Looking up

Clara's room is still lacking baseboards, but we decided to move her in anyway. The first night was rough but we stuck it out. One she realized we were serious about not coming back in there to get her, subsequent nights have been fine. However, this has meant that I'm unable to work in the adjacent bathroom during her nap, which has always been my prime working time. D'oh! 

I've decided to make the best of it and work on the attic room instead, which has been sitting at 65% completion for two years. The people my in-laws hired to do the drywall did a simply awful job at it. I knew it was bad before, but it's even worse than I thought. Only about half of the seams were sanded, and the ones that were sanded had left the drywall tape exposed. It took all week, but I finally finished the mudding and sanding. I even got about a quarter of the priming complete today. I don't have any pictures of the progress, but here are a few inspiration images.

Enough white to keep it light, enough color to be cheery.   

Definitely doing a whitewashed paneled wall. Love the soft colors, too.

Bright and cheerful. We've planned for recessed shelves like these.

I believe this is a Martha Stewart room. Love the mismatched beds and spreads.

Martha's own attic craft room. What could be more perfect?

 More white on white. I love the paneling here, too, but I'll probably only do it on the gable-end walls.

Love this little trundle. Can't you just see a couple of babies curled up here for a nap?

More tired than my accomplishments should allow

Here are the bullet points for what we've done since we last checked in:

1. Finished making and installing window trim. Filled, sanded, primed, painted.

Don't be jealous of our view.

2. Moved an electrical box in the bathroom and patched hole. Don't ask.

A fascinating picture. The hole no longer exists.

3. Fixed some problems with the drywall where they didn't leave enough room for backerboard and tile.

4. Primed bathroom walls.

5. Added framing for a little alcove in the shower for shampoo and body wash.

6. Enjoyed the sweet fragrance of the hyacinths in the front bed (and did the weeding).

7. Mowed the lawn for the first time this year (OK, so Tom did this one, not me).

8. Completed several of the little projects I alluded to previously.

9. Traveled to Alabama and back for my little sister's wedding. Congratulations, Rebecca and Chris!

Hmm. That's it? Only 9 things? Please take into account that I only accomplish anything when this:

and this:

  happen at the same time. Most of the time it's like this: 

and this:

:)

Trimwork

This weekend I took on the job of making and installing the window trim in the girls' room and the guest room. Because this style of trim is mostly straight cuts and butt joints (rather than miters), it has gone pretty quickly - an hour and a half per window. I still need to pick up the crown moulding to finish the tops. I have three windows at this state of completion with one left to go.

Crown is king

The crown moulding in the girls' room is pretty much done! I finished it up about a week ago - including caulk and paint - but never got around to posting. If I hadn't been a dope and used clear caulk, I'd be entirely done with it. But I am a dope, so I have to touch up some areas with paint. I'll do that once the baseboards are ready to be painted. I also refinished a toddler bed that my aunt gave me. I couldn't wait to see what it would look like all put together, so I assembled it in the room.

My mom provided the blue bedding, which I love. Unfortunately it doesn't coordinate very well with the wall color I picked (we've already established that I'm a dope). It'll have to find a home in another room on a more permanent basis, but for now it'll do. Several other items peeking into the sides of this picture will be receiving their own makeovers shortly.

Land o' plinth-y

The next step in the girls' room is to do the door and window casings. Our house might be considered a Victorian, but it's not really a pure style. The original mouldings and millwork are mostly gone, but we have just enough remaining to be able to approximate what was here before the gut job. The door and window casings are more of a simplified neoclassical design than Victorian - i.e. this:

source

rather than this:

source

Most of the components are available, but I had to make my own plinth blocks. Fortunately they are the simpler neoclassical style with no routed profile, so it only took a few cuts to make. I couldn't really find a good tutorial for the process (everything I found just said to use thicker lumber, which I don't have access to), so I had to figure it out myself. A few passes through the table saw, some gluing and clamping, a little wood filler, and a couple of nails yielded this:

Now that they're in place, I can work on the baseboards. Getting close to finishing this room!

Coincidence or kismet?

I spent an entire afternoon on my hands and knees scrubbing the floor in what will be the girls' bedroom. As I cleaned I realized that the color of the floor matches the wall color very closely. Coincidence or kismet?

New year's resolutions

Does putting your list of resolutions on paper and making them public increase accountability? We'll see. Here are a few goals. 

1. Cook more/eat out less. Already I'm not doing so hot with this one. We had a bad leak in our bathroom tub faucet, so for a couple of weeks we've had the water turned off to the whole house. Cooking and washing dishes when you had to go back and forth from the basement was a pain. As luck would have it, I couldn't find the replacement parts locally and had to wait for them in the mail. But I fixed it and am miraculously keeping up with dirty dishes.

2. Sticking to the lists. I mentioned before that I'm a compulsive list-maker. I've got a notebook dedicated to weekly construction to-do lists. The tasks are small and manageable, which I've found helps me from feeling like I'm getting absolutely nothing done. Additionally, every third week's list is lighter so I can catch up on anything I didn't finish from the previous two weeks. 

3. Finish the second floor. That means everything on the construction list, plus a few more things I haven't added to it yet. Yeah, I'm sure I'll be making this resolution again next year.

4. Read more. I like settling in with a book in the evening after the kids are asleep, but dragging two little kids to the library by myself to obtain books is a hassle. I'll have to make Tom come home on time once or twice a month to take advantage of the library's extended evening hours.

5. Be more patient. I know I lose my cool too easily, especially with Clara. I know I'm going to blink and she will be all grown up, so I'm trying to breathe and enjoy all that energy she's got. Hopefully putting her in her own room where nothing is off-limits will help channel that energy into playing with toys rather than destroying my things.

What are you trying to accomplish this year?