And it is done...

One evening towards the end of summer, while out in the front yard looking at the house, a thought came to me about how great it would be to paint the house.  It was looking a bit tired.  Unhappy in a strange sort of way I thought.  I even thought how fun it would be to do it ourselves and even save some money.  Who really likes spending tons of money on painters and then just have to go behind them and re-do things any way, right?  

Sometimes I shouldn't think about such things. 

Paint colors were tried out on the side of the house.  It only took me nearly a month to decide.  Back and forth, back and forth.  It was really sad how the one side of the house looked during this time with all the different colors it had on it.  We finally picked two colors (the two in the middle) and the trim color.  A very fast trip was made to get all the paint one afternoon before I even had a chance to change my mind and go into the debate mode again.

It was the middle of September and I was thinking the weather will be perfect.  Not too hot, not too rainy.  Just perfect for painting.  It will only take a couple of weeks with us doing it ourselves.  I was so excited!

The first couple of days were fine.  Then the rain came, the temps dropped below 50.  So not perfect.  The house was looking all patchy from all the starts and stops we had to do because of the weather.  Awesome.  Our friend even came over to help Glenn with some of the high parts of the house.  Didn't seriously think I was getting on a tall ladder?  That's funny.

But that is when all the fun started.  Our friend used to build homes before the big crash.  He knows things.  He sees things.  He saw things that we have never noticed before.  Things that really should be fixed and not left alone.  Things that were never done right when the house was built.  So we were buying more than just paint.

Awesome, again.

Fixing, painting.  Fixing, painting.

So much fun.

Then we did the whole window thing.  Which really was awesome!  I can't help but smile still when I look out that wonderful new thing.

But after all the scraping, priming, painting, cutting lumber, nailing, bracketing, etc., this little place is looking happy and spiffy again.  I smile when I pull into the driveway again.  All the work the last month and a half was well worth it for just the smiles alone that it gives me.

I even picked out a new color for the front door.  Happy just can't explain how much I like it.  An aqua front door!  Totally out of the norm for me and I'm loving it.

Even the back door got a new spiffy color.  Loving it too!

Long story short:

Comments (by the neighbors) were made about a joking suggestion on the back door color.  I was happy to paint it white like the trim.  Glenn was up in the air about it.  He didn't really care either way.  But after the said comment was made, the door definitely went Crush Orange.  Glenn had no choice in the matter.  I was nearly tempted to paint that whole side of the house orange because of the above mentioned comment.

Even the deck got all spruced up, shored up, etc.  It will be tough deciding where to sit outside when Spring comes around again.  Hate decisions like that.  The only thing left to paint is the ceiling of the back patio.  It will wait till Spring.

It was lots of work to get everything done before the weather turned.  I didn't think we were going to make it.  So well worth it though.  I won't have to go behind anyone anytime soon.  We saved money even with all the little fixes here and there.  And I have become friends with everyone down at our local hardware store.  Even more so than before.  So much so that they when they found out who built our house (not their favorite person in town) they made sure we got all the supplies we needed fast.  Kind of felt like they felt sorry for us and needed to help any way they could.  Free delivery for all the big stuff is a fabulous service they have if you live in town.  I walk in the door now to get every day type of stuff and who ever is up front calls out my name.  I kind of feel like Norm from Cheers.  Strange.  Needless to say I will be delivering a big batch of cookies down there in the very near future.  They were a BIG help during this entire project.

Now I'm just going to sit back, veg out and enjoy the weekend and all its first Fall storm weather it will be bringing us.

Now that's awesome!

~*~

kar