Overbooked? Making our Library Space 1D

I have been ogling indigo/brass/wood interiors for the last year or so. I thought it would be hard to sell Eric on this, but it was not. YEY! So, I dug out my paint decks* and narrowed my choices down over a few days while checking out how the samples looked at different times of day. The hardest part was choosing a ceiling color. I did not want white. I also did not want to just carry the wall color up onto the ceiling which is something I frequently do like. But then Eric bought new running shoes and guess what colors they are. Go on, guess. Yup, like navy blue, brass and a warm, light greige. Huh.

I do not have the skills to make an interesting photo of the ceiling and its decidedly not-white or ivory color, so here's this one.

Speaking of lacking photography skills, there is this photo of the walls. 

How about this pic, then? Nope, still no good, but I was excited enough about getting the color up that I took one.

These are a big commitment, so I decided to take advantage of the Benjamin Moore Sample Pints. Luckily, I loved them! They are 2061-20 Champion Cobalt and OC-27 Balboa Mist. Also. luckily my local Authorized Benjamin Moore Retailer sold me the tint for Champion Cobalt so I could mix some Venetian Plaster. WOO!

*This is not true! I had done this way before even mentioning this colorway to Eric. [wink]

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THE BREAKDOWN

Phase I

1. Empty that room!

2. Remove base moulding

3. Remove closet doors & hardware

4. Remove the carpet and pad

5. Remove tack strips and staples

6. Remove chair rail and paneling

7. Determine if wall paper is removable

8. repair walls

9. prime walls and ceiling

10. paint walls and ceiling

11. decorative finish(es)?

12. Replace light fixture (back-ordered, supposed to be available July 7)

13. Replace switches and outlets, covers

14, make and install closet shelves, etc.

15. prime existing subfloor x 2

16. pour self-leveling subfloor

17. install LVP

18. reinstall base moulding

19. reinstall closet doors

20. install transition piece at doorway

21. make window covering

22. install window covering

Phase II

1 - ?. Build built-in bookshelves

... Finish last course of flooring

... Add base shoe or other moulding to bookcases
... picture rail

Overbooked? Making our Library Space 1C

I struggled to get excited about getting started with this room. I thought I'd start demo in February. And then we got DUMPED ON by the Snow Gods in Feb and I spent a goodly portion of many days dealing with snow removal, sometimes plowing & shoveling twice a day for at least an hour each time. I honestly don't remember exactly when I really got started emptying the room, but it was probably near the end or March or beginning of April. For some reason, I didn't remember that once I got past the Undoing Phase and onto the Doing Phases, I would feel that old enthusiasm. Or at least some of it. Sigh.

You may notice a slight difference in color on the left and right. The left is the still-wet second layer of skim coat, the right is the dry first layer. My trusty hawk and trowel sit on my trusty step stool.

Since my last post, I have A) primed the seriously damaged drywall substrate I was left with after removing wallpaper and fake paneling (no photo), B) skim-coated the appropriate walls, and C) primed those walls, and D) primed and painted the ceiling.

Paint this knock-down (i.e. "brocade") textured ceiling is a humongous pain in the butt. Even with the long-nap roller, the priming, the slow and tedious attention to every stroke the first coat was riddled with holidays. Brining in the halogen work light helped a lot with the second coat, but boy did this whole thing go a long way to supporting my personal distaste of this texture.

I know most people love light-and-bright, but dark-and-cozy is my jam, so it was a little it of a thrill to get this darker grey primer up in preparation for the dark, indigo blue.

I have also ordered some Modern Masters brand (acrylic) Venetian Plaster in the Ultra Deep Tint Base, and picked up sample pints/quarts of paint to give the colors a test run, then gone back to purchase a gallon of each. I also did a test tinting of the Venetian Plaster with tint purchased when I picked up the gallons.

