Barry’s done a bit more in the kitchen – only took a couple of hours but it makes a real difference. He’s fitted the skirting boards back and they look really great! They still need repainting. He’s also run silicone around the bottom of the units and added the strip that joins the living room floor to the kitchen floor. That’s 2.5/8 of the kitchen tasks done and 3.5/8 of the living room ones!
Tag: DIY
Second hand
My mum is going to move out of her house, and has asked us if we would like some of her furniture because she doesn’t need it any more. She’s got a large chest of drawers, two bedside tables, three double wardrobes and a bucket chair. We’ve said yes please to all of them and when can we hire the van?
She’s happy for us to paint or stain any and all of the items, and we’ve said we’d like to chop the wardrobes up as Barry feels like he could have a good crack at built-in wardrobes for our room, and she’s happy for us to do that as well! Score!
There’s a couple of places in our bedroom where we could have built-in wardrobes, but they’re in the eaves so they’re expensive to buy and get fitted. Better Barry has a go at it first!
Happy birthday to Barry! Katheryn’s boots didn’t fit, so cross your fingers my Supergirl boots hold tonight…
Peninsula
Barry’s started the peninsula. He had to carve a hole in one of the walls he’s carefully built up with plaster, and put a pole into the spare bit of worktop (actually, he accidentally attached the pole to the top side, but never mind!).
At the moment, it’s balanced in the hole, but he needs to attach it and cut a bit of upstand, then stain it all so it matches the rest of the worktops.
In the meantime, I’ve been working on my boot tops for my Supergirl outfit. More on that tomorrow!
Photos of the balanced peninsula below.
Check! Check!
Although we didn’t do much this weekend, I did cross off a few tasks from the Depressing visual representation of all the jobs left to do: the living room, namely task 1, half of task 2 and task 3.
1. Sand and repaint wall and paint skirting boards
Barry was making a stand about not doing any DIY last weekend, so I did all this with my own fair hands. In the beginning, he wasn’t even willing to instruct me on how to do it, but he gave in in the end and gave me a bit of idea!
I had to cut away the cracked parts of the wall before I could sand. Very nervous with Stanley knives as in very clumsy! Then I had to caulk the wall (cue lots of jokes about loving caulk). I ended up caulking half the wall that was left to paint as it was so cracked from the flooring being put in.
2. Paint these skirting boards and cut and fit the beading
I painted all of the remaining skirts, but the beading still needs to be done.
3. Paint this door (both sides) and the doorframe on the other side
I did all of this, which took a few hours. I may have mentioned that we are going on a fancy dress pub crawl this weekend. On Sunday, I watched Supergirl (to get into character), and we watched the first three Indiana Jones films. I say watched, I was just listening because you can’t see the TV from the door/floor behind the sofa.
We were also prepared to have a good crack at tasks 7 and 8 (getting white frames, drawers and baskets), but who knew Ikea was closed on Easter Sunday?
Probably won’t get anything done this coming weekend – it’s Barry’s birthday and we have people staying over again, so may not have much to report.
Depressing visual representation of all the jobs left to do: the living room
In the second of this two-part mini-series, I take a closer look at the living room, and all the things we still need to do. Click here for yesterday’s gripping instalment.
1. Sand and repaint wall and paint skirting boards
2. Paint these skirting boards and cut and fit the beading
3. Paint this door (both sides) and the doorframe on the other side
4. Paint this radiator
5. And this one
6. Fit the strip thing between the kitchen and living room
7. Create the photo wall – finalise photos and buy frames and prints
8. Buy white drawers and baskets for the units
Depressing visual representation of all the jobs left to do: the kitchen
This is part one of a two-part mini-series whereby I put all the work we’ve already done into perspective and think about just how much more time and money we still need to dedicate to these two rooms of the house that are taking over all of our free time and finances. This is part one: the kitchen. Tune in tomorrow for an exciting look at the long list of tasks still to do in the living room.
1. Sand and repaint the ceiling
2. Cut skirting boards to size and repaint
3. Fit skirting boards
4. Finish painting the kitchen walls
5. Finish sanding and fit the peninsula
6. Tile the kitchen walls
7. Paint the stairs wall, handrail and ceiling
8. Replace all of the switches with brushed silver ones
9. Get a condenser tumble dryer
Kitchen floor announcement
Ahem. Ladies and gentlemen. I have an announcement to make. The kitchen floor is in. No more concrete crap on everything!
I’ve included photos from before (we had bits of living room carpet down to stop us walking the dust about) as well as after, and we obviously have several bits still to do (like beading), but the bulk of it is done! I came home from work and think I caught Barry seriously considering another way out, but he got there in the end.
In the meantime, I’ve continued the thankless task of painting white gloss over white gloss. No photos there then.
After this, I’m going back to trying to find superhero-themed songs for our superhero-themed night out next week. We all know we’ll end up at karaoke.
Fear
I had an email from the eBay lady last week. Its very presence in my inbox struck fear into my heart. With a shaking hand, I clicked on the email and braced myself for its contents.
What could it be? Did she need training in selling items on eBay? Did she require our aid in transporting the old kitchen to its new home? Was everyone else she knew in hospital? Was there a drawer still in Barry’s car boot? Did we forget to tell her what this piece of wood was for?
She was writing to thank me for sending the pictures. I breathed again.
Permission to paint
As Barry is away, I’ve finally got permission to pick up a paintbrush! I’ve been left with instructions to paint a little bit of wood by the front door with wood stain, and paint the bits of skirting board and doorframes that I can reach in the living room.
While I’m proud of my progress, there’s not much point me putting up a photo of me painting something that was slightly off-white, white.
So, in the meantime, you can see a pretty picture of the kettle Barry bought last week. It’s glass and lights up. What more do you want from a kettle? Oh, it boils water too.
Hit the floor
The living room floor is in! We still have some work to do (painting skirts/painting radiators/painting doors/putting beading on/never mind the photo wall), but we can walk on it, and it looks great! I think Barry has RSI from putting it in, and he couldn’t face starting the kitchen.
A couple of things we were selling on eBay finished yesterday – the radiator with the leak went, and the kitchen trolley thing went for £102! That will cover either the photo wall, or a trip to Ikea to get some white drawers etc. I really didn’t want to leave the red ones in because they hurt my eyes now because they don’t match, but Barry won’t let me take them out, because we use them, or some such reason. Progress photos below.
