Trim & a "new" headboard...

I was lucky to have Good Friday off, making a long holiday weekend last week.  You know what happens on long weekends...projects!

This time it was a lot of painting, a few planks on the wall, barn light installation, & a start on trim.

Oh, & last night I kind of revamped my old upholstered headboard to fit the space & aesthetic of the attic bedroom!  But, more on that later...

Excuse the mess...we're still in a construction zone after all.  Here's a view of the landing from inside the bedroom.  (Yes, I shamelessly hung up the blinds - just couldn't wait!)

See that saw?  My grandpa gave it to me a few years ago & it weighs a million pounds.  I'm not lying.  If I had a scale that went up that high I'd prove it.  I'm waiting for it to crash through our makeshift work table & crush someone.

A close-up of the plank wall and some little details.

...and now for the sneak peek of the headboard that I mentioned earlier.  I'm not going to type up an entire post on it right now as my fingers are still raw & sore from all of those upholstery tacks.  Not easy, so worth it.  (It's not hung on the wall yet...that's just some of my bedding laying on the floor so I could see what it looked like.)  It's that patience thing again.  Could.Not.Wait.

My mental timeline says that we're supposed to accomplish the rest of the trim work on the landing this week.  We shall see!

A Quick Attic Update

I got everything primed late Sunday night...like 11:00pm late.  But it's done.  And it is glorious.

I'm going to attempt to get everything painted with the final coat this week.

Then we should be able to hang the light & get the planks up on the upper portion of the window wall.  After that comes the trim.  We've got a long holiday weekend coming up, so I'm hoping I can get most of the painting & trim finished - eek!

After that, my dad will be working his crazy carpenter wizardry to fit these $25 Craigslist stair rails around our stairwell.  Once the rails get fit into place, I can paint that darn floor & start doing the fun stuff...like decorating!

It's the final countdown!

Finally.

Spring finally came!

***Quick attic update***
You guys...we're almost done with drywall!  You can't imagine how excited I am about that.  This weekend I got the walls on the landing primed, but we still have a couple of touch up coats of mud to put on some spots on the ceiling.  Those sloped ceilings are tricky to mud!  I think we'll be ready to prime the ceiling & paint the whole room by Sunday.  Eek!

In other news, since I don't have enough going on already, I'm also taking Karen Russel's Snapshots of a Good Life photography class over the next couple of months.  I'm only a couple of weeks in, & I already highly recommend it!  No matter what level of your photography skills, you'll come away with something new. 

Our week 1 assignment had to do with composition.  So, I took Grady to the park...which proved to be challenging to say the least.  The kid doesn't stop moving to begin with, but get him outside, at a playground, after the longest, coldest, most cooped-up winter I can remember...& yeah...it was hard for this girl to visualize, much less get a shot with good composition before he was moving on (at warp speed) to something new.  I did manage to get a few shots that I liked though...

I'm really looking forward to the next 8 weeks of Karen's class & am anxious to see where it takes my photography! 

{I'm looking forward even more to spring...& more days at the park!}

Sorry about the Silence!

I can't believe it's been close to two months since I've posted anything here!  We took a little bit of a break from working in the attic...I think dad & I were both a little burnt out after a couple of months straight of spending nearly all of our free time up there.  That, & there have also been a few family things we've been dealing with.

But...I'm back!

In the last week or so we started taping & mudding the other half (landing/bunk/office area) of the attic.  It's going a lot faster & a lot smoother than the bedroom/closet area - woohoo!

If you remember what this view looked like a week ago...

And what it looks like today...

We're a touch-up coat & final sand away from being ready to prime & paint the walls.  The ceiling has a little more work to be done.  I have high hopes of getting it all primed this weekend, but I'm on my own with Grady, so we'll see how much he lets me get done!

We're slowly inching toward the finish line...

When we first started working up here, I thought it would maybe take 4-5 months to complete.  Here we are over a year later & still chipping away at it! 

We're planning on getting all of the mudding & priming done by next weekend, the painting, trim & planks, & light hung in the following week.  After that, we'll work on the stair rails, floor, & storage areas.  Then, we'll finally be able to move in!

I.Cannot.Wait.

