Painting The House!

Here's the next chapter in of the story our house! 

The painter was supposed to show up on July 2nd to paint the window wraps inside the house. I was at home and no painter showed up. I texted Michael and he contacted the painter. The painter told him he didn't show up because pressure washing had not been included in the bid that the contractors gave him. Not sure why that mattered at that moment since he wasn't going to be doing the pressure washing that day and when Michael looked at the bid yes it did in fact include the pressure washing. By this point Michael was done! He wanted the money so we could get this taken care of THIS summer! This yahoo was taking forever and we just wanted it done...plus we wanted someone that was going to treat us and our house right. 

Thankfully the contractors had submitted another invoice to the insurance company for the correct amount to do the painting so there was more money to work with then they had originally told us. Since we were done dealing with them we also told them to not worry about the blinds we would just take the money they had allotted, buy them and install them ourselves. We were so ready to part ways with the contractors and get our house finished! By this point we had been dealing with this claim for 18 months!!!

Michael and I thought about contacting the painting company he used to work with, but in the end we just decided to do the work ourselves. Who else is going to take better care of your house than yourself. Michael had already had vacation time lined up for us to go to his Family Reunion in late July so instead of going to that we decided to stay home and paint. I was thinking of going to the Family Reunion for one day with the kids, but in the end the Family Reunion ended up getting canceled due to Michael's Uncle Bob needing to have surgery so it all worked out. 

I took the kids down to my parents house on Wednesday, July 24th. They were going to spend 4 nights with them so we could focus on the house. 

Thursday morning Michael got up and started prepping the house by masking everything. The Sunday prior to painting we had had a BBQ with friends and one of them mentioned he had a paint sprayer we could borrow. Michael has a paint sprayer it's just not working right now and it takes a couple of weeks for them to get repaired and we didn't have that kind of time. We were planning on renting one, but when this friend offered to let us borrow his so that was great.

Unfortunately, that morning we checked it out and noticed it's more of a small job sprayer. The back of our house is 3.5 stories high and the hose wouldn't even be long enough for Michael to paint that. We looked into renting one and then Michael called Sherwin Williams and ultimately decided to buy a new one. When you rent a machine you never know the condition it's going to be in and if they cleaned it out well enough. Also you end up feeling rushed to get it back in time and then you fork out hundreds of dollars and have to give it back. This way Michael didn't feel rushed and we've already used it to spray the house, the fence and the doors. Plus we now have it so we can loan it out to friends when they need it. 

Getting ready to lay down the tarps. 

As well as painting the house we were also going to paint the fence and the mailbox area. 

The first bit of color going on! 

The week prior while Michael was at work I had order all the paint and went and picked it up and all the supplies he needed. Of course that didn't mean that I didn't have to run to Sherwin Williams almost every single day!!! 

Michael sure didn't think he'd ever be painting again. It's been almost a decade!!! 

The wall that started it all!!! 

By the end of the first day Michael had sprayed the front and south sides and part of the back of the house. When I was looking at the house like this I kept telling myself it was beautiful mainly talking myself in to it. I loved the color, but it was dark!!! We have always had lighter colors on the house so it was a bit shocking. 

Moving onto the back side that's 3.5 stories high. Thank goodness Michael kept all his extension ladders. First thing he needed to do was mask off all the windows. 

This is the wall on the deck. I was the one that masked the floor and put the tarps down. I also used the plastic and masked the Hemlock that's on the ceiling. We definitely didn't want to get paint on that. 

During this portion of our house project I didn't really feel like I was that much help...not like when we built the deck. There wasn't much I could do except run to the store or refill Michael's tea. It was mainly all on Michael's shoulders. On Friday, July 26th that's when I decided to try to find things that I could do in order to take some things off his to do list. 

I got a scraper and some steel wool and I scraped away at the brick under the mailbox and then I repainted it. Later on Michael came and painted the mailbox itself white. It was cream colored. 

I also removed all the masking on the house. Once the masking was off the windows the house felt and looked so much better. Seeing the white trim really brightened it up even if it hadn't actually been painted white yet. 

By the end of the second day Michael had completely painted the whole house. 

The third day we sprayed the fence and then he started working on trim. 

And touching up areas that were masked off and needed a little attention. 

Yes our house is really tall in the back! 

It's a bit scary when he's up so high! 

On Sunday Michael sprayed the front door and the basement door. I was busy painting the underneath side of the deck. That was a lot of work...I calculated that it took me a total of 12 hours over 3 days to paint it all. Michael did help a little bit, but it was mainly me. It really did turn out nice though being the Fired Brick color. 

This is actually one of my favorite pictures of our house. It's an angle that I've never taken a picture from before, but I love the way the deck looks and the combination of colors. It's so pretty! 

The deck is gorgeous and it's not even stained yet! 

I'm absolutely in love with the blue!!! 

During the week while Michael was at work I was busy with some finishing touches. I repainted the two red chairs and Jack and I even painted the bench red since it was green. I love my patriotic house!!!! 

A few days later Ella, Zeke and I went to War-Mart for a few things and we found these cut outdoor accent pillows on clearance! 

I love love love how it all turned out and the best part is it's finished!!!! 

The only things left to do now is paint the window wraps on the inside of the house, but I think we will wait until fall to do that. 

As for the blinds I ordered those online and decided that I would try to install those as well. 

This is how our rooms have looked for months.

Of course when I got the brackets up I realized that I incorrectly measured for the blinds. So I loaded them up and took them back to Lowe's and got the correct size. 

We got the exact same blinds we had before...the faux white wood blinds. Except now they don't come with pull strings you just push them up and pull them down. They are really nice and now I'm a total pro at installing blinds I can do one window in 15 minutes flat! :) 

And now that it's not a blanket that's stapled to the wall I can actually let natural light into our rooms. It's amazing! 

And now the windows on the second floor look so nice with white blinds in them instead of all these different colorful blankets! 

Next up is installing the storm door that I bought...it's just glass so it won't hid our beautiful front door, but it will make it so I can leave the door open, get some fresh air and not let in all the flies. Speaking of flies we still don't have window screens. The contractors have them and we are hoping to get them soon. Once they give us the screens and get one more thing figured out with the final invoice we should be completely finished and can finally part ways. I'm so ready!!! 

We also have new garage doors on order...they should be here by August 18th. They are white with little windows on the top. I can't wait for all that natural light in the garage. I'm also thinking of revamping our posts to be more like chunky columns. That's going to be a bit outside my skill set since I've never really used the nail gun or the table saw, but Michael will teach me and then I'll get started. I have one more post about the staining the deck and then hopefully my next update will be the final update to this saga!