Bathroom Floor - MULLIGAN!

I didn't like the way it was looking so I started over. It's frustrating, and this will screw up my project schedule, but this is one of the benefits of paper flooring.

No stain in the goo.

After three coats of glue-stain-goo.

Here's what it looks like before sanding:

And here's what it looks like with a quick once-over with a sanding block:

The sanding brings out all the white veins.

So anyway, as I write this I am doing a happy dance (internally; I'm way to tired to do it externally) because I've just put down the first of 10 coats of Polycrylic. Translation: The End Is In Sight, People!!!

Bathroom Floor

With the walls and ceiling completed, it's time to get the flooring done.

Carpet tack strip holes patched, floor cleaned.

One layer of paper applied with glue + stain.

Floor received a light sanding to bring out the veins. Inevitable boo-boos patched.

Second coat of glue/stain.

Third coat of glue/stain.

Hall update

Huzzah! The floor, it be finished! I applied the final coat of Polycrylic yesterday afternoon.

It looks nothing like marble, but at this point I couldn't care less. 

I don't even care that this picture is crooked.

Now all that's left is to buy baseboard material and get that installed, and then buy something out of which I will create thresholds at each doorway.

I looked at marble thresholds today but they are too think and would be a tripping hazard. I'm thinking something very, very thin. I might go with pieces of laminate flooring in which case I'd have to cut off the tongue/groove nonsense and then paper and poly them to match the floor. Maybe I can find similar material that doesn't have the tongue and groove nonsense. 

In any case, as I said: Huzzah!

Hall update

OK, let's see…

This phase of the project started several weeks ago, before everything got real dirty. I used concrete patch stuff to...wait for it...patch the concrete. Only where the carpet tack strips left holes; no need to patch cracks or anything before papering.

As you can see, this was before we mudded over the old paint and texture.

This past week I started the second phase: faux flooring. The first day I papered as much of the hallway as I could before my body gave me the finger. I had completed about two thirds of the hall at that point, and this was done with stain in the glue goo.

 Let the papering begin!

I thought I was very clever to paper the length of the hallway first down one side and then down the other. With at least one side dry at any given time, we would retain access the bedrooms and bathrooms. When I went back the next day to paper the bare side, however, I discovered that the dry paper on the first side absorbed too much stain on my second pass. This created a dark "trail" down the center of the hallway.

 Unacceptable.

At that point I decided my best course of action would be to cover that all up with a fresh layer of paper using glue goo with no stain. Just glue and water.

It took two layers to cover the darkness.

This worked great, but now I would need to repaper the entire frigging hall. Best to start with the whole catastrophe matching, I figured. So I did. The whole hall. With two layers. That took another couple of days. (Remember - I'm feeble.)

Then I mulled things over for a few days.

My brain was focused on achieving a marble-like finish, but I wasn't sure I'd be able to accomplish that. I watched a YouTube video on creating a faux marble finish on furniture and figured the floor inside the hall pantry would be a great place to test this out.

I gave it one layer of glue goo with the stain mixed in, then took a fine art brush and added full-strength stain at some of the paper seams. Once that was dry, I added another layer of glue goo + stain over the top of that. It turned out looking like crap.

An artist, I am not.

The pantry floor will be getting a mulligan at some point.

So aaaaanyway, after carefully vacuuming and then getting on my hands and knees with a damp washcloth to scrub off all the cat and dog footprints (storm, remember?), I started painting on the goo (with stain).

Here's the hall with one coat. 

It's looking pretty good, imo, but needs to dry completely 

each time before I decide if I want it darker.

 

2 coats

 

3 coats

 

4th coat of stain with lots more stain in the goo!

I'm probably going to apply just one more coat before transitioning to the poly finish, but I wanted to get this published. It's been sitting in my drafts for the past couple of weeks as I do the work and add the photos.

More to come...

Let the papering begin!

UPS brought my ginormous roll of butcher paper yesterday! Let the papering begin!

What's Up... Vance and Molly

It's been over four months since I posted that I should be writing more, and the most I've written in that time is a grocery list. Sad!

Mom finally sold her house in Oregon and was packing to move in with my sister, so there was a semi-mad dash to finish some things at Cory's place to make it ready. Over three weeks, I helped  clean and paint what would become Mom's sewing room and install a shopping bag paper floor in the basement so she can make that her fortress of solitude.

