Around the House

Yesterday I finally finished two projects I have been working on for way too long: painting the upstairs bathroom, and the hanging lantern. Here's how it went, what I did, and what I learned.

Bathroom:
Rent a sprayer. Painting cabinets and beadboard are a pain in the butt and the finish just doesn't look as smooth as I would like.

Prime. I thought since I was painting bright white over dull white, I would be fine with 2 coats and no primer. It took 4-5 coats (honestly, I lost track) which is why it took me months to finish.

See what I mean? That's after 2 coats, I believe.

And this taught me that it wasn't as white as I thought. Looks like someone peed on everything and left it stained yellow. Ew!

Water-based paint can rust. Wrapping your painting supplies in plastic only works if it isn't left for weeks between coats.

Trying to get the drawer pulls off was no fun because the screw was 2 inches down in this hole.

Wish I had a before shot, but here it is all painted a bright, crisp white (minus the mirror trim, which I'm definitely not doing without primer because of it's texture)

And the other wall with the lovely towel rods I installed because the previous owners took even the hooks off the walls. Towel bars looks nicer (though can't hang as many towels). Now I still need towel rings next to the sinks...

Paper Lantern:

Back in Wilmington, I saw an arced floor lamp sitting out by the dumpster, and I brought it into the house. It had a paper lantern, with only a few small tears and a lightbulb still in the socket. Since there were no overhead lights in our place, lighting was sorely needed and I kept the lamp. After seeing a pin on Pinterest, as well as a post on Houzz, I decided it was time to remake my lantern, since it just didn't fit in our new house.

I don't have a before pic, but this is basically what I started with. Not a really big size either. This plus 430 coffee filters and 40 mini glue sticks. (approx)

Scrunch your coffee filter til you get a small, flat surface to glue.

This is what the other side should look like - kinda like a carnation.

Hot glue right up against one another with no gaps.

Pretty isn't it?

I was thinking about putting in some cupcake liners for a little color. What do you think?

The one thing I didn't plan for, was how heavy this was going to become! It's waaaay too much weight for my little floor lamp. It's currently wedged between the couch and the wall, though it would fall if any of the kids batted at it. But it looks great - good scale for the room, and all the rips were easily covered. It does hang a bit lower than it used to and I've got to figure out how to weigh the base, but I am happy with it - even if it took hours and hours to make - less time than the bathroom anyway!

Next projects... well, I still haven't finished the upstairs bathroom completely... I need to hang up pictures, fix up the craft room, paint Seth's room, paint the kitchen/living room - which also needs furniture - and then none of the rooms have curtains and the bench seat needs to be recovered, and I've been working on styling our bedroom (new headboard, bedspread, lamps and nightstands) but it still has a way to go. And of course there's my dining set to restore, and the guest room is still in boxes, and I haven't even begun to think about the basement. And this is still with Jay and Julie's stuff and my MIL's stuff too. Decorating this house is going to take eons! Guess I'll just have to enjoy it one step at a time. :)