Clean Crisp White

I love white closets. If you have a big walk in closet then it should be painted like a room otherwise I believe they should be white.

After texturing Bill sprayed everything with a drywall primer. Now it's time to add the white.

 Doesn't the coat closet look great with clean crisp white walls? Now to add the boot shelves, closet rods, door, and scarf /glove organizer and it will be finished.

The Industrial Look

The Industrial look is very popular right now in home decor.  We have that look now in the existing Pantry. When we took the cabinets out to put them in the new Pantry we still needed somewhere to put our kitchen stuff that's used daily. So we moved shelves that will ultimately go into the garage or workshop in to hold stuff.

Metal shelving and canvas baskets, we are so on the cutting edge of design!

Less Yellow

One more night, one more project done.

Moved more cabinets from existing pantry into the new one.

 Pulled out the bottom units to move them to their new home.

 Into their new place. Now to add the shelves and really get boxes unpacked.

Yellow is getting less and less.

Moving In

The Pantry is a little more finished every day. As one thing is done I move stuff in. No waiting for it all to get done; I am way too anxious.


A crock pot put on the storage shelf over the coat closet. Only things I rarely use will go up here, it may be a spot only Bill will be able to get to. Even with the six foot ladder it will be difficult to get to anything that is put over the freezer.

 The freezer is in its new home. Tucked into the corner. Everything that goes in tones the yellow down. I think it is actually going to be the bright and cheerful color I wanted and not too overpowering.

 These cabinets are being moved from the existing pantry to the new one. I hope the super bright yellow doesn't make these cabinets look too orange.

 Putting the upper cabinets in first so we aren't having to lift and hold them over the lower ones. Using painters tape to mark level and studs.

Uppers are in and are being filled. These are being used for non food items. Things like paper and plastic goods, bubbles, and dog treats. We don't have a puppy at the moment but we have a wonderful grand dog who comes to visit and needs his treats. Most people will be surprised to learn that yes I actually have plastic cups and paper plates, there are times that they are the best things to use. I am such an everyday environmentalist that we use cloth napkins at every meal and cloth rags not paper towels for cleaning.

Floor Time

Walls painted, light in, electrical plates on , time to lay the floor.

This is the part that makes my head hurt and makes me eternally grateful for Bill's mathematical mind. He laid out a few courses of the tile and then got out the tape measure and started figuring. He needs to start at the back of the room and end up at the doorway. So he has to figure out what size to cut the very first tiles that go against the back wall so he will end with full tiles in the doorway. I get dizzy just thinking about how to do something like that.

 Bill, enjoys passing his knowledge along to the most wonderful grandchildren there are. Wyatt thinks like Bill and they work together so well.

Time to add water to the thin set and get started.

Our nine year old, Wyatt, laying tile. This is a sight that makes me so happy. Everyone should have a basic knowledge of how to do these things even if you never do it yourself; you know what to expect from contractors.

 Amazing! Full tiles at the doorway, his math skills triumphed once again. In the back you can see some weird colored tiles. We are putting cabinets along that wall so you will never see the floor. These were left here by the previous owner so we used them and saved by not having to buy that tile.

Family Heirloom

My brother and his wife bought a house almost 40 years ago and replaced one of the light fixtures almost immediately. They didn't like it at all. My Mom took it home thinking she would do something with it. It has sat out in the grainery all this time collecting dust. It was perfect for our new Pantry. After painting and freshening, it is time to go up on the ceiling.

How much fun! 

Daisy light in the Pantry.

Cheery and Bright

I wanted the Pantry to be a bright and cheery place so I chose yellow for the walls. Lemon Zest to be specific. Oh My Goodness, it is yellow. Yellow with a capital Y.

 Once the cabinets, deep freeze, and all the shelves with food go in the color should be just about right.

Cutest Painters Ever

Grandkids were over for the weekend and it was time to paint.

 Everyone learned the importance of wearing a respirator.
 The boys had their paint clothes on and Mallory said her Hello Kitty shirt was play clothes so if it got dirty it was okay.

Next thing to learn is that you start your motion before you pull the trigger and you continue your motion after you have released the trigger. That is not an easy skill to master. That is what gives an even coverage.

Minor Flaw

The light for the Pantry is a little small for the space so we added a celing medallion to make it seem larger. And we like medallions; at our last house every bedroom and the entry had medallions.

 After painting it the same white as the light it was time to go up.

Oops, either the medallion is not perfectly level or the ceiling is not perfectly flat. I am sure it is the medallion our construction would never not be right.   You can see a shadow on the right that shows the little bit of a gap. No one else would probably ever see the gap but we would know it was there. Bill can fix anything that isn't perfect.

Here he used the ladder and a bar that ratchets to the length you need and scrap lumber. He put the adhesive on the medallion and this provided the pressure needed to hold it flat to the ceiling until it cured. The bar is one I got him for Christmas several years ago to hold things in place in the bed of his pick up. I don't think he has ever used it for that purpose but he finds all kinds of other uses for it.

