Elephant Challenge: Two birds with one stone
Nothing like guests coming into town to launch you into full on get-s**t-done-mode.
I was running around crazy last week and (as I learned in college) I do my best work under pressure. In the 11th hour, I knocked it all out, and was quite proud of myself.
Luckily, our guests weren't getting into town until Midnight last Thursday, so I spent my nights last week chipping away at all my to-do's.
I know I missed my elephant challenge last week, but you're in luck, because this week you're getting two projects for the price of one.
As I was running around the house changing light bulbs, greasing squeaky hinges, making beds and fixing toilets (two of the three were broken) I was wishing I had have put all those on my challenge list. Then, I realized that taking a photo of a broken, and then fixed, toilet wouldn't be that impressive.
And since impressing my guests was my number one priority, I decided to tackle a big project.
Repainting the main floor bathroom.
When we finished our basement, the plumbers, who were rerouting our plumbing noticed that there was copper plumbing going to our main floor bath. The offered to replace it while they were already here for a very reasonable price, so we took them up on it.
The only downside was that they had to cut a hole in our main floor bathroom wall.
We didn't realize until after the hole was cut and then dry-walled over, that the previous owners hadn't left us any of the wall paint.
We didn't LOVE the light green paint, but we didn't hate it. It was liveable and since we planned on doing some updates to that bathroom in the next year (bathrooms are next on our list) we didn't really care to repaint it.
But, once we had a giant drywall hole, it gave us a bit more urgency....but not too much, as we let it sit like that for 9ish months.
So, guests were the perfect excuse to paint- so we could pretend as if our house was perfectly done and decorated (not that they were going to be fooled that easily).
Since I didn't have any time to do my usual paint selection technique, which involves a complicated tapped-up-mess of swatches all over the wall. I walked into Lowes and picked two paint colors and brought a quart of each home.
I figured, that even if I hated both colors, I would have enough paint to at least cover the walls and then change it later.
Well, actually the opposite happened.
I LOVED one of my choices, Cornflower Blue by Valspar, and then I ran out of paint.
And when I say I, I should explain that I actually means WE.
No, not Chris and I.
My bestie Lauren and I.
She is my painting-partner-in-crime (and a lot of other things too). Would you believe she OFFERED to come help me paint?
Yeah. There is a special place in Heaven for her already set aside.
Plus, she showed up in a t-shirt that read "How can I help." I have no idea why I didn't get a photo of her adorableness. My brain was foggy from single-mother-with-a-teething-baby-syndrome and I was inhaling lots of paint fumes while drinking wine.
We were a dynamic painting duo, just like the old days, when Lauren lived with us for a few months, and we systematically painted every room in the house.
She was the "roller" and I was the "cutter-iner."
We we so close to being done (around 10pm), and then we ran out of paint... and wine.
Honestly, we were probably a 1/4 cup of paint shy of finishing the whole room (it is a tiny bathroom).
We called it a night and I ran by the QA hardware store the next day to pick up another pint (because they also carry Valspar paint).
I ran home and slapped the finishing touches on the wall after Hunter went to sleep and before our guests arrived. I also turned on a space heater to help the drying process.
Since I was painting at night, I did my best to cover any bare spots and blend in the new touch ups, all in rather dim light.
It wasn't until the next morning that I realized that my second quart of paint was slightly different from my first quart (how can that be??).
I was running around crazy last week and (as I learned in college) I do my best work under pressure. In the 11th hour, I knocked it all out, and was quite proud of myself.
Luckily, our guests weren't getting into town until Midnight last Thursday, so I spent my nights last week chipping away at all my to-do's.
I know I missed my elephant challenge last week, but you're in luck, because this week you're getting two projects for the price of one.
As I was running around the house changing light bulbs, greasing squeaky hinges, making beds and fixing toilets (two of the three were broken) I was wishing I had have put all those on my challenge list. Then, I realized that taking a photo of a broken, and then fixed, toilet wouldn't be that impressive.