Then Corbin inked a deal for a commercial space where he and Nancy are opening their new business. (Shameless plug: go to www.SacramentoCerakote.com and give them the business!!) Steve and I helped them paint and prep the space, interspersed with spilled paint disasters (thanks, Bailey!) and squirt gun fights (thanks, Nancy!). They'll be opening for business SOON!!!

I've been doing a lot of home improvementy things around my own abode. Small things. Probably not noticeable to others until I physically drag them over and say, "LOOK WHAT I DID!"

I show them the front door where I scrubbed off 20 years of cat pee and repainted and now it looks all fresh and clean.

I show them the address sign I painted but haven't yet put on the house.

I show them the other address sign I painted on the curb because I'm too adamantly DIY to pay $5 to the vagrants that come to the door and offer to paint it for me every couple of years.

I show them the bathroom we finished (finally! with a little help from our friends).

Note the exemplary paper floor.
I show them the glass lanterns I've collected and, recently spruced up by painting the insides with nail polish, hung from the patio roof.

They make kind, appropriate sounds. "Cool," say they.

Not as cool are the big patches of my w-w carpet that I've had to cut out and discard because my 15 year old grand dame

"What."
all of a sudden thinks it's much more satisfying to pee on carpet than in any of the potty boxes. I'm trying to decide what to do with those areas and when. It would be dumb to have new carpet installed, only to let her pee on that; we're wondering if we want to try staining or painting the concrete sub-floor to see if we like that as much as the floor at Nugget Market. Anyway...TBD.

Some time back I became a Verified Doobert Transporter. You can read about the organization at doobert.com, but I'll save you the trouble. It's an animal rescue thing. Once they vet you and decide you're not a cat/dog murderer, you can volunteer for any relay legs you like for a given transport. For example, earlier this month Steve and I drove to Colfax to pick up Vance, a 2 year old Treeing Walker Hound, and Molly, a 4 year old Beagle/hound mix.

We schlepped them back to Sacramento and handed them off to the next volunteer. The dogs' trip originated in Minnesota and would end in Santa Rosa, so our part was small, but they were very nice passengers, it was a very pleasant volunteer gig, and we can't wait to do it again.

Oh, also, I'm teaching Bailey to ride in a shopping cart. Because she's cool and I like taking her everywhere with me.

"Hey lady. Try the Oolong."
The kids and grand-kids are all fine, although there's always the on-again, off-again saga of who's speaking to whom and whom isn't. It seriously blows my mind that this happens in my nuclear family. I don't understand it, and it stresses me out to think about it, so I mostly don't. They're all traveling down their own individual paths and they must have a reason so I just leave it alone. When they want to talk, or visit, I figure they'll let me know / invite me. In the meantime, I just respect their privacy and love them from afar.

And in closing....today would have been my 35th wedding anniversary. For what that's worth.

DIY Alert!

Y'all may remember I bought, and Steve installed, this:

Well, I love it. The only bummer, though, is that to keep it looking new and gorgeous, one must massage it every 4-6 days with mineral oil. Otherwise it shows all manner of dried water schmutz and looks like this:

Hideous, right? BUUUTTT.....I have a son who is certified gunsmith and a Cerakote expert. He popped over here Monday night to help remove my sink and has hauled it off to Santa's workshop to perform his magic. He has the same sink and has followed the same process at his house (minus installing it before the Cerakote) and he's very happy with the results. I'm so pleased he's so good at what he does and all will be well in the end!

In the meantime, as is typical with houses, once the sink was removed I started thinking about finally doing something with the counter tops. I had talked myself into living peacefully with the fake wood grain Formica all these years not because I like it but because I've been loath to spend the money it takes to get what I really want: soapstone. BUUUTTT, now that we'll be making the sink perfect, and we won't want to have to remove it again once it's back in, I figured the time is right to make a move.

BUUUTTT, I still don't want to spend the money for soapstone, partly because it's a bit over-improving for the neighborhood and partly because I prefer not to have to live under a bridge when I'm 80. So I've decided to paper the counters. Like I did with the bathroom floor.* 

Squeee! I'm so excited about this project! Here's a before shot. I'll post afters after.

*I just realized I never posted pix of the bathroom floor project. My bad. Here's a shot of the paper flooring I did to give you some idea of what I intend for the kitchen counters. The counters will be a bit lighter, though. More like Carrara marble (I hope).