______________________________________________________________

THE BREAKDOWN

Phase I

1. Empty that room!

2. Remove base moulding

3. Remove closet doors & hardware

4. Remove the carpet and pad

5. Remove tack strips and staples

6. Remove chair rail and paneling

7. Determine if wall paper is removable

8. repair walls

9. prime walls and ceiling

10. paint walls and ceiling

11. decorative finish(es)?

12. Replace light fixture

13. Replace switches and outlets, covers

14, make and install closet shelves, etc.

15. prime existing subfloor x 2

16. pour self-leveling subfloor

17. install LVP

18. reinstall base moulding

19. reinstall closet doors

20. install transition piece at doorway

21. make window covering

22. install window covering

Phase II

1 - ?. Build built-in bookshelves

... Finish last course of flooring

... Add base shoe or other moulding
... Add picture rail moulding

Overbooked? Making our Library Space 1B

Demo is mostly accomplished! Tearing out the carpet and pad were the least of the issues. All that kneeling and crouching wasn't super comfortable, but that part of the demolition was straightforward and surprise-free. I realized after the fact that I don't think I took a photo of just the carpet, but this one gives you the idea; dingy tan shag with really obvious seams.

What you see sitting on the carpet is a piece of the fake paneling, some of the base moulding, a piece of the plastic moulding that went with the paneling, and the end of a piece of the chair rail. Speaking of all that, look what that paneling did to the wall! Why? Well, instead of using panel nails, they used panel adhesive. I realize that's probably standard, but I sure wish more people in the industry on all sides would consider more carefully the un-doing of their products when designing and executing their installation methods. This is what "the next guy", me in this case, is left to deal with.

I'm just trying to remember to be grateful that they paneled not quite half the room and only to chair rail height. There is at least a sheet of this stored in the shop loft, so it really couldn't been worse.

ANNOUNCEMENT: 

THERE IS A REASON THERE IS A DRYWALL TEXTURE SPECIFICALLY FOR APPLYING WALLPAPER! 

Anyway... the wallpaper. Oh, sweet baby Bigfoot, the wallpaper! The steamer could not handle the painted-over-ness of it. This method has worked for me in the past, but not this time. Sigh. And indeed, just like every single other roll of the stuff in this house, it was applied directly to the drywall which at least this time seems to have been primed. Still, this is what removing it did. Those dark spots are the torn drywall paper bits. Admittedly, this is the worst of it as I got better at finessing it off as I continued around the room.

BONUS BITCHING! During all of the various projects we've done around here over six-and-a-half years, there have been a few, repeated, uh..., issues that indicate that whoever did the drywall here, was not an expert. Or even really especially competent. The first thing we noticed, and by far the most common issue, is that just about every single hole for the electric boxes - switches, outlets, and fixtures - is cut too large. This means that the outlets are not secure and that some plates and most of the light fixtures we've bought to replace the old, dated ones do not cover the holes. I'll replace the outlets and switches to fix these. I've had to add small medallions on three ceiling fixtures in the house so far and hope that I won't have to do another.

But that's not what I want to show now. What I want to show now are these examples of what I'm starting to think of as Bullshit Workmanship.

Yes, that's the same image as the first in this post. Apparently there was some kind of significant savings in time or money to not finish the corners behind the chair rail. Oh, and this. This part where they didn't think that the whole surface above the closet opening needed drywall, just allllmost all of it. It's not just this little bit either, it's all along that top edge.

______________________________________________________________

THE BREAKDOWN

Phase I

1. Empty that room!

2. Remove base moulding

3. Remove closet doors & hardware

4. Remove the carpet and pad

5. Remove tack strips and staples

6. Remove chair rail and paneling

7. Determine if wall paper is removable

8. repair walls

9. prime walls and ceiling

10. paint walls and ceiling

11. decorative finish(es)?

12. Replace light fixture

13. Replace switches and outlets, covers

14, make and install closet shelves, etc.

