Paint: All over but the shouting

Perhaps one more coat of paint is not the most exciting news to report...But it is about as much as we can pull off at the moment and in any case, this particular room was rather cathartic to colorize. We'd had this room hastily painted (along with the bathroom, which is now the only room which still needs color work) right before we moved in. Trouble is, we'd chosen a color which didn't ultimately fit into the whole Monadnock palette like we'd originally thought it would; plus, we didn't realize it was necessary to tell the guys they should paint the ceiling white, assuming that all rooms have white ceilings and so that should go without saying. Oops. So I remember vividly the first night sleeping in this house, in this room, with no drywall except here and in the bathroom, staring up at a ceiling which was as alarmingly yellow as the rest of the place. I'll be honest: Those first fifteen or thirty minutes were the only time since we've moved here when I've been truly scared. What am I doing here? I'm drowning in an ocean of cheap mustard. How the hell is this a home? Then the fear passed and it hasn't come back. Nevertheless, that's why finally getting around to redoing this corner of the castle has been, as I mentioned, cathartic.

My camera still inspires no confidence that it captures colors accurately, but here's a picture of roughly what we're dealing with. The "technical" name of this color is natural wheat, but if I were in charge of naming paints I'd call it coffee ice cream or the color of those shakes they have at Wendy's. Whatever the nomenclature, it's a huge step up from burning migraine yellow or what it might be like in the core of the sun or whatever the fuck it was before.

This marks the end of our painting odyssey...except for the bathroom. Which we're going to wait to play with until we find out just how much more (re)work needs to get done in there. (That's another can of worms for another day.) My original prediction, once we decided to paint by ourselves, was that it would take...some number of weeks longer than if we'd hired out the gig. It's turned into months. But I was talking about this house with some friends the other day and some words of wisdom escaped my lips which I was not prepared for: Projects of this magnitude, you don't plan. They plan you.

A cozy fire and yet more paint

Our first fire...unfinished fireplace be damned. What we'll do with this particular nook of the house is completely unknown, although something has to happen. (Notice the ancient smoke stain from some flue mishap of Sherene's dad's.) Tile it? Paint it? Mantle? Hearth? No clue how this will end up; for now, it's December and high time to light up a fake log.

We did some painting over Thanksgiving break, too. Pictures when the second coat is done, but for now picture the color of one of those chocolate shakes from Wendy's. Remember those? When I cracked open the paint can, I almost couldn't resist grabbing a spoon and tasting it, it reminded me so strongly of those delicious fast-food treats...

Still paintin'

Yes, there is still paint to get on the walls. Today is a day off of school for me—and I hardly know why. (I think it's because my broke-ass district is doing some "furlough day" or something.) So why not slap a bit more up there?

The green room was already almost finished, just had to polish off the second coat that had remained incomplete because we'd run out of paint. And...first coat in the living room is done and drying. It's the same color as the dining room, but it doesn't look like it yet.

Green room underway

Can't get a good picture of what this color looks like on the walls...suffice it to say, it looks niccccce. (Got another coat to do later, though.)

What with the backyard cleanout and the new color up, it's been a pretty good weekend for Castle Monadnock.

Back to work

With school back on, progress has slowed considerably. Last weekend, just did barely enough taping and cutting to prepare for more colors, which I'm only getting to on this luxurious three-day.

As usual, the colors coming off my iPhone camera are completely unreliable and in any case this is only a first coat, still wet and glistening...but at least it's another piece-o-progress! If I can get this dried and then do the last coat later tonight, I'll be well satisfied.

Beyond ceilings

More night-time rollin'

Renie works best after dark.

Two rooms, one coat each.

Painting update, mostly ceilings

It seems absurd, but it's true: Tomorrow is my first day of the 2010-2011 school year. So things are going to slow down for me considerably when it comes to the painting routines. Renie's got a few weeks of sanctuary left and she'll be holding it down with the rollers while I'm typing up syllabi...



Music: Rollin' Blues, by John Lee Hooker

By the way, the nasty kitchen ceiling vent in this video was clogged up with plenty of seed-pods from the big tree out back (who still needs a name). I thought it was a mighty cool Darwinian trick that a tree could sneak its DNA all the way into our kitchen. Through the roof, the ceiling, and everything! Talk about a will to survive.

Bigger test patches

Bigger test patches tonight, with colors we're now pretty sure we're runnin' with...Pretty sure!

Lavender for the corner room...

Burnt-orange-brickiness for kitchen/nook.

Let the paint begin (and open the windows)

Three or four ceilings cut, and dining room ceiling done, first-coat-wise. Still some light left; can I at least get to the smaller breakfast room before dark?



Music: Duke Ellington and John Coltrane, Take the Coltrane

Priming update

Sherene's doing this night owl thing of priming after dark, now that I'm starting to shift more school-planning back into the hours of the day. So it's a little hard to say how many days of priming we're up to exactly...

If all goes to plan, those windows you see should start getting popped into walls next week, with restorations happening soon thereafter. Then: paint!

This is only a test

No primer underneath, applied with brush so kinda streaky, and photographed with an inaccurate camera...but here are some test patches of color Renie started slappin' around today from a couple sample jars we had. Painting is one of the next steps, and the biggest one so far we will (hopefully) accomplish ourselves.