Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Home Improvements -- Woe is The Floor

Recap: The painted wall paper is off the walls. The bare walls have been spackled, sanded, washed and given 2 coats of primer. The decorative 2 step process is done on the walls.
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The ceiling is now done. The clouds were quite easy to do with a "pouncer" brush. That's a 1.5" dome brush with natural bristles. I experimented with a 1" paint brush and artists brushes, and the pouncer by far gave me the best results with the least amount of effort.
I mainly used a swirling motion with an occasional "stabbing" motion to get the effect. The wispiness was done by circular and straight dry brushing. The worst part of it was the neck strain of working on the ceiling. A rolled up towel wrapped around my neck helped that issue quite a bit. Too bad I didn't figure that out untill the end.


Here's the room as it stands now.


The closet is quite small and closed in. Here's a before shot complete with unpainted wallpaper and blue rug. It so worked with the pink shag in the rest of the room -- NOT.



Since it's small and closed in, I removed some shelving that has never been used added sky to the upper part of the walls. This is what it looks like now.




The carpet pad is off the floor and the greatest room mystery has been solved. It's not pleasant. Those morons (previous owners) painted the wallpaper and splattered copious amounts of paint on the floor. They didn't bother cleaning it up before they installed the rug. The paint will not come off. There are stains of all sorts and colors along with thousands of holes from the staples and tacks holding down the carpet. It has an odor and decades of ground in dirt.



Isn't it lovely?

Today I'll start on refinishing the floor. And I was hoping all the guest room furniture and stuff would be out of the dining room by Thursday. No such luck.

On the bright side, the guest room will no longer be an embarrassing hell hole. The Z, and anyone else who comes to visit, will have a mighty fine place to sleep.

The deadline approaches.

Home Improvements Part One -- Deadlines
Part 2 Home Improvements -- Day 3
Part 3 Home Improvements -- Welcome to Hell
Part 4 Home Improvements -- Hell has Left the Building
Part 5 Home Improvements -- Creative Issues
Part 7 Home Improvements -- Floor Update
Part 8 Home Improvements -- Finally Done

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

The pictures of the ceiling and walls don't do it justice. It is very beautiful. I know that you've had your attention on that room for over a decade. What a relief you will have when it's done. Since you will have all that attention free what will you do with it?

Eclectic Dilettante said...

I will rip out the wall to wall carpet in the music room and deal with the floor.

But not right now.

Dade Cariaga said...

Whenever I read your blog, lately, I have to be ready to hide it when Maty walks into the room. I don't want her to start getting ideas....

:-)

Congrats on the project. You're getting there.

Eclectic Dilettante said...

Dade,
That's really funny.
The slightly devious side of me wishes I had Maty's e-mail address....ideas can be good....

:-)