DIY progress...

Thursday, Feb. 18
I had a chance to spent a few hours over there and managed to get a first coat of paint in the playroom. (pic to follow)


weekend of Feb. 20 (this is all Chris and Richard)
and
weekend of Feb. 27 (Chris and I worked on this, while Grandma Mary and Sarah took great care of all the kiddos)
Here is a quick iphone "before" picture of their first huge project. Their initial goal was to cut down the tile where you see the tape lines and lower the mantle. This is in the room that we will be using as a TV/Family Room, and there was just no good place to put a TV as it was. Once they cut the tile down, they realized there was a brick wall directly behind the current dry wall. This meant there would be no place to hide unsightly electrical wires once we hung our TV. Lucky for me, Richard and Chris are beyond your average "do it yourselvers" and they went ahead and "firred out" the wall. (I just asked Chris how to explain what they did and he told me they "firred it out", but I wouldn't know what that meant if I was reading this, so I'm going to go ahead and say they framed a new wall that sticks out a little more in the middle where the TV will be.) They also ran the wires that we will need, so it's all ready for a TV.
Before, with their tape lines:


During:


When the dry wall guys were back on Monday, they finished it out for us.


Their next big project was in the kids' bathroom. Which, for at least a few months, will be our bathroom as well. The new stairs caused the kids' bathroom to lose 9 inches, which means the tile was torn up a few feet in. Chris and Richard used the tiles that were saved during demo and put them back down. Here's the floor after they laid the tile back down.


and here's the floor now, after Chris spent a ridiculous number of hours scraping out old grout and then re-grouting it. I am in awe of how clean/new it looks!!


Next on their to-do was yet another floor! We decided to put a cork floor in the playroom. Initially, it was going to be carpet, but when we started to think about the functions we really need in a playroom, carpet did not fit the bill. You can't push a toy car or train on carpet, or put a puzzle together. Paint and other craft messes don't clean out of carpet so easily either. We needed something smooth, but not too hard and something that would be easy to clean. It didn't take a lot of research to come across cork. (and then I remembered that my friend Gretchen had done it in their basement playroom about a year ago, so I was able to drill her and find out that it should be the perfect solution for us!)

So...Chris and Richard installed the floor in just a couple of hours. I don't have a picture, b/c they covered it up so that the ceiling dry wall did not get it all messy. Here is the image I took from the website, (ifloor.com) Following that is the paint swatch. It looks gray and boring on here, but it's a really nice soft gray/blue. It's Benjamin Moore Quiet Moments.




Here's a picture (again, iphone) of the playroom wall painted, with a piece of the cork next to it for reference.



And that leads us to baseboards. Of which, Chris and Richard purchased and painted enough to cover the whole house!


Weekend of February 26

Took the french doors off new dining room and pulled down the trim (plan to reframe it w/o hinges b/c we are going to leave door off)
Painted window and door trim in dining room- 2 coats
Painted dining room
I wish this picture really showed off the color. It looks pretty boring here, but it's just the perfect soft neutral. We'll be doing this same color (Benjamin Moore Clay Beige) at 50% intensity in the entry/hall.



Painted the kitchen (1 coat) Benjamin Moore Bennington Gray
(also replaced all of the knobs/pulls, which is hard to see in this picture)


Put shelf liner in a few doors/drawers in the kitchen
Took toilet out of kids' bathroom
Cleaned toilet

If you are wondering who had the honor of cleaning the toilet, that would be Chris. But, before you think I got off easy, check this out:



Yes, that is our refrigerator. And here is what it looks like now. I used a Magic Eraser Bath Scrub and WOW- I was sooo impressed. It didn't make it any less disgusting of a job, but it did make it much easier. After using the Magic Eraser, I went back over with a regular sponge and water and then wiped it out again. In order to REALLY get it clean, we took every removable part out to clean it and the space around it. Even these ledges here came out.


And because that is just too gross to end on, here's a sneak peek of a project in the works! We're turning an Ikea sideboard cabinet into a vanity for the kids' bathroom!