YEAH...THE PAINTING IS OVER!

This is a followup to "Never Use Wallpaper Border" that was posted on February 8th!  

Well, today is the 22nd, and the painting was completed today.  It was actually a good news, bad news, situation for Judy and me.  The good news is that we think we had the best people and the best home interior painters in all of Roane County.  The bad news, we enjoyed Ruth and Kenneth Whittenbarger so much, that we were sad to see it end.

From the 8th to the 22nd sounds like a long time, but it was only around 7 days of work.  The work included painting all the ceilings, including inside the closets.  All the walls, including inside the closets, and painting a lot of trim.  That all happened only after a large amount of time was spent removing old wallpaper and border.

Now Judy did a huge portion of the wallpaper and border, saving us some money.  I commend her for the hard work she expended during this time.  She was also pretty sick during the first couple of days, but hung in there.  It involved standing on a step-ladder, spraying Diff, and scrapping with a 1" putty-knife, all with her arms high above her head!

I just couldn't hold out long enough, having had a couple of shoulder surgeries, but I busied myself picking up, sweeping up, and vacuuming what she torn off!

We both worked hard at unloading and then restocking our closets, moving furniture, getting supplies, cleaning up floors and windows, and wiping off the tops of everything in our house.

I then had the job of putting back up the curtains, and the new wood venetian blinds, in several rooms.  All-in-all, it was a very busy two weeks, plus weekends!

Ruth is the best too.  No one I've seen can match her dexterity with a paint brush, her endurance, and skill!  She never stopped, except to give Judy fresh new interior design ideas to spend more of my money!  She is a wonderful person, and we could tell, one of the best grandmothers going!  She loves her babies!

Ruth is also blessed to be married to Kenneth.  I don't think there is anything that Kenneth can't do when it comes to home building and repair.  What he don't know, he's just forgot!

Once we pulled off some wallpaper next to the fireplace, and there was a horrible sight!  There was rotten wood with mold!  Luckily, if there is any good part to that scenario, the wood was dry, which meant that it had received the damage prior to the new metal roof installation.  

We had no idea, and had this work not been done, we may have never known, or our fireplace would have fallen, either into the living room, or out into the backyard!

I thought all was lost...especially my billfold!

However, Ken just looked at it and said, "No problem, I think I can fix it."  No explanation point, just a matter-of-fact tone that eased my mine almost immediately.

I scrounged up some 2X4s and a 2X12 from the basement, some sheet rock I had gotten to patch up the old 1978 intercom holes, and took off to Christmas Lumber for a couple more 2X4s and some R11 installation.  

By the next afternoon, Ken had dung out all the old stuff and put in all the new stuff, and sealed the plywood!  The next morning Ruth covered everything up with paintable wallpaper and applied the first coat!

They are good!

If you live locally (Roane County, Tennessee) and want their information, just send me an email and I'll send it to you...or you can look them up yourself!

So, today was a little bitter-sweet, but it is good to have the house back to ourselves, but we will miss our new friends.  We intend to get together at KFC one day for lunch and make some more memories!

All that's left is for us to get new doors for six closets, and cut, stain, and nail in floor molding in three rooms!  Will it stop there...nope!  She wants the screened-porch made into a sun room.  Luckily that just involves sliding windows, but I still have to deal with installers!

Wish me luck...and send money!

NEVER USE WALLPAPER BORDER!

Over the last two weeks, and it looks as though there will be a week three, we have been having our house interior painted.  If you've ever done that, not just a room at a time, but a project that begins with the intention of not stopping until it is all painted, including the ceiling, then you know the pressure, back pain, sleepless nights, second guessing, and the joy of knowing your house, closets and all, are truly clean and freshly painted!

We up at 8 each day, waiting for Ruth and Ken to arrive at 9 with the paint and eager to begin.  Judy and I sit finishing our breakfast watching them scurry in and out getting their gear ready, and dreading getting started ourselves.

We naturally have to work ahead of them, getting each room ready for painting.  One of the first acts we did, ended in a small disaster.  The cheap plastic framed garment rack broke under the weight of my clothes.  Luckily Judy's bed caught them and held them there for two days until we got a stronger steel rack and transferred the clothes.

All the light and plug plates have to be removed.  All the furniture has to be moved to the center of the rooms.  All the curtains and hardware have to be taken down, and all the dusty junk hiding on the shelves in the closets have to be moved to a staging area.  I was amazed that I threw away three 39 gal. bags full of clothes and shoes!  Goodwill will love me!

Then all that stuff has be put back in its original place so there will be room in the rooms to be painted next.

Right now they are about half finished, having moved into the living room, heading for the dinning room, kitchen, and laundry rooms!

My back is killing me from bending over so much picking up the wallpaper border, and now wallpaper, that Judy is slowly peeling off the walls.  Our lesson learned is to never use wallpaper border again.  The removal process isn't as easy as the Diff instructions let on it is!  It is coming off in small strips the size of a putty knife blade.  It drops wet and sticky to the floor where I sweep it into large piles and put into a garbage bag.  We've filled four now, and, like I said, we're about half way!

There was border in every room of our house, with the exception of Judy's bathroom.  I even had a "car" border in mine, if you remember this post!  It all had to come down!

Judy had to say goodbye to her "pink" living/dinning room color.  She called it something else fancy, but it's pink...that's all it could be!

Anyway, I apologize to people I had promised to things for this week; people like Randy and Pam, but as you can see, I was trapped here in the rubble that was once a comfy home!

So, let me sign off, take some back pain meds, and get some rest.  It's not long until 8AM!

Just remember...never, never, ever use wallpaper border.  For that matter, never use wallpaper!  It will break your back one day and laugh at you all the way to the dump!