Remember The Hallway?

The one we started painting but never quite finished all the way back in August? Well we finally got around to the finishing it!

If you recall we left off here:

With only two walls painted. Since our hallway contains stairs and a nice big vaulted ceiling its impossible to reach the top of the walls with a regular ladder. When we initially started the project we figured we'd just do what we could until we found a taller ladder. In the midst of Halloween decorations, Poseidon's hospital stay and preparing for our European vacation it got pushed to the back of our minds. Until we decided to host Thanksgiving this year.

There was no way I was letting guests into our home with a halfway painted hallway. I mentioned this to a coworker whose boyfriend has a variety of ladders and was willing to let us borrow one (thanks guys!). So I bought it home from work on Friday and Saturday Jonathan got to painting.

He prepped the floors, cleaned the walls and positioned the ladder. Since the ladder leaned against the wall he started at the top and worked his way down.

In order the reach one the walls he did have to lean dangerously over the edge of the banister.

And in the end we have a completed painted hallway!

Wedding Wall

Sorry for the cell phone photos! It was late....

We finally got around to hanging some stuff in our recently halfway painted hallway!

These frames were previously hung outside our bedroom in a grid formation. After we painted I decided that I didn't really want them there anymore and I thought it would look better on the staircase. So Sunday (before the Packer game!) Jon hung them in a staggered fashion. He didn't measure, just eyeballed it and we're really pleased with the outcome.

These frames were actually on the tables at our wedding. The tables were named for cities and had photos of us at all the different places we'd traveled to as a couple. There's Boise, Salt Lake, San Francisco and Solvang were we had previously vacationed. There's also Redlands, California since that's where we met.

Now we kind of have a wedding wall going on. On the other side of the door (to our heater... I think) is a shadow box with our save the date, invitation, menu and some dried petals from my bouquet. Our guest book is also there. Eventually we want to add our wedding date as decal above the frames. I'm still thinking about what I should hang below the shadow box... its a work in progress! At least we have one wall almost done. 

Blinded By The Light

Who doesn't like this song? Even if no one really knows what the lyrics are.



When Jon and I were painting in the hallway we noticed how gross our hallway light was. Its a bad photo but you can see how cloudy and dirty it is. It kind of looks like this. But it had a huge bubble on it where the lightbulb had gotten too close to the plastic coverings and melted it. Gross.

So I asked Jon to take it down so we could at least clean it. But we couldn't figure out how to get the stupid thing down. After a few tries we got frustrated... and decided to take a hammer to it. Poseidon and I ducked into the guest bedroom while Jon swung away. The frame still wouldn't come out... until we realized that all we had to do was stick something into between the ceiling and the frame. Then it just popped off. Oops.

Once we pried it off we discovered that we had an attic! My mom and I had been wondering about that when Jon and I did our final walk through when we bought the place.

Broken light fixture = Home Depot run. Much to my delight and Jon's dismay.

Initially we wanted to replace the tray and the acrylic sheet but we quickly discovered that the tray (the metal thing in which the acrylic light cover lays) didn't match any of the ones in the store so we think it was a custom job. Since we couldn't replace the whole thing we settled on at least replacing the acrylic sheet. $10 and half an hour later we were on way back home.

Jon used the old one as guide to cut replacement sheet down to size with a box knife. Quick and easy!

While the thing was open we replaced the old bulb with an energy efficient one. We flipped on the light and exclaimed "woooow!" We were amazed by how much brighter the hallway was.

We were so impressed Jon did the same thing to the similar smaller one in the entryway. Here's the before:

Jon and Poseidon cut it to size...

... gave the frame a fresh coat of paint...

...added an energy efficient bulb and installed it!

You can tell that new light coverings are clearer and let through way more light than before. And it looks a lot cleaner. No more dead looking bug things being illuminated. Thank goodness!

But we didn't stop there. While Jon was painting the highest corner in our stairway I asked him to clean the chandelier. He noted that the chandelier had old white bulbs instead of the new energy efficient ones. So he changed those too. Bright lights, big change! I think we said "wooooow" again. Who knew light bulbs could make such a big difference? We had actually wanted to replace that fixture because we thought it was too dim so we're definitely reconsidering that now.

The best part? We only spent $10! We already had the energy efficient light bulbs. Those were a gift from my parents when we moved in. Our only expense was the new acrylic sheet and we used that for two different fixtures. I LOVE cheap and fast upgrades and this one brightened up our home and my day!

Halfway Hallway

We're making hallway painting progress!

Big improvement over all the white. 

When I started painting the hallway I discovered how hard it is! I knew that I didn't want to finish on my own so I asked Jon to help me out. Proving himself to best and handiest of husbands he agreed. So early Saturday morning (ok, kind of early) I got up and started prepping the walls. After I removed the pictures and taped everything off we got down to business. I started painting in the middle and Jon did all the edges because he's really particular about getting the lines perfectly straight. Love him. We think Poseidon helped us out since he ended up with paint on him!

Our staircase actually leads into our small hallway upstairs so some parts are two stories high. Obviously this makes it really hard to each some parts of the walls. Currently we don't have a plan on how to reach those areas so we're only painting where our ladder allows. That's why we've only gotten halfway done. So when it came time to paint the highest corner we had to get our ladder out. Unfortunately the landing was not big enough to open the ladder all the way so we wedged in between the wall and the first step and hoped for the best.

DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME. Clearly its not safe but Jon thought it would be okay.

Either way we got 'er done. The space is now inviting and warm. Well half of it does.

But I can totally visualize how its going to look when its done and has something on the walls. I still love the color and I can't wait to see how pretty it will look when all the walls done. We just got to figure out how to reach the top of the walls... and by we I mean Jon.

Either way, its still better than before!

I Can Paint All By Myself

Friday I DIY it and started to paint the hallway myself.

This was a big deal at the Stubblefield house since normally I wait for Jon to do it. Not only does he have a lot of practice he has such attention to detail that my painting skills completely pale in comparison. He actually told me once that I'm not allowed to paint since I don't really care if its not perfect. Is a little paint on the ceiling really that bad? Not to me. Jon feels differently and that's why he does the painting around here. But sometimes I can't wait for Jon...

I had been wanting the hallway painted for a while now but Jon hadn't had a change to get to it. I actually wanted it to be done before our guests arrived but we've both super busy. I finally got tired of looking at the stark dingy white walls and decided to get to it without Jon's help. Friday was the perfect day since I'm off work and have the place to myself.

I decided to start by our bedroom and our linen closet. Ideally I would have started where we had left off from the entryway but the ceilings are super high and I don't do ladders. Its a small space so I thought it would go by fast and I figured if I messed up it won't be so noticeable. 

I cleaned the space and taped it off. The tape always makes me nervous. If you don't do it right then the paint line will totally off and I know Jon is really meticlous and careful about it so I was feeling that extra pressure to get it right. 

Taping off the linen cabinets was actually really hard. I had to bend back in there Matrix style. After I reenacted it for Jon I him he could call me Neo. 

Then I painted. I'd like to say it wasn't it bad as I thought it was going to be but it was. I was sweating up a storm doing it! I do have a newfound appreciation for all the hard work Jon does around here. Seriously, the best of husbands. 

After I was all done I was exhausted and went to happy hour. I earned that skinny margarita! 

Of course I was excited to show Jon what I had done. He didn't even notice! I had to point it out. He said I did pretty good overall but that I really got the ceiling. Oops.