On not falling down stairs

That paint job is disorienting; one needs all the help one can get not
to nose-dive from the attic.

P.S. - Thanks, T&M!!

Doors day 3

Well, sorry for the delay in posting - so much going on over the weekend, we didn't have time to report!

But, because Tim and I are that dedicated to our home renovation, we did spend a lovely, if late, evening on Friday night scraping paint off the three doors, with pretty awesome success:

Although there are a few areas left to touch up with the citri-strip, these babies are pretty much ready for sanding!   Now, they are safely stored in our storage unit, waiting for an evening when we can finish that touch up and get them sanded and prepped for staining.

We do have an open question:  We have a bunch of door and window hardware that we need to depaint.  Any recommendations for a good remover for that job?  Any tips and tricks for restoring 1870s metalwork?  Also, thoughts on what the appropriate finish for those?

Slow going

Sometimes going slow is a good thing. We like to meander off to whereever we're going by bike. Four times walking speed is about ideal for us, and we can (as you can see) haul just about everything we need. Here's the trailer loaded up with vacuum cleaner (we're prevacuuming with the shop vac, but following up with the home machine, and the home machine is better-equipped to get the cobwebs and dust out of the joists, down in the basement.






Sometimes, though, going slow is just slow. Below, the before-and-after for a 2-hour "soak" with Citristrip, and a half-hour of scraping.

Is it any wonder that during those two hours we got had a painter come by to measure and estimate?

Open Letter

Dear Mid-Century Homeowners,

Painting all your woodwork was NOT a good idea.

That is all.

Love,
The 21st century homeowner

Well, that job's jobbed

Before on the left. After on the right. (yeah, I should've taken the picture with the outlet tester proudly showing no red, two yellow lights!)



Puzzle for the day: how in the heck did they break the receptacle like that?

Practical question: what to do about the deep-mounted box? Shim out the outlet so it's flush with the faceplate?

Update: The setback really isn't deep enough to use a box extender (they're designed so you can put a new layer of drywall over an old wall and not remount the boxes 1/2"-5/8"). Evidently there are purpose-made spacers for this task, but there are craftier solutions: You can wrap a length of #14 copper wire around a small screwdriver to make a coil tube, or you can cut a drywall anchor to an appropriate length to use as a spacer. Our local hardware guy just recommended loosening the receptacle-to-box screws and tightening the faceplate-to-receptacle screw to pull the receptacle forward, but I'm leery of relying on the plastic faceplate as the main structural support for the receptacle. (Imagine 200 cycles of plugging and unplugging the vacuum cleaner; no way that such a solution would last.)

Because stripping paint all day wasn't good enough...

We decided to haul a bunch of doors back to the dorm and set them up to strip, since it's spring break and we've got our whole hallway to ourselves!  To protect the hall, we first laid down two layers of plastic, and then a thorough coating of old RedEyes.  Thanks, RedEye! 

We had dinner, packed the wee ones off to bed, turned up the volume on Part I of the season finale of Top Chef so we could hear it in the outside hall, and started off.   Here's where we are after the first coat of stripper has been applied and scraped:

Yes, we are insane and decided to do three at a time, since that's what will fit in our hallway.  Hey, we have twelve to do, and this is the only week we can spread out like this, so we're taking advantage of it!  If we can get these three done, we'll consider it a good week at the dorm.  Then, we have to figure out how we can continue with project door restore when we no longer can occupy entire hallways.....

If you are wondering what doors these are, - the two that are less-stripped (more paint) are 1) Varro's room to the hallway and 2) Varro's room to Nelly's room.   The last picture shows one of the library doors, which is 7 feet tall and super heavy, and also apparently much less painted, because that one is stripping beautifully! 

Also, for those of you who are looking for the right tools, these became my new best friends last night:  the two edge paint scraper (use cautiously, but it works like magic), and the plastic butter knife.  Yep, the last works like a charm on loose paint in the curvy bits of trim, and doubles to remove all the junk that accumulates on your magical two-edge paint scraper!  This project moved light-years faster when we started to arrive at the right tools.  A week and a half ago, we started Varro's room using two 1.5 inch plastic putty knives.  After wearing out 4 of those in one weekend and making little progress, we decided a new strategy was needed.  Tim did yesterday's house project with two metal putty knives, and he brought those home to work on the doors.  I tried out the two-edge, and it conveys a clear advantage over even the metal putty knives, as long as you don't get over-enthusiastic and start scraping off door!  (I did put a slight scrape in one of the doors, so word to the wise.....)

The last thing we need to find is an easier way to attack the curvy bits, so we're looking into that. Stay posted. 

Oh, and Nelly and I have been reading the BFG.  Having analyzed the story thus far, she reported last night that she knows two important things:

1)  Dreams come from your heart.
2)  You should blow good dreams from your heart at your friends. 

Late afternoon update

He's making progress: