Entryway is painted!

The entryway has finally been painted and the new light is hung. It has been a long time coming because of the repairs and because we have gotten distracted on several other projects. 

Before:

Here is a before picture from how the house looked before we bought it. The floors and wood detail are beautiful, but there was a LOT of work to be done on the plaster. Cracks everywhere. We also got rid of the random "chair rail" near the ceiling. 

Here is the view from the front door. Unfortunately the floral carpet has not yet been ripped up. We are waiting to do that until the end so the floors don't get damaged. We aren't too worried about spilling plaster or paint on this flowered beauty. 

During: 

Here are some photos of the renovation process. The walls got patched up and we put down painters paper so we don't damage the wood floors while we are doing all of the repairs. 

Stairway walls had to be entirely removed and re-drywalled. 

 My sister came and helped with the painting :)

After: 

Paint on the walls and light is up. I kept going back and forth about this light, but since we waited so long to hang it up, I can't return it and therefore it IS my light. No negative comments because it is staying! (kidding...kind of?). We painted the entryway with Benjamin Moore Revere Pewter. It was actually Behr Paint + Primer tinted to that color, and luckily we only needed one coat of that! 

 Gracie had to inspect everything, and she approves. 

 I got the chandelier from overstock (here). 

I'm so happy to be done painting the entryway. We needed to have a room that was nearly complete because everything else is gutted and ugly and it was getting kind of depressing. Now we walk in the front door to fresh paint and a light!

How to remove carpet

I have been removing carpet from all of the bedrooms upstairs...super fun stuff! The actual carpet removal is easier than I thought it would be and it provides some instant gratification when the carpet is gone. 

Tools:

- gloves

- crow bar

- knife/blade

- tape

- cute canine helper

- nasty carpet that you no longer want 

Step 1: Take a picture of your old carpet in the room so that you can look back later and be very pleased that it is gone. 

Step 2: Use the blade to cut strips in the carpet, about 3-4 feet wide so you can pull them easily and roll them up for easy removal and disposal. Start pulling after making the cuts. (Don't cut too far, you don't want to damage the floor below)

Step 3: Start rolling the carpet and use the duct tape to secure the roll so it doesn't come unrolled and tick you off when you are moving it around! (Not that this happened to me............)

Step 4: Once the carpet is removed, do the same thing with the carpet padding. Roll it up and secure it with the tape. 

Step 5: You are left with whatever flooring is under that carpet! At my house, its some pretty nice wood floor that needs a bit of refinishing. There are also tacks of nail strips and staples that need to come up...I talked about those in the last post. Oy. 

Carpet is officially up in all of the rooms in the house! There is some on the stairs still but we are leaving that until the painting is done so we don't damage the floors any more. 

Floors and demolition

I am finally moved out of my college apartment and done studying (for now...knock on wood!).  I'm living with my parents right now because Camp Ave is uninhabitable at the moment.  My parents have done a ton of work, but every little thing takes a lot of time and energy so it is still slow coming. 

The past few days I have been working on the floors upstairs.  We ripped out the carpet in two of the four bedrooms (other two will be ripped up soon). The wood underneath is beautiful. It is a darker tone than the downstairs and wider planks. Unfortunately, the previous owners decided to paint the walls without covering the wood floors, and there are paint splatters everywhere that will have to be dealt with. There are also a million staples and nail beds that we have had the joy of pulling up over the past few days. 

    (Below: Paint on the floor, nail beds, staple remove tools, oh my!)

 (Below: My loyal companion Gracie)

Also on the agenda is the room we refer to as "the brown room" due to the ugly brown carpet and heinous brown shelving unit.  My parents ripped out the carpet in there while I was gone, and I spent the day yesterday taking out the staples and nail beds from the carpet. 

I also decided to try to channel my inner-rehab-addict and take down that awful shelf. I made sure to wear my coolest safety goggles. 

The result? Not very far but better than nothing. In my defense, this thing feels like it's made out of steel! I will probably need help finishing this job.