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!

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. 

A Concrete Catastrophe

We stained the concrete in the backyard this weekend.

Yeah... we don't like either. 

The plan was to stain the plain concrete a light, warm terra cotta color to warm up the space since it was pretty blah to begin with. We had read a few home blogs and discovered that people have stained the concrete with fantastic results. It seemed like an easy and cheap project. So we went to Home Depot and picked out a color of Behr Semi-Transparent Concrete Stain we liked. 

That was a few months ago. Jon actually forgot what color we had chosen since it had been so long. Why did we wait so long? The stain cannot be applied if its over 90 degrees. So we really couldn't apply it in the height of summer. We had already done a little bit of work back there we decided to focus on projects we could do in air conditioning. Now that its not crazy hot we decided to finally apply the stain. 

First Jon cleaned the space. The instructions said to work in 4' by 4' sections. Luckily our patio floor is already broken up into sections. That way we could move all of the furniture to one side and then do it again but on the other side we it was time to paint the other half.

Poseidon watched us work.

Then we got to staining. Jon used the roller to get majority of the space and I used a paintbrush around the edges. I know the photo is of Jon but I swear I helped. 

As we were doing it we noticed the color wasn't really what we thought we had originally picked out. And we noticed it was really orange. But not in a good way. This is coming from two people who actually embrace orange is all its bold glory. We both hoped that it would dry lighter but it didn't.

Apart from the color we don't like the uneven application. Its really dark in some places and very light in others. The instructions say that two coats help achieve an uniform color but we don't to intensive the orange. 

Now we really don't know what to do. Jon is leaning towards finishing it off just to see what it would look like but I think it would be overwhelmingly orange. I want to paint it a darker color. Jon mentioned a coworker of his painted his concrete patio with a product by Rust-Oleum that left it shiny and smooth. We're thinking that might be the new plan. Maybe a dark gray or a brown with a glossy finish. I think if we chose a dark brown it will match the new flooring we'll eventually put in and make the outdoor space look like a extension of our home. The gray would define the space more and be neutral enough to appeal to buyers down the road. 

Either way, the orange has got to go. After the shutter debacle this project is our biggest mistake. At least this is an easy fix!

Wall All Full

Look Mom! No more stripes!

I guess my post about our half finished living room got us motivated. Maybe its because that I'm having friends over this weekend. Or the fact we have some house guests coming at the end of the month. I don't know. But something finally got to us and we finished!

Jon even cleaned when he was painting under the stairs. 

I love love love love love this color. Its warm, inviting and the perfect neutral. Its a great starting point for this room. Our house looks so much more done now that the living room is painted. If we ignore the mismatched sofas and coffee tables. 

Obviously we still have a lot to do in here. We need a new couch. I think a smallish sectional would look good. Once we have a couch then we can get a coffee table. I'm not really fan of the two mismatched ones pushed together. And a new rug because that carpet remnant isn't really doing it for me. But these are all big ticket items that have to wait until we save enough money and find the ones we want. 

There are things that we can do now. We want to find away to hide all of the TV cables. I wish we could put them inside the wall but since its mounted above the fireplace that's not really an option. And we were discussing a photo gallery wall above the couch. I just have to be on the look out for frames. 

We love this color so much we are planning to use it in the stairway and upstairs hallway. That will give it some continuity since its an open space. Painting that area will be a bit more complicated because the ceilings are so high and we are still trying to figure out how to place a ladder on the landing. 

Progress. It feels good my friends!

Wall Half Empty

After almost seven months of continuous home improvement projects things are slowing down at the Stubblefield house. Jonathan needs a break and the sunny days make it hard for us to spend weekends cooped up with a paintbrush. We haven't really tackled any new projects. In fact we only have one ongoing project... finish painting our living room.

Jon started doing a wall at a time.

We started in the entryway (with a quick decorating detour). The plan was to paint the rest of the room a wall at a time. Jon finished the wall that extends to the entryway and opens up in to the dining room first. He removed the air conditioning control, carbon monoxide alarm and doorbell. Can you say gross?

Much better.

As a side note check out what the extreme heat did. This was stuck around the inside of our paint can. Ewwwwwww.

Next up was the wall with our TV. Jon had to take down it and carefully paint around the mantle. We did not want to be touching that up.

After that he started on the last wall! Only to run out of paint.

Yeah, that's been like that for a while now. "Buy more paint" is on my to do list for today. Right underneath "buy a new pair of black flip flops." A certain cute furry nephew of mine decided it made a good snack.

Come On In!

Behold! The power of paint!

Check out the boring before:

Jonathan and I finally started working on the main living space of our house. Its an open space thats divided into four spaces: the living room, dining room, kitchen and entryway. Obviously we've already started in the dining room but we wanted use a different color living room and entryway.  After much debate we selected this light neutral from Behr paint. It was actually pretty hard to chose a color because we plan on using it throughout the downstairs. We want it to complement the deep gray we have in the dining room and whatever we decide to do in the kitchen one day. 

We decided to start by our front door for a few of reasons. One, we didn't have to move any couches. Two, it's a small space so it wouldn't take the entire weekend. Three, once we add a piece of artwork in that empty space behind the door we're done!

I gathered all the painting supplies and Jon did his thing.

After he was done I cleaned up. I removed all the tape, cleaned and reattached the switch plate and replaced our "S" wreath. Isn't that a pretty wreath? It was a wedding gift from a crafty coworker. Normally it's  on the outside but when I hang a holiday wreath I move it inside. Right now its been temporarily replaced by our 4th of July wreath.

I've just been staring at the corner. Out of all the paint colors we used so far this is my favorite. And since the half bath is right next to it I can pretend our house is actually all done. If I'm looking at from the right angle from our couch.