Little victories

Progress is being made!  Last night was our second night staying at the house.  We're sleeping on an air mattress, but it still counts.  This house is primarily heated by a pair of pellet stoves and we're dealing with the learning curve on those.

All the ambiance, none of the work

I was quite cold in the house last night when the stoves did not turn on.  I fiddled with the thermostat and got them fired up, but in the meantime I added another blanket to the pile I was sleeping under.  The thermostats are the old, plastic kind and aren't exactly accurate.

Not high tech

We're now shopping for a digital version that we can actually set to a certain temperature and not have to guess what the little plastic bit is set at.  When they're going, they heat the house nicely and should save us a fortune over the electric baseboard heaters that are scattered around the house.  Most of those are completely turned off.  We'll see if we can make it through the winter without turning them on.

Joe had his first victory in the house.  The bumper rails project is complete, letting our dogs have run of the stairs.  We lucked out and the previous occupants left stains and paints that were used in the house.  That made it a lot easier to stain the added wood to match the existing rails.  It's not an exact match, but the original rails are 34 years old.  We're pleased with how it came out.

Safety and style!

You can see the lower rail on the left that was added to keep the dogs from plunging off the side if they're running too fast or if our older dog loses his balance.  We also filled in the gap between the stairs and the wall on the right so we don't have to worry about the dogs falling through on that side.  Or the people for that matter.  I was in a hurry and missed the steps before the gap was filled and almost put my foot through.  We feel a lot safer with the additions and they didn't ruin the open feel that we love.

That would be a very long fall

While Joe was constructing and moving things in, I was hard at work in the offices.  With the foil wallpaper thwarting every attempt, we decided to back up and focus on the easy room so that we could get one of the offices ready for move in while I keep working on the other room.  This means I got to take a break from wallpaper scraping and paint instead!

First step was to remove all of the piles of wallpaper that had accumulated.  I had the bright idea of throwing it off of the balcony rather than dragging it down the stairs.  I didn't plan on it snagging on the railing and flipping over on the way down.

Oops

Fortunately I got it cleaned up and out of the garden before Joe got home.  My helpers were very amused.

Our dogs, Cowboy and Peyton

With the mess out of the way, I taped everything up and secured the drop cloths.

It was a bit of a heart attack to get the paint up on the wall.  I've lived most of my life in rented housing of one form or another, the walls are universally white or some shade of white.  This was seriously grey.  I'm glad I didn't go with the stronger color we originally picked out, I would have chickened out!  The first coat went up at 8pm and the second coat went up at midnight.  Joe helped with the second coat so we were able to head to bed by 1am.  This morning I woke up to find this.

It came out great!  It's hard to see the color in the photos and with the shop lighting (power is off to the fourth level while I steam wallpaper), but you can see the contrast to the white ceiling.  The eggshell finish worked really well and the second coat smoothed out the little flaws left from our drywall repairs.  I'm really, really pleased with how this came out.  Joe is, too, which is good because this is his office.  I'm going to let it set for about 36 hours, then add the accent lines I have planned in white and sapphire blue. 

My little victory has given me the boost I need to go back into my own office and finish that battle.  It's not a pretty sight right now.

But the wallpaper is 75% down.  Once it's down, the walls will need a scrub and some repairs.  But then I can paint this room the same nice shade of gray, add the accents, and I'll be DONE with this project!  I can't wait to move on with my life and actually get my desk and fish moved into my office.  Sharing the dining room with Joe when we work from home is not the most efficient office set up.  He doesn't like my taste in music much.