And since impressing my guests was my number one priority, I decided to tackle a big project.
Repainting the main floor bathroom.
When we finished our basement, the plumbers, who were rerouting our plumbing noticed that there was copper plumbing going to our main floor bath. The offered to replace it while they were already here for a very reasonable price, so we took them up on it.
The only downside was that they had to cut a hole in our main floor bathroom wall.
We didn't realize until after the hole was cut and then dry-walled over, that the previous owners hadn't left us any of the wall paint.
We didn't LOVE the light green paint, but we didn't hate it. It was liveable and since we planned on doing some updates to that bathroom in the next year (bathrooms are next on our list) we didn't really care to repaint it.
But, once we had a giant drywall hole, it gave us a bit more urgency....but not too much, as we let it sit like that for 9ish months.
So, guests were the perfect excuse to paint- so we could pretend as if our house was perfectly done and decorated (not that they were going to be fooled that easily).
Since I didn't have any time to do my usual paint selection technique, which involves a complicated tapped-up-mess of swatches all over the wall. I walked into Lowes and picked two paint colors and brought a quart of each home.
I figured, that even if I hated both colors, I would have enough paint to at least cover the walls and then change it later.
Well, actually the opposite happened.
I LOVED one of my choices, Cornflower Blue by Valspar, and then I ran out of paint.
No, not Chris and I.
My bestie Lauren and I.
She is my painting-partner-in-crime (and a lot of other things too). Would you believe she OFFERED to come help me paint?
Yeah. There is a special place in Heaven for her already set aside.
Plus, she showed up in a t-shirt that read "How can I help." I have no idea why I didn't get a photo of her adorableness. My brain was foggy from single-mother-with-a-teething-baby-syndrome and I was inhaling lots of paint fumes while drinking wine.
We were a dynamic painting duo, just like the old days, when Lauren lived with us for a few months, and we systematically painted every room in the house.
She was the "roller" and I was the "cutter-iner."
We we so close to being done (around 10pm), and then we ran out of paint... and wine.
Honestly, we were probably a 1/4 cup of paint shy of finishing the whole room (it is a tiny bathroom).
We called it a night and I ran by the QA hardware store the next day to pick up another pint (because they also carry Valspar paint).
I ran home and slapped the finishing touches on the wall after Hunter went to sleep and before our guests arrived. I also turned on a space heater to help the drying process.
Since I was painting at night, I did my best to cover any bare spots and blend in the new touch ups, all in rather dim light.
It wasn't until the next morning that I realized that my second quart of paint was slightly different from my first quart (how can that be??).
I was not pleased.
Not only was I going to have to completely repaint the bathroom again, I was going to have to explain to our guests why I have a very poorly painted two-toned bathroom.
So, I'm back at square one.
I need to repaint the bathroom. Again.
But, at least I got to cross if off my list.
And, to add insult to injury. I thought I had fixed that toilet (it was constantly running), but I hadn't so when our guests arrived, I had to ask them not to use that bathroom anyway. So, they barely noticed the paint discrepancy.
What they did (probably) notice was that the caulk in the shower in our upstairs bathroom was clean, smooth and mold & crack free (which wouldn't have been the case, had they arrived a few hours earlier).
We know we have some water leakage in our upstairs bath, but we can't get to the problem without ripping out wall, and since it's already in the plan for 2014, we keep putting a bandaid on the issue.
I've re-caulked at least once every year we have lived in this house.
I didn't even bother to take a photo this time, you've seen it before. It's not glamourous.
Just imagine me, in the shower, in my pajamas, caulking while listening for the guests to arrive (I cut that chore REALLY close).
So now, I'm down to one task left on my to-do list. It's Hunter's birthday this weekend, so with any luck, I'll get my act together and refinish his airplane (which I found at a garage sale) for one of his birthday presents.
I know it doesn't seem like a lot, but knocking off these projects that have been hanging over my head for months feels amazing.
Chomp Chomp.
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