Progress Report - Full Disclosure...

 When last we met, I was preparing the old guest room for a coat

of paint. This is the way it looked after the holes were repaired. Yes.

There were actually two different colored paints on the walls in here. 

The dark color on the window wall was used to cover HUGE colored flowers

that graced the wall when we first bought our home. Lucky for the little girl

who lived here before us, but not so lucky for the grandparents who moved

in and had to cover them. (Of course, that would have been the two of us!)

 This is how the room looked after the first coat of paint. I used Behr 

"Waterfall Mist" (Code #W-D 510). It looks silvery blue, but is a little

more blue-ish in the middle part of the day. I purchased color/primer

all-in-one, hoping that it would cover completely with one coat.

 Same room, opposite wall.

 I really like this image with the "artsy" ladder shadow play. It's not the

 shadow of the step stool you can see. Rather, the larger one out of frame.

 Tag kinda let the "cat" out of the bag about how chaotic the house

is these days. I can't believe ALL this stuff was in the studio...

 and that it's camping out all over the house now. This is the reason I'm

working so hard to get this project accomplished ASAP. What a mess!

 This is actually our second guest room. The futon Tag was complaining about is

under all that fabric and supplies. (See arrow?) Definitely no naps here these days!

 This is the other side of the same room. Oh, dear. I have so much to do!

 Handsome has been so patient. He just walks through the house,

shakes his head back and forth, says, "Donna Carole" and sighs.

I do believe he's a saint and I'm not ashamed to tell the world so.

 Turns out the room did need a second coat of paint, so I did that yesterday

 morning while Handsome drove to Sandy's Quilt Shop to pick up the five

  shelf units that started all this remodeling. You might notice that I've

 reinstalled the cleaned window blinds on the likewise, newly clean window.

I left the curtain rod in place so that I could hang all my beautiful acorn

ornaments on it. Many of these were gifts from blog friends, so they are

important to me. I'll show you more pictures of them after the room is finished.

 The second coat of paint dried by mid-day, so Handsome and I pulled out the

carpeting, padding and those pesky tack rails. (Those were a bear to remove!)

I managed to install five rows of the vinyl plank flooring before I had to quit for

 the day. (My knees were starting to protest, so I decided to listen.) I also found

 that this floor height doesn't match up to the height of the tile in the adjacent

 room and hallway, so I have to go choose a transition piece before I can proceed.

 I need to find out how that transition piece has to be installed before I do more.

 I'd like to crow about this flooring a bit, too. I'm really happy with the way

 it looks. There will be no apparent seams when it's all down, so I won't

have to worry about losing dropped pins or needles in any flooring cracks. 

That's critical for any craft studio. It's going to help keep my space clean, too.

The planks are so pliable, they bend when you take them out of the package.
Each piece is cut to size with a utility knife and the floor snaps together at joints.
There's no adhesive either, so it's easier to install than rolled flooring.

Finally, I think it looks pretty darn realistic, with a slight sheen. It will be easy to clean and last a long, long time. The plan is to get the rest of it installed today so I can start putting my new studio together - and then  reclaim the rest of our home by the weekend. What's today? Oh, yeah. 

"Julie, Julie, Julie!"

Should be downhill from here, right?

Paint, Planning and Playing...

You might have noticed that I've been in a redecorating mood lately. Heck, if you've been on my blog at random times during the day, you'll find me experimenting with color, margins, gadgets and what-have-you.  I guess it's the desire for something different to begin the new year, whether it be on my blog or in our home.

I've been cleaning rooms, tossing, painting and re-thinking the amount of clutter stuff I have. It has always been a mixed blessing for me. So many things I care for and move from home to home, across hundreds of miles. Yet, there are times I feel more that those things own me than the other way around. I'm really getting better at moving things out of here, but it's a daily challenge.

I love the newly painted guest bathroom and I'm slowly sorting my way through paint chips as I try to decide on a new color in the guest bedroom. I want something as quiet and restful as the color we chose for the bathroom. Not the same color, but something that will coordinate with it. I plan to share it with you when I finally make my decision and start putting paint on the walls.

I forgot to tell you the trick I read about on a blog I found through Pinterest. Add a tablespoon of pure vanilla extract to your gallon of paint and you won't have a paint smell permeating the house when you're finished painting. I did this and it really works! (It doesn't affect the color of the paint, either.) All that fresh paint, with none of the yucky paint smell. Magic, I tell you!