15. prime existing subfloor x 2

16. pour self-leveling subfloor

17. install LVP

18. reinstall base moulding

19. reinstall closet doors

20. install transition piece at doorway

21. make window covering

22. install window covering

Phase II

1 - ?. Build built-in bookshelves

... Finish last course of flooring

... Add base shoe or other moulding

Overbooked? Making our Library Space 1A

I had a lot of books. Eric really had A LOT of books. Together we have SO MANY BOOKS and we've only acquired more. But as everyone knows, it's not hoarding if it's books. YEY! It's not really a surprise that when we left all those Craftsman built-ins in Portland, we lost a lot of book storage. Even though all our books are out of boxes and most of them are on shelves that are not in closets, the storage is unsatisfactory and makes the craft studio/library/auxiliary guest room layout unsatisfying. And since we (well I mostly, let's be candid) need to entirely empty the craft studio/library/auxiliary guest room in order to rip out the carpet and to install the new flooring, it seemed like the perfect time to figure out every other surface in there as well as address the book shelving situation.

I forgot to get a photo before I was well into the process. This big shelf was FULL of books on both sides and full on top.

These 24 boxes are tightly packed with all (well most) of those books! They will stay right there until most of the remodeling is done since that wall is where the new bookcases will be installed.

In addition to the carpet and the bookshelves, there are a few other issues. The dreaded painted-over wallpaper for one. If that wallpaper was put in by the original owners, then it is very likely glued directly to the drywall and will have to be skimmed over. If not, there's hope it can come down with my trusty (slightly crusty) steamer.

What is even under there? Did they throw dirt at the wall while putting up the paper?

There are also some seemingly random applications of that faux paneling popular in the 1970s when the house was built. This stuff could very well be glued to the drywall, too. Which could mean lots of repairs. I do believe there is a full or nearly full 4' x 8' sheet of this stored in the shop loft, too.

My guess is that the paneling was an afterthought, because of the extra mouldings applied above the base and below the chair rail.

The dinginess of the photo quality here betrays the feeling the finishes give the room. 

And to complete the wall renovation triple threat, a chair rail that goes all the way around. It was also painted over when the wallpaper was, so it's going to require some extra work to get off and also not be especially appealing to reuse in the future.

I don't know what the original look was, but it seems like when they decided to paint over the wallpaper they just pained painted over everything that wasn't fake paneling, including the chair rail.

Just as with the guest room, this seems like the perfect time to improve the storage capabilities of the closet as well as repaint in there. (no photo) In fact, I'll have to repaint the whole room and perhaps utilize my old decorative painting skills. [wildly waggles eyebrows]

I actually find both the ceramic base and the glass globe charming, but less so together. It's also inadequate in terms of both providing light as well as for scale. It's a very small light in a rather large room. Each of the pieces may find their way to other spots in the house.

And finally, we want to change out the central ceiling light fixture - hopefully with something that could give us more light around the room, which is actually quite large for a 2nd bedroom in a house this size. Which means installing a dimmer and while I'm at it I may as well update all the outlets and the closet light switch, too.

______________________________________________________________

THE BREAKDOWN

Phase I

1. Empty that room!

2. Remove base moulding

3. Remove closet doors & hardware

4. Remove the carpet and pad

5. Remove tack strips and staples

6. Remove chair rail and paneling

7. Determine if wall paper is removeable

8. repair walls

9. prime walls and ceiling

10. paint walls and ceiling

11. decorative finish(es)?

12. Replace light fixture

13. Replace switches and outlets, covers

14, make and install closet shelves, etc.

15. prime exisiting subfloor x 2

16. pour self-leveing subfloor

17. install LVP

18. reinstall base moulding

19. reinstall closet doors

20. install transition piece at doorway

21. make window covering

22. install window covering

Phase II

1 - ?. Build built-in bookshelves

... Finish last course of flooring

... Add base shoe or other moulding

Let's Potty! Part II - A Water Closet Renovation

As home remodeling projects tend to go, this one ran into some obstacles which made it take a bit longer. The biggest obstacle was simply that we ended up having to order our new toilet, because they were out of stock. Luckily, they had some coming and we got our name on one! Yeah... we're considering ourselves lucky to have our name on a toilet. Phases A-E are here. Below are the long-winded phases!

