gloves, and (2) a holey sock.

It is so, so easy, and I have read good reviews on it. It took me about 5 minutes to coat the whole dresser and all of the drawers. In the photo you can just barely see that there is a little bit of a film left on the wood. It should be just enough to help my bonding primer to stick. More to come next week once I stock up on supplies!

Meg vs. The Mailbox: 5 minute paint job

Wednesday: Spray paint the ugly mailbox.

The hardest part about this project was finding the can of paint I purchased for it months ago. I never did, so I had to wait until the car was available and go buy another one. (Thus the "after" picture was taken at night). Good thing it was only 99 cents! I topped it off with a coat of spray lacquer that I already had for another project; I think it helped make it look more finished, but we'll see the real result in the light of the morning. Regardless, it is much less noticeably hideous than it was before, and saves us from paying twenty times more for a new one.

Meg vs. The Kitchen: Paint chips

Wednesday: Buy seam tape and plaster, pick up paint samples for the kitchen and paint (tape) them up. Price (maybe buy?) replacement doors for the master bed and bath.

I realized that we didn't have enough of an idea of what color we wanted in the kitchen to actually paint up samples, so I grabbed a pile of chips at the store and we narrowed them down to the ones we liked. We knew we wanted to stay in the green family because our granite has green in it, and weren't even sure we wanted to change the color at all.

The contenders are Asparagus (really similar to the current color),

Mountain Haze,

and Laurel Mist.

We probably won't make a final choice until we also choose whether to do a tile backsplash and have a better look at our options there. But at least our brains are moving.

I also purchased tape and joint compound and a new hook for the dining room chandelier, and took a look at interior doors (nothing struck my fancy, so I'll take my time there). I should give myself shopping assignments more often!  Hehe.

Meg vs. Assorted Unfinished Business: Finishing up

Thursday: Clean up the painting stuff and put the bedroom back together. Put a final coat of paint on the living room bench.

The first half mostly was done because my husband felt bad and did it for me while I was washing a giant mound of dishes at 10pm. The second I did during nap time (the only time I was home before dinner all day!). It is nice to actually have something finished rather than in progress or waiting to be done!

Meg vs. The Bedroom: Done Painting!

Wednesday: Do a second coat and/or touch-up in the master bedroom as needed.

This morning John and I decided I should just touch up the walls and skip the second coat. Then during nap time I got to work, and of course the more I touched up, the more annoying spots I found. It didn't take long before I decided to ditch the touch-up effort and slap a new coat on as quickly as possible. And I finished the whole room during nap time (about 2 hours)! My arms are killing, but I'm glad to be done. I think I'll need a while to regroup before we tackle the next room. I'll post a final photo of our room once things are put back together.

Meg vs. The Bedroom: Still more painting.

Tuesday: Tape and paint the master bedroom walls.

I taped all morning, I did 3 walls during naptime, then the last wall and the hallway after the kiddies were asleep. When I was done at 11pm I still needed to go grocery shopping, as we were almost completely out of milk (with my 3 housemates, that spells disaster). So now, at 1am, I bring you, two fuzzy pictures of the day's work:

My first 3 minutes of work up next to our paint samples. 

The same wall at the end of the day. It is lighter than it seemed like it would be from the sample, but I'm glad because we bought the same color for all of the bedrooms, and it is fairly unassuming. I think once the green tape is down you'll be able to see the contrast better with the white ceiling; in this picture it all looks white.

We are debating on whether to do a second coat. John votes no, mostly because he wants me to be done already. I am not convinced, because I know how annoyed I'll be when I start noticing discolored spots. We agreed to decide in the light of the morning. We'll see how hard or easy tomorrow's goal will be!

Meg vs. The Bedroom: More painting!

Monday: Paint a second coat on the door trim. Put a coat on the trim and baseboards in the hallway as well. Take down the blinds and clean around the windows.
I don't really have much to say about this except that it is done. I even did the dishes today, and started working with the kiddies on getting ready for Daddy's birthday. I am excited for and also dreading two more big painting days and then having my room done!

Meg vs. The Bedroom: Paint

Friday: Start painting master bedroom.

It is 10pm. I just swiffered my ceiling, and am currently covering everything in this room in plastic in preparation for painting. I will shut down my computer for the night now, but I feel confident pre-emptively crossing this one off. As long as I get even one brushstroke up, I technically started, right?

I hope you all are sleeping already! I'll get back to my goal of going to bed early after Spring Break is over =).