We've been a bit overwhelmed lately.  I don't even have time to spell it all out - suffice it to say that it is getting cold and we Still haven't had time to finish the soffits and fascia on the new roof or get the new windows framed in and insulated.  Rather uncomfortable, really.

BUT.  The Ft. Jackson house has sold.  Woo Hoo!  We're not going to make any money on it but a family has moved in - he is a construction contractor and she loves the house so all is well there. 

We have re-thought our color scheme for downstairs - again.  One thing we have learned is that you NEVER buy paint until the very end.

(Does anyone want to buy two huge buckets of pale blue paint?)

Because our plan for the layout of the downstairs has changed slightly and because the cabinets we had priced and planned for last winter are no longer available, we have had to re-think our whole plan for the downstairs.  I'll tell all in another post once I've got caught up with the mess in this house (it is truly amazing how much volume the cabinets in the Ft.Jackson house were hiding!) but in the meantime - here is a short overview of our color scheme:

Kitchen walls - Dark teal (yes, really)

Living Room walls - that dusty pink and/or the chocolate brown - tile work with will be done in that faux aged stone tile with a few decorative tiles thrown in.

Cabinetry and Built-ins in both rooms - pale mustard yellow with that dark formica flecked with gold and teal for the counter tops.

Ceilings - the paler yellow

Paprika Curtains in the LR, teal throw pillows and other accents, something lightweight and cream or kitchen curtains.

We hope to have at least some of it done before Christmas!

O.K.  Time for some real life work.  (The color chips look so much better in real life - I've played with the color balance but digital cameras just don't manage blues against reds very well.)

Maxx and Molly's rooms are well on their way to completion, also. 


We still need to finish the window trim in both of the rooms.  We tried to remove most of it in salvagible condition but it is looking like we just need to put new casings on everything.
Maxx wanted a pink room . . . we managed to talk him out of that - not so much because he's a boy but because none of the rest of us like pink that much.  He chose a Scooby-Doo color scheme with Mystery machine Green and Blue for the walls and ceiling.  We've promised some Scooby-Doo posters for his room and after September,  I'll look into getting some orange vinyl clings of groovy flowers or something for his walls.

Molly's room was a bit problematic.  Both Molly and Maxx's rooms started out with this horrible dark Amish green painted on their walls.  It made both rooms look like caves.  Max's walls were pretty stable by Molly's were peeling in large chunks.  We were advised that we should completely strip all of the walls upstairs before painting or they would look messy. 

Well, we tried that with Molly's room and it quickly became apparent that if we stripped everything off the walls, we would actually be removing the walls.  The wallboard is very thin, very old and covered in multiple layers of paint and wallpaper - I think I have counted 5 layers of wallpaper in MB's room.  Most of it incredibly old and crumbly, some of it seems to have actually merged with the wallboard itself.  e scrubbed off as much as we thought was safe and forged ahead.  Her walls are not wonderful but both rooms would need to be totally gutted and resurfaced to become BH&G wonderful. 

You know what?  I don't need BH&G wonderful at this point.  I just need clean, safe rooms where my kids are happy.

Molly is going with a cramy white with dark red trim.  She is having trouble - the red is requiring 4 or 5 coats before it starts looking as dark as she wants it and she started in on the molding with red and hates it.  Time to break out the primer again.

Oh -more good news today - Our water tested clean.  Yay!!!


And the cousins are on their way - we are totally ready!













. . . .

We (almost) finished our bedroom last week. 












This was probably one of the easiest rooms we will redo in this house.  When we started it was a very weird retro green color with heavy dribble stains along all of the walls.  We worried at first that this was an indication of some strange leak in the roof but it soon became clear that the problem was the result of very high humidity in the room at some point in the past.  I cannot imagine why any of the former occupants would have needed such a humid room . . .

There was no indication of mold or mildew in the room - just  dribbles.  We washed and primed the walls but Kilz did not do the job that we expected it to.   The walls were a strange matte texture and the primer just soaked right in no matter how thickly we rolled it on and the dribble marks showed through clearly in several areas.  We had to switch to Bin to get the job done there.  That's very stinky stuff but it covered up very nicely.

We chose the paint colors based on Lowe's Olympic Audubon Glorious color theme.   I have some art with prominently golden and tawny colors that will be beautiful in there as soon as I get around to hanging it.  And I love the slanted ceiling above the bed.  I grew up in a log cabin with slanted ceiling/walls in my bedroom and I love to be in a room that is un-boxlike.  It is a great room for sleeping!

Since taking this photo, I spray painted my little night stand a darker purple to compliment the walls. 

And this ugly chimney?  We could rip it out right now but that would involve roof work and messes in two bedrooms and the living room that we don't want to take the time to deal with just yet.  We are going to box it in to cover it and create some small shelves for shoes between the chimney and wall.