Phase F: Install new, modern, low-flow toilet

I forget about good ol' WD-40, so was mentally preparing myself to have to take a hacksaw to the various metal bolts holding all the parts of the old toilet together. Pulling the old beast (tank dated: August 14, 1977, so still younger'n both of us) out of that tiny room was still a hassle, but less of a hassle than feared.

You know you're a reeeeeally grown up grown-up of a certain stripe when things like fancy toilets and endless storage space with thoughtful design are part of your lottery-winner fantasies. This toilet is not fancy, but was rated highly-enough and the price was right. In fact, simply by pulling the old toilet out myself, I probably saved the cost of the new toilet! And by installing that myself, I saved the cost of disposing of the old one and buying a new flange... plus some. So this is essentially a free new toilet! Or something.

We picked up a new trash can - one with a lid, because a certain member of our family likes to eat things out of the trash can. I'll let you determine which one of us that is. Ahem. Not sure we'll be keeping the rug-thingie. This is the only toilet in my life that has ever had one and I'm not convinced I want one. It's hardly been used and it seems like a thing no one is going to want to buy used, so the idea of generating waste by not keeping it is bothersome. Yeah, I'm that person.

Bummer: I ordered the toilet on August 8 with a pick-up date of August 24. When I didn't hear from them on the 24th, I called on the 25th. They had no real idea when to expect it, but since it was a stock item they guessed August 31st of September 3rd. I got the call on               . I called again on September 5, and was told it was there! This situation was more frustrating than I expected it would be,  because having any clean running water with indoor toilets is pretty great and we have two even without this one.

Phase G: (Reprise): Install that TP holder... with a modification.

I had to move the holder to the far right of the crate to make room to replace the roll, because the whole kit and kaboodle needed to be installed closer to the door than I expected.

Phase H: Refinish and hang cabinet for TP or make/buy holder-storage combo.

So, I decided that I needed to go with the make/buy option... which became the make option.

The toilet is not centered, so I had to decide how to hang the cabinet: centered over the toilet or centered on the wall. The difference between the center marks was about an inch and I roughly split the difference.

I've already been down the special-toilet-paper-for-a-particular-bathroom-due-to-storage road and I am over that crap. (heh)

It is a bummer not getting to reuse that perfectly serviceable cabinet and that the TP holder wasn't going to do. I donated both pieces to the local used building materials warehouse. I did look there for replacements for both of these pieces, but had no luck. All this means that I ended up making a little cabinet! I had purchased a pair of these little bi-fold doors at a thrift store years ago and am glad to finally actually use at least half of them. The wood* for the carcass came from shelves we removed from the master bedroom shortly after moving in. I was also able to use stash for the shelves, shelf pegs, and paint. And the knob is an antique door knob we brought with us that had been in Eric's basement in the old 1911 Craftsman in Portland! I did buy the plywood for the backing, new hinges, and some supplies to make the doorknob into a cabinet knob.

Another bummer: So. The carcass. Well, I hadn't remembered we had those 1x8s stored in the rafters of the shop and when I was shopping I decided to save on budget and buy some MDF. Well. Sigh. Let's just say that didn't work out for me. The bummer is exacerbated by the fact that scraps of MDF 1x6 and 1x8 aren't nearly so useful as "real" lumber. The bummers just keep coming: the door was too heavy for the hinges I bought, which were pretty much the same as the hinges that had been on it if the "scars" were any indication. So I ended up buying continuous (i.e. piano) hinges. And then procrastinated installing them, because I was scared that they also would work, but they did!


Part III:
Handmade & vintage decorations!

Taming the Monster in the Closet: I

A project in which the closet itself becomes a monster.

