Painting The House:
It was brought to my attention, that this blog is called Robin's Urban Farmhouse, and I have written very little about the house! So, I am going to make an effort to include some of our house projects. On top is the house when we bought it. The paint had since gotten worse. The bottom picture is what it looks like now!
When we bought the house there was A LOT to be done. It was a like a puppy, so cute and loveable, but so messy and time consuming!
Our house was missing key things, like door handles on the bathroom. Apparently the last owners and their two kids either didn't close the bathroom door or got out a screw driver every time they walked in or out. That was obviously one of the first things to be fixed.
It was brought to my attention, that this blog is called Robin's Urban Farmhouse, and I have written very little about the house! So, I am going to make an effort to include some of our house projects. On top is the house when we bought it. The paint had since gotten worse. The bottom picture is what it looks like now!
When we bought the house there was A LOT to be done. It was a like a puppy, so cute and loveable, but so messy and time consuming!
Our house was missing key things, like door handles on the bathroom. Apparently the last owners and their two kids either didn't close the bathroom door or got out a screw driver every time they walked in or out. That was obviously one of the first things to be fixed.
We made a list. We only let ourselves put five projects on the To Do List at a time so we wouldn't get overwhelmed. I am a total list person! We worked on those five projects, and we got great satisfaction from crossing a project off when we finished it. We have kept this list thing going. I think we have one page for each of the years we have been here.
Of course there are always projects to add, but last week we crossed off our LAST major project on the list. We finished painting the house! With a 90 year old house, everything is done a little differently than a new house. For example, it is hard to replace an interior door, because they were all cut by hand to fit the specific door frame. So a door that is actually a prefect rectangle, won't fit in the door frame!! Frustrating.
Of course there are always projects to add, but last week we crossed off our LAST major project on the list. We finished painting the house! With a 90 year old house, everything is done a little differently than a new house. For example, it is hard to replace an interior door, because they were all cut by hand to fit the specific door frame. So a door that is actually a prefect rectangle, won't fit in the door frame!! Frustrating.
Painting the house was no different. You can't just paint the house. You have to water blast the house and catch and clean EVERY little flake of paint, because back in the day they used lead based paint. Then you have to scrape what is left. Then fill in the holes in the old redwood siding with Bondo. Then sand it all. Then prime it. At this point you can think about paint. I have to admit. We hired a handyman to 90% of this.
Justin and I haggled over colors, painted about 6 different yellow on our house, which I am sure the neighbors enjoyed, and finally came to an agreement! Thank you to my parents who mixed more quarts of yellow paint for us than I can count! We did the final touch up of the pain ourselves. This means that I painted it. Justin isn't really allowed to paint much around here, because I have to repaint them after :) I think he does this on purpose.
For a final touch we discarded an absolutely ugly old light that we had a got a charming lantern for the front porch. DONE! Dust off the hands, wash the paint brushes, and hopefully store them in the basement for a long, long time...
Justin and I haggled over colors, painted about 6 different yellow on our house, which I am sure the neighbors enjoyed, and finally came to an agreement! Thank you to my parents who mixed more quarts of yellow paint for us than I can count! We did the final touch up of the pain ourselves. This means that I painted it. Justin isn't really allowed to paint much around here, because I have to repaint them after :) I think he does this on purpose.
For a final touch we discarded an absolutely ugly old light that we had a got a charming lantern for the front porch. DONE! Dust off the hands, wash the paint brushes, and hopefully store them in the basement for a long, long time...
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