Summer Overhall: Day 3 & 4 - Now we're getting somewhere!

Day 3 of the Make-over marathon was somewhat uneventful but very productive.  First, we got my living room put back together (for the most part at least).  Then we finished both of the stairway/hallways.  Lastly, I cleaned out the library (it was a mess!!) before calling it a night.

Here is what the living room looked like as we started in on the hallway - freshly painted, furniture moved back and albums back up.  Still keeping blankets and sheets over the furniture so we don't get paint all over it though!

And this is where I left off with the hallway yesterday:

 

And this is the hallway all painted and tape/drop cloth free:

 

Here is a freshly painted stairway down to the library (you can start to see the mess):

 

And here is the library pre-cleaning (yikes):

There were lawn chairs from 4th of the July weekend, my suitcases from our Europe trip, a box of stuff from school, the vacuum, a RockBand drum set, extra lamps, and obviously all of my (many many) books...what a mess!  But after a few hours of moving this here and putting that there...

A library with a lot less clutter but still way too many books (if there is such a thing!).  

[You can't see hardly any books from this shot but there are four bookcases and two sets of build in shelves full of books that are sort of hidden in this pic!]

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Waking up on Day 4, I felt really great about our progress so far.  We had already painted a lot and managed to keep everything pretty cleaned up (picking up each day, putting the furniture back, replacing outlet covers, etc) as we went along and the library looked much better.   I still wasn't to stoked about how the gray color I'd picked was turning out on the walls - it reads a lot more bluish than the gray that I'd wanted...  but by the end of the day I we would finally be getting into something turning out just as I'd hoped.

Day 4 ending up being time to finish some odds and ends.   First, Dad started putting up shelves in my hallway closet.  A lonely hamper and the shelves, ready to be installed:

 

 Freshly installed shelves - so so happy for the extra storage!!

 

Of course I immediately had to test out the storage capacity with some blankets and towels.

So excited to have finally hallway storage!  This closet has been full of boxes of towels and sheets so far - not optimal.  Now I've got plenty of room for them on their own shelves.  Also, eventually I'll put up a curtain back up as a "door" once I find one to match the new color (the old one doesn't look right).  So stay tuned for the new "door" and probably a completely full closet!

Next, I tackled a small project - painting the cover on the doorbell....thingy?!  Here it is drawing attention to itself in the hallway before (the ugly brown box on the wall) and an up close shot:

I took it outside to give it a healthy coat of white spray paint.

[For those who read my FB status about the snake dropping down from the ceiling of the garage right next to me Indian Jones -style -- It was while painting this stupid  cover!!  And I thought it was going to be an easy project! ]

After a it dried, we got it right back up in "new" hallway.  Here is an up close picture and a shot of the newly white cover in the the newly gray hallway:

It still stands out some, but it looks much better than than it did before in the brown.  

So with two projects down, I got Mom to help with the last project of Day 4 - the "accent"/"island" wall [obviously I don't know what to call this odd wall].  Here is the wall (still with that awful maroon color) before we started painting:

And here is the wall with several layers of primer:

Starting with basically a blank canvas, I decided to try something eye-catching - a chevron pattern using white and gray.  So, we made a stencil to trace on the walls.  Here is Mom, tracing away.

Then I carefully taped the lines of the gray parts, remembering that the tape would be outside gray areas and inside white areas and looking strange when finished.

I dumped some gray paint into a disposable plastic cup so I wouldn't have to drag a full gallon of paint around.  I also tired (and LOVED) a trick I found here via Pinterest - wrapping a rubber band around the cup to wipe off excess paint and letting it drip back into the cup instead of it dripping down the outsides:

So I took my rubber band -wrapped cup and  I started painting in the gray parts:

Mom was very excited to take the tape off, so we anxiously waited for the paint to dry some before ripping it off and letting our hard work and effort shine through:

After getting all the tape down and the covers secured to the wall again, we put the mirror from this post and the table from this post back in place et voila!  

 

Finally something was going exactly as I envisioned and things were coming together!  I'm in love with this wall now and to make sure you all are too, here is a before and after.  Love away.

                  

Tomorrow, we are going to start priming the bedroom (trying to cover the ridiculous shade of green the previous owners choose - they picked the darkest colors ever!) and get started in the library.