I tell ya', full-on occupying these spaces for almost 6 years means that these rooms and their closets are full-on filled up which is adding complexity to this flooring project in that it takes not a small amount of time to move stuff around repeatedly.

When the room is too narrow to get frame the photo well so you rotate it in Photoshop and then realize that the shelf was level before you rotated so you leave the background weirdness to add to the overall non-fun house effect.

It also means that I am taking this as an opportunity to attack these closets by adding some shelves and getting a fresh coat of paint in there. I had a gallon of paint that was a bad choice for the guest room's neutral, but a fine choice for inside a couple of closets.

What are those cutouts for? Only the left-most is over a stud.

On both ends the closet has room for shelves; on one end they're deeper than is practical for storing clothes, but the only clothes we store in here are costumes and they are hung on hangers. So that means that we need some hanging space for costumes and I want to have some for guests should they want to hang any of their clothes. On the other end where the shelves are shallower, we have an access door to the shower plumbing, so the shelves work around that and will store something easy to unload.

Of course, the doors and base moulding will be reinstalled, but after the new floor goes in.

What follows is the long path, riddled with obstacles, that lead to this unremarkable closet:

I reused what I could from the closet as it was when we moved it; parts of the closet rod and shelf, as well as the drywall-textured and painted-over rod/shelf brackets. The condition of the brackets really bothered me, but the idea of wasting them bothered me more. I decided to soak them in a Simple Green & water solution, scrap/rub off the paint and texture, then spray paint them to protect them from rusting, then reuse two of the three. I also drilled holes in the rod holder parts, so I could keep the rod stationary when sliding all the contents to one end.

I'm sure I'm not alone in that when I am remodeling and find something... er, unusual... I wonder about the history of the processes that went into the existing situation. I had always assumed that the knock-down/brocade drywall texture had been added sometime after 1976 when the house was built, but when I removed the base moulding, I saw that it covered all of the drywall. However, apparently they had installed the closet hardware before texturing the drywall. Curiouser & curiouser. And it seems that they had an issue with the plumbing in the shower at one point and cut through this drywall to deal with it.  Fair enough, but when they patched the wall that wasn't the access door, they didn't remove the shelf that was on top of these brackets. Funny thing is: the shelf was not attached to the brackets. Just resting on there. The whole thing is even more puzzling since they aren't installed level.

Black was not what I was imagining, but it is what I already had on hand that wasn't a just-plain-wrong color or a color that might be better saved for more visible projects.

I used scrap moulding from the front door project to make a support for the rod/shelf part in the center of the closet. Despite all the extra steps in getting the brackets cleaned up and adding these supports, the was the easiest and most direct part of this project.

Just to get every inch out of that closet rod, I put some stops on the ends. I used some funky cabinet knob escutcheons that came off the upstairs bathroom vanity. They're definitely weird and probably gauche, but I think they're funny and... they work! So at least this section of the closet is no-cost... except the screws. GEEZ!

The access door to the plumbing for the shower on the other side of that wall is oddly fancy with it's angled trim and it's not-just-a plywood-square door. It also has a way more secure latch than did any of the three screen doors when we moved in.

I used this as an opportunity to take a whole mess of stuff we've removed from the house or that was left here to Home ReSource in Missoula for donation. I was hoping to get materials for building the shelves there, too, but they had none of what I was looking for. It would have felt good to use something that might have otherwise ended up in the landfill and to nurture my inner cheapskate by not paying full price. At least I was able to keep 6 light fixtures, a ceiling fan, a stainless steel kitchen sink and faucet, 3 curtain rods, some curtains, a couple-few dozen switch and outlet covers, and various other bits of hardware and some paint/stain out of the landfill with our donation.