Better Than TV

Who needs a television to watch. Our grandkids get to come to our house and watch a concrete mixer go round and round. It's pretty sad that we all get really excited getting to things like this.

The best part was when it was poured out; it looked and sounded like body waste falling into the wheelbarrow. How much fun is that for 9 and 7 year old boys.

Another Step Done

The walls are looking more and more finished. Bill went home and sprayed 5 and a half gallons of primer on the walls we textured. Ran out with about 10 feet left to do in the West Wing hallway.

 Next coat in the Pantry will be the yellow. Can't wait to see how this room turns out. I think I am more excited about it than any other room in the house.

The back hallway won't get any more paint until we have built out the rest of the house. I don't know what color we'll be using and there is no reason to waste paint or time since we would be redoing it. Bill added color to the primer so it is a nice soft brown color. He went to our store of left over paint cans and started throwing color in. He did a very good job.

Painting the ceiling medallion to go on the Pantry ceiling. The light fixture we are using is a little small for the room so we are adding the medallion to boost it.

Neccessity is the Mother of Invention

When you are texturing your ceilings the mud goes everywhere. It covers everything within it's reach; including your lights. We wanted to have the lights on but didn't want the hot bulbs to get covered with the cool mud. My husband is always thinking outside the box. He is the one you want to be with if there is a Zombie Apocalypse, he will save everyone with just a ball of twine and some duct tape.

He created this nifty little tool with stuff literally out of the trash.

A piece of scrap OSB, a foam cup, and painters tape.

It covers the light bulb for the short time the hopper is spraying mud where the bulb is. Ingenious!

Still Leveling

The concrete guys worked on getting the garage floor to level out the elevation difference between the two buildings. You can only do so much before it is evident that there is something strange.

With the walls up in the living space that was built in the garage we can fool everyone into believing the floors are level.

First order of business is buying a concrete mixer. We have always wanted one. Well, I have always wanted one. Bill lays the concrete while I am the one who always got the privilege of using a wheelbarrow and hoe to mix the concrete. Now we have the tool to do it for us. We will be using this baby a lot as we progress. We will need to cut out the Residence floor to lay additional sewer and water lines. After installing the new lines we will need to put concrete back in where we just took it out.

Bill poured  the hallway floor first. The floor is now level with the Residence floor and you can't tell that is is higher than the garage floor because there is a doorway between the two floors. It is so funny after living for a year with the difference in elevation we find ourselves almost tripping on the level floor. Our muscles have memorized that you have a 2 inch step down or step up and our minds and legs still try to do the memorized movement.

 

He poured the concrete in the Pantry along the side one day and finished it the next. He needed to be able to get in with his leveling boards to be sure everything was how it should be.

The Cleaning Closet floor is not leveled as of now because we suspect there may be some water seeping in from somewhere and we don't want to hide a problem before correcting it.

How Much Mud Does a Mudder Mud

The last six weeks we have been taping and mudding the garage wall, back hallway, West Wing hall, Pantry and Cleaning Closet. Yesterday we textured the walls.

The walls have received 4 coats of mud. Each coat goes wider that the previous one to smooth out the joints. After each coat has dried you sand the mud. The first coats you sand to get the chunks off. The last coat you sand it all smooth then wipe the walls down with a damp sponge to get all the sanding dust off. Then you are ready to start texturing.

 Garage wall

Pantry walls

Next step is to mix the mud and add water to make it the consistency of pancake batter. You use a drill with a paddle on the end of it to mix it up.

 All Bill's building drawings are about to be covered up. No building plans mean you just draw what you are going to build next on the wall.

 We are starting the texturing in the coat closet so we can decide exactly what style of texture we want. The beauty of texturing is that after you have put it on you can scrape it off, if it hasn't dried yet, and start over if you don't like it.

 Bill has to be a pretzel to get the ceiling of the small closet sprayed.

The part you put the mud in is called the hopper and it sprays our through a  nozzle. It is powered by the air compressor. This gets the texture on the wall without having to do it all with your arm muscles.

 After spraying we decided we (me) wanted the texture smooshed down and swooped. I use very technical terms. The amazing part is that when I say these words Bill knows exactly what it is I am expressing.  After 39 years of marriage he really does understand me.

 This is what the texture looks like before the smooshing and swooping.

 Going high in the pantry. This is extra storage for who knows what above the coat closet. We didn't know the Pantry walls would be 10 feet until the framers were finished. You can never have enough places to stick stuff.

 These are all the boxes of mud we have gone through in the last month and a half. That's 12 boxes of mud going up on the walls.

 

 It's amazing with just the texture on the walls they start looking finished. You don't see the drywall joints and everything is almost the same color. Now on to laying the tile floor, putting up the shelf supports, painting the walls, installing the shelves and the cabinets, and putting up the light. Then we will be ready to move in the freezer, stock the shelves and unpack almost all the kitchen boxes.