Chalkboard Valentines

This weekend we hadn't quite worked up the energy to start mudding the landing area in the attic, but since Grady requested to "create" something, we decided to tackle his Valentines.  Lo & behold...the Valentine's Day message board!

We thought it'd be fun to make chalkboards by slicing up some logs and painting them up for Grady's friends.  No such luck.  We found the "perfect" logs at my parents' house, but after slicing one section off & letting it dry out, we realized that it just wasn't going to work.  So. Many. Cracks.  He sure had fun digging through the wood pile in below zero temps though.  Seriously...when will it warm up?!?  This polar vortex will be the death of me...brrr...grrr...brrr.

The remaining log did make a great stool for Grady to lounge on in the shop though, so it wasn't a total loss.  (How tall does he look here?!?)  He's not a little babe anymore, but he still melts my heart.  Take that polar vortex!

Back up plan...we cut out a bunch of ovals from a few cedar boards my dad had laying around.  They were the perfect size for an avant garde headpiece.  (We watch Project Runway too much.)

Or perhaps a necklace?

Grandpa sanded down the edges for us.  Nice & smooth...

Grady picked out a few "Valentiny" colors of craft paint, & we brushed them on the edges.

I painted one side with chalkboard paint, let it dry overnight, & had my handsome assistant "season" the chalkboard.  He's a pro...& a perfectionist...& loves helping me.  I love him.

Then I doodled around the chalkboard with some white craft paint...they needed some flair.  Does anyone else immediately think of Office Space when they hear that word?  :)

Ooh-la-la!

I'm obsessed with the arrows...we'll be keeping one of them!

We thought the back would be a neat place to write a little message to his friends, so we flipped them over, I left the room,  & Grady decided to surprise me by drawing some circles with a paint marker.  We collaborated with me adding some doodles to his art.  :)

Then we attached some white ribbon with thumbtacks.  Grady's friends can hang them with either side out!

The project took a lot more time than I'd normally spend on Valentines, & we probably won't do anything this elaborate again, but it was a nice way to spend a very COLD weekend indoors.

Anyone else doing fun projects indoors during this frosty winter?

Happy Valentine's Day friends!

Putting down the paintbrush...for now.

The bedroom is painted!  (Well, everything but the floor...but that's a project I'll tackle at the end of the remodel.)

Everything is painted Benjamin Moore's Simply White.  The walls & ceiling are satin, the mouldings are semi-gloss.

I've never used it before, but while I was at Menards picking up paint, I saw a display for Glade paint additives.  You mix the packet into your paint & it's supposed to freshen your space for up to 6 months!  So far I love the smell...I'm curious to see how long it actually lasts!  The only thing that I didn't like was that the additive seemed to make some of the paint "chunk" up.  At first I thought the roller head was shedding, but I switched to a brand new head & it was still doing the same thing.  Of course, it could be the brand of paint I used as I've never tried that kind before.  I'll update next time I use it with another brand of paint...

A few pictures of the space...the next step is organizing the under-eave storage & moving everything out of the landing area & into the bedroom so we can start all over again with the tape & mud.  Womp womp.

Here's a glimpse of the wall our bed will go on, & the access to one of the storage areas.  My dad is building custom doors for those spaces.

The other side of the room, more storage, & Eli's closet.

Here's hoping we'll be able to get started on the landing area this weekend!

Attic Update #?: The fun stuff

This weekend, in the spare time between basketball games & a late Christmas celebration, we'll be finishing up the priming & painting of all the trim in the bedroom.  Cue angel voices & ringing bells!

In the last few days, dad & I finished nailing up all of the trim & door jambs in the bedroom area, have filled all of the nail holes & gaps with joint compound & caulk, primed a lot of it, & hung up the new medallion/canopy above the barn light.

My amazing mother is at my house as we speak priming trim on her day off work.  She's the best.  No, really...she's actually the best.

The wall & planks are the only areas that have their final coat of paint applied to them.  All of the trim around the window as well as the board & batten trim & baseboards are only primed & are waiting for 2+ coats of Simply White paint!

Hopefully early next week I'll be able to post some pictures of the room completely painted (except the floor) & cleared of miscellaneous tools, paint, trash, etc.  :)

Happy weekend!