[I had intended to take a photo of the stuff all loaded up, but forgot. It would've gone here] 

I decided to at least use what I could from our scrap wood stash to make the shelf cleats. Most of this is what was left from building the wood shed. I tried to buy 3/4" plywood from the local lumber yards. Yard I doesn't have a way to rip a 4x8 sheet into two 2x8 pieces so I can actually haul it. Also, the "new" guy there is almost-subtly patronizing and a blatant mansplainer... he once actually mansplained to me how I should feel about the weather. So yeah. Yard II simply didn't have any 3/4" plywood. I didn't have the heart to further inquire about the smoothness of the 3/4" that usually carry and to ask again if they could cut it - the poor trainee seemed to be really struggling with the phone call already. Well, dammit! I tried to do good, but had to drive back into Missoula to a big box supplier.

Dumb mistake: I had the audacity to assume a wall that is longer wider than 16" would have a stud somewhere between the two ends. This is not the case for the shorter front walls of this closet. Of course, I didn't check until I had 3/4 of the cleats cut... from a 2x4 ripped into thirds. What a waste of time and materials! Maybe at least some of these very specifically cut lumber will be suitable for the studio/office/sewing room/auxiliary guest room close when I get to that?

Sigh. And so. Thinking about what we had already:
-Standards and brackets, but what sizes and in what quantity are out there? And were exactly are they out there? Not the right sizes. In the two places I thought they were.
-What is there that would not be best used in another place, sitting unused for even more time until then? All of it would be best used elsewhere, unfortunately.
-What about all those wooden brackets removed from the master bedroom way back when? Nope. Too small.

You can see that I haven't yet gotten the top shelf installed. That's because I'll need to get more 1/4" AC plywood, so next time I'm in Missoula and near Lowe's I'll get it. Then I'll already have materials for the next closet!

Anyway, that's the deal with the pine-board brackets; they're screwed to the corner studs and to the cleat on the back wall. The shelf is screwed to the brackets. I added a piece of screen moulding to the front for a tiny bit of added stability and to cover the plies.

Something similar will happen in the studio/office/sewing room/auxiliary guest room when I tackle the floors in there later this year, but hopefully it will go much more smoothly, quickly, and unembarrassingly.

Take Cover, Chair!

Once I got going with all the other projects in the guest room, I decided I really didn't want to live with the 1980s dusty blue upholstery on this chair. The chair is perfectly serviceable otherwise and not without its charms, but the upholstery is just too not-right.

I don't have the skills to truly reupholster it and I'm committed to cheapskate-ing this guest room update project to the bitter end... hence, the quick-n-dirty slipcover.

I scoured the small selection of upholstery fabric at JoAnn which is the only place I know of to buy upholstery fabric around here and came up with this as the least offensive of the cheap options. Only later did I realize the herringbone texture echoes the the pattern on the window shade fabric which is also the fabric used on the back of the duvet set. So there!

That's right, in order to get enough fabric to make both window shades from the fabric I had already, I had to orient the herringbone sideways! What's the world coming to?

This just needed to be quick, easy, and done.*

Although I steam pressed that crease out most of the way, it's obviously still there. Hopefully it will just kind of diminish over time. As it faces the wall most of the time and is a clean crease rather than a messy wrinkle, I'm not going to worry about it.

I got to use some of these great buttons that were a gift from my friend, Tiffany, over at Fizzy Party.

On my last post - Loads of Fun Laundry Room - I added a Real ________ Room Situation photo at the end so I wanted to do that here, too. But first a reminder of the recent work I've completed in the guest room.

 And now for the Real Guest Room Situation (RGRS) ...

Apologies for the blurriness. One has to act quickly with photographing Delia as she doesn't have time for such nonsense and will take measures to avoid the camera.

____________________________________________________

For this part of the guest room update project all I needed to purchase was 2 yards of fabric. 

    OUT OF POCKET COSTS:

      $  7.98 - clearance upholstery fabric
      

_____________________________________________________

*In the interest of full disclosure: I am not quick; I spent about five hours making this, not including sourcing materials. It wasn't hard-hard, but it did take some time planning in order to not waste materials or have a bunch of weird seams. I have no amendments to "done," because it is. Done, I mean.