I’ve told you twice now that I’ve been sleeping in an unfinished room.

It looked like this for a long time.

Then we finally got around to the sanding. If I ever leave or even slightly tick off MK, he’s got photos of me at my most doofus looking – the day I had to sand the room. Eye gear, beanie since it kept getting in my hair. Long shirt and pants. And it still got everywhere. Drywall spackle dust SUCKS.

Then we primed it and it looked bad. So there was some respackling and resanding. Then priming again. Then this week, FINALLY, MK, who lost a bet and got forced to do it instead of me, put up the knockdown. The walls were textured and we had to make our new wall match. Yikes. So glad it wasn’t me. And thankfully he did incredibley, considering how tricky of a project it was.

Then I painted and WOAH! For the first time probably since we moved in, the bedroom was all the same color. The walls and trim got a touch up. The  closets are done. We have curtains and vases and wall art and only need a TV for the room the be complete. Amazing!

New Walls!

Ta Da!

Sometimes this house stuff is so uninteresting I feel bad making you read about it. But, Momm likes it and it’s pretty much all I do. MK won’t let me go for a hike or bike ride until I’ve completed the renovations of the entire house. Slave driver.

So, the latest idea is to put a hole in the wall between the kitchen and the living room. Not JUST so I can watch Law and Order while I cook, but to open it up and let more light in. And so I can watch Law and Order while I cook.

We’re planning on taking down all the wood on the living room wall (when MK’s dad comes, which is soon approaching!). Here’s what that looks like to remind you.

The other side of that wall is the pantry. Here’s what that looked like to remind you.

MK ripped all the wood out, and much to our chagrin, as I mentioned in this post, ever so briefly, found wallpaper. And had to remove it. And that was gross. But I did it, patched all the holes, and painted the space.

We have no idea  if it’s possible to make it a whole walk through doorway, or just a picture window type deal. We’ll find out. In the meantime, we went ahead and took down all the shelves. Because if it is eventually a walkway or window, you don’t want to look at our food. We found the perfect ikea piece, which is technically called a ‘desk’ although I can’t see you using it for that. It’s our new roll top hidden pantry.

If anyone didn’t check my Twitter over there on the right (you don’t have to sign in to look around!) you are totally missing out on my super awesome patio and furniture. A few chairs with cushions was all it took to make me fall in love with this house all over again. The weather here is so perfect, so it follows being comfortable outside is perfect. I thought I’d share it again, in a much sunnier picture:

I’ve been sitting out there with my coffee and book most mornings for a week now. It’s all kinds of  gorgeous and lovely. Tons of sweet chirpy birds keep me company. By the way, the latest book I finished, An Arsonist’s Guide to Writers’ Homes in New England, was great if you’re looking for something to read!

We’ve done so much to the house! I kept stalling on the photos – trying to get the B’s over here to see it in person. But each phone call from Momm means I can’t wait any longer.

Here’s a before of my office/2nd guest/future kid if there are kids room:

There were two touching blue walls, and two touching white-ish walls. No idea why. It bugged me. MK replaced all the outlets, and I painted the walls and the ceiling. Then, I finally talked him into letting me put some racing stripes on the wall. It’s the chardonnay and merlot room now!

Painting with a dark color like that on a not perfectly flat wall was no easy feat. Neither was getting the one little drop of paint out of the carpet. But I am super thrilled with how well it came out. Still need to hang a bit of wall art, but making good progress! We painted MK’s office closet, which means I have painted every single room in the house, ceilings too, except his office and the one bathroom downstairs that came done. No wonder my neck permanently hurts!

We’re back to work. Now that it’s warm and dry we can get so much more done. MK rented a trailer and we took two runs to the dump. There was 1700lbs. of trash in our garage! Including the woodstove, the pipes, the wood we’d taken down in various closets, and just some random trash. We swept and cleaned out the garage and it looks great now. MK also went and bought two large trees for the side yard, and some patio furniture for our front deck!

Lot of Crap

The second trip

 I put the furniture together while he ran around. I also cleaned the front and back yards and decks, weeded, seeded and watered the yards. I’ve never really done that much yardwork before, it was tough, probably good exercise. We planted some small shrubs last week, and they haven’t died yet, so I’m calling that a success.

We turned on the hot tub and shocked it. We’re cleaning it to hopefully sell. Those things are way too much work and trouble, and we never used it.

We spent a day at ikea buying a bunch of decorations, got them home, then brough half of them back. We have two floor standing vases with sticks in them. Whatever.

We have a huge list of furniture to order and get brought to us, but first we needed to finish our room! Remember this post? Where I called it a big reveal, pfft? And said coming soon? Well, now it really is. It’s been sitting like that looking crappy for two whole months. But I just got done respackling, sanding, and priming my wall. It’ll be gray tonight. MK has to do to the knockdown on the big wall and ceiling. It should be gray soon. We’ve picked out a dresser to go along the wall, a huge canvas to hang on the wall, and a TV to hang over the canvas. It’s gonna look coooool.

We painted MK’s closet in his office, pulled down junky shelves, and moved one of my big library shelves in there. Which means I had to rearrange my office. It looks a little empty but it works. I’m planning on painting it this weekend.