Oh, and let me say something about Pinterest. I'm still finding my way around, but it's a great resource. You can bookmark anything you find on the internet into one handy place. (Dang! Like I needed one more place to kill time.) There's a lot I don't know about the site yet (someone told me that she'd seen some of my Brynwood photos "pinned", but I can't find any), but I'll be rationing my time there as I try to figure out how to navigate all the cool places you can get to through them. I have a lot of projects I want to do this year, so I can't be spending all my time there (and believe me, it wouldn't be hard to do).

Last night was Handsome's spotlight solo as he played the main percussion rhythm for Ravel's Bolera with the North Port Concert Band. He was wonderful, so I want you to see him play, too! I haven't downloaded and edited the video yet, but I'll do that today and share it with you tomorrow.

Oh, TOMORROW!!! TAG COMES HOME TOMORROW! As I told my friend, Troy at Junk Exchange yesterday..."There will be rejoicing throughout the land".

Greeting The New Year With A Paintbrush...

On New Year's Day I got a bee in my bonnet. I wanted to start the new year off with a house project. Something a little more involved than vacuuming and dusting. You have no idea how much I dislike those glass doors on the guest bathroom tub, but I'll tell you. It's a lot!

Having them on the tub makes it difficult to bathe grandchildren or step into the shower (if you're tall). Let's not even talk about how hard it is to keep them clean! I have to get into the tub to clean the tub - and the doors are always water-spotted, even if you use a squeegee. Gah!

The walls have been that chalky white color for the whole nine years we've lived here. I'm sick of it. It was time to choose a color that would accent the off-white woodwork.

I went to Home Depot and brought home a bunch of paint chips. I love Behr paint and the great coverage I get when I use it. Handsome and I finally settled on this color - Wheat Bread. I wanted to make sure we didn't go too dark, otherwise I might have chosen Mocha Accent. I love the color, but didn't want to darken a small room that much. (I cut the color name off the bottom chip when I cropped this image.)

Anyway, Handsome and I removed those shower doors on Sunday morning and put them aside to donate. We tried the local Habitat for Humanities office, but they said they didn't take shower doors. (Really? They rebuild and refurbish houses and don't take stuff like this?) They weren't grungy or anything. They just needed a light cleaning and we'd been really careful to remove them without damaging them. In the end, we contacted the Suncoast Humane Society Thrift Store, and they were thrilled to have them. Handsome delivered them to their store on Monday while I started painting.

This is the "after" picture of the tub area. New shower curtain, rugs and waste basket. The color is actually truer on the second photo (below). This one looks more tan than it actually is.

This is better. See all those tiles across the back of the shower? They wrap all the way around, and they were installed in the house when we purchased it. There were two young children living here with their parents, and their handprints and artwork became part of the decor when the house was built. Perhaps some day they'll be replaced with our grandchildrens' artwork, but they'll stay for now.

This bathroom is referred to as "Jack and Jill", because it sits between two rooms and is shared by both. The tub area has its own sink and the linen closet is in this section. This is the "before" photo of the sink area.

This is the "after" photo. Subtle change, but we like it so much more in  this color. I decided that the heron print was more appropriate with the seashell shower curtain than the dog images, but I had to keep that Golden figurine on the sink. It makes me smile.

The toilet side of the bathroom has a sliding door between the two rooms. It also has its own sink. "Before"...

and (a blurry) "after" shot. This section of the bath doesn't have a window, which is why I was careful choosing a color. This side could have gotten really dark had we started with a darker shade of paint.

This is the toilet area "before" painting, with my favorite grizzly bear poster on the wall. He's looking at the camera as he scratches his back against the pine tree. This used to hang in our master bath in our northern house, and I wanted to make sure it had a place in our home in Florida, too.

It went back on the wall in our guest bath. So, that's how I spent Day Two of the new year! Day Three (yesterday) was spent emptying and sorting through my studio bath closet. I'm still not finished sorting through all the things that were in that closet, but I took a few bags of yarn to my friends in the knit group at Paneras last night along with two boxes of knitting magazines. I'd say that's a pretty good start.

I'll be cleaning up the transplanted closet clutter out of the studio today and then dealing with my "piling system" in my office area so that I have that mess under control before the end of today. I need to get back to creating in the studio soon. Doing this stuff wears me out!