Remodeling Our Hut Part 31: Painting and Siding

As soon as we had the plywood on the lean-to addition, our next job was painting the interior of the house.   When we went to the paint store, the clerk was very helpful, but I'm sure he found us boring.  Though it will seem too bland to almost everyone but us, we went with only three very light colors, 'Dover White' for the downstairs walls, 'Hyacinth' for the upstairs and 'Extra White' for the ceilings.  We're not very adventurous, but hey, it's three shades of white instead of only one.

The employee of the paint store did some calculations and we ended up with what looked like a ridiculous amount of paint in five gallon pails and a bunch of gallons.  We were lucky it all fit in the old Buick's trunk and back seat.   We avoided any fast moves (or stops) while hauling it home. 

We had less than a week to get the painting done as the flooring contractor was scheduled to begin very soon.  I looked into renting a paint sprayer but had no luck finding one.  Though the hut is not huge, it was a rather daunting task to paint every room (and ceiling) in the house with plaster primer first, followed by two more coats of paint all in less than a week. Carl was not in favor of buying a sprayer at all, but after listening to me whine about how much time it was going to take us, he changed his mind and off we went to the big box store to buy one of our own.

Thank goodness we did, because painting is not my favorite thing.  Briana, Joel and I masked off all the windows in the house on Saturday in preparation.  Luckily for us, Joel volunteered to run the paint sprayer.

Sunday, November 3, Joel donned a mask to protect his lungs and set to work.

We had to cover all the hardwood flooring boxes and anything else we didn't want covered in overspray, too.

The sprayer (and Joel) was very much appreciated.  It certainly did cut down on the work.

Pictured above: Dining room/study bay windows.

Below:  Breakfast nook and kitchen

November 4, and the contractors are starting to install the ceiling on the front porch.

 While the contractors were working outside, I was working on painting once again, this time cutting in with the darker white paint in preparation for the finish coats later than week.

 Upstairs, south side, 'Hyacinth' walls, 'Extra White' ceiling

 Upstairs, north side.

 When I finally finished upstairs with the transition between the walls and ceiling, in the late afternoon, I moved downstairs.

 My feet didn't like standing on ladders for long stretches, but of course I was continually dropping stuff, so my back got a great workout in, too.

From my perch on the ladder in the bay windows, I could see the shadowy figures working on the porch ceiling.

By Tuesday, November 5, the porch ceiling was nearing completion.

And surprise, the next day, Wednesday, November 6, we had our first accumulating snow.  

We had the heating ducts cleaned because all of the plaster dust and demolition debris needed to be removed.

Carl and I finally got the rest of the old orange plywood flooring out of the downstairs hallway and began ripping out the bathroom floor next.

Once we were done with the hallway, the old blue bathroom was next.

Prying the floors up was a job we were both glad to be done with.

Carl thought we should paint the two finish coats of paint by hand instead of using the sprayer so we wouldn't have any overspray.  The two of us painted together after he got home from work and though we finished the first coat, we had a five gallon pail of paint left over.  And sad to say, we were exhausted. I especially did not feel like painting the house one more time,  so when Joel volunteered to man the paint sprayer gun again, I was thrilled.

    Carl followed Joel around with the cart and the pail of paint.  The following day we were able to clean the gun out and put the sprayer back in the box.  We'll be using the sprayer again in the spring on some outdoor projects.

On Friday, November 8, the shake siding came in for the back of the house, so the contractors were busy installing it while I worked on touching up the painted walls where the ceiling and wall meets.  I was on a ladder inside the house and they were outside.  Ah, fun, fun.

                                "Hi there, Mr. Contractor!"

The weather had turned very cold.  I was glad I wasn't up on a ladder outside.

 

 They made great progress and were able to finish the gable by noon.

Later on Friday, Carl and I went to work touching up the rest of odds and ends I'd missed.

We are still debating what type of railing to create for the staircase.  Working upstairs with no balcony railing is very dangerous, so I decided to get a piece of decorative grating to see if we would like the effect of iron or wood better.
  
  I grabbed one of our stained glass windows so we could enjoy it in the sunshine just for a few days and see how the glass lights up during the day.

Just before dark, I went outside to lock up the chickens for the night and look at the house from the back.

 The contractors also sided over the orange flooring plywood on the garage.  Cody had come and installed a new garage window earlier in the week.  We removed the smaller ten year old window which, after I cleaned it up, was a good replacement for the east window in our garage.

The contractors are going to replace the brown vent cover in the eaves with an off-white one when the order comes in, so they left the ladder standing in the meantime.

 We had hoped to be done with the house by Thanksgiving, but that was not possible.  There was (and still is) so much to do.

We won't be back home for Christmas, either, but that's ok.  


It saves me the work of putting up a Christmas tree.