Humble Home Progress 4

Today was a frustrating day...little painting, mostly small, but necessary tasks that were time consuming. We had a "rent-a-husband" guy from Ace Hardware come out to give us a quote on putting a small fence through the back yard to fence off a dog run, and a quote on installing 3 new toilets, and on painting the high walls in the living room/foyer. His price was basically $65/hr, which makes me hesitant...I mean, wouldn't he work as slow as possible? idk. We decided to at least attempt the paint ourselves, and we will probably have the Ace guy replace the toilets and put up the fence later on.

   First thing I did was finish up painting the master bath--all except for one wall, where we took out the lighting fixture (it was that ugly strip of round bulbs..like all 80/90's bathrooms had..you know, the "im a movie star" dressing room lights.) So after removing that, we saw there were 2 large holes to be patched. Still waiting for it to dry so I can sand it--so that wall will be painted tomorrow.

   I spent a lot of the day doing correctional crap...I am astounded by the previous owner's..not only the dirtiness, but the carelessness--they obviously took off outlet covers to paint, but didn't care about paint getting on the sink, tiles, bath, shower baseboards and trim....it literally looks like wherever some paint dripped or ran, they decided to just paint another line. No matter what tools/sprays I used, I couldn't get the paint off the grout/caulk in the tile, so after all that trouble, I decided to just put a thick bead of caulk. It's good enough, but i have to touch up some of my paint along the edge (came off from scrubbing).
Befores:
 The pictures make the paint look more green, but it's the same color as the accent in the master.

















They painted part of the door frame too. These baseboard pics don't look as bad as they did in person...looked like a dog continually peed on them, and scratched them up. And apparently this bathroom has been painted 3 different colors before...all of them leaving messes somewhere.














I patched up these holes and we bought new light fixtures...to do tomorrow after sanding and painting.

This orange paint just made the room look horrible after all that work...

After:

Retouched and caulked:

 Caulking was not easy..what a mess. Ended up using tape too.---need to touch this little bit up at the top of the shower though.

 I'll do better pictures when it's all done.

 Doesn't this make you wanna jump in and shower!? I wonder what these people looked like...yuck.

Then we took a break to go to Lowes and get more miscellaneous stuff...John bought some replacement planks for the back fence (to keep those big dogs from eating Tyrone or Shmoopy.) Then he got some top soil and bricks to fill in holes where shmoopy was digging under the house..
  And all day John took on the huge task of taping the big walls....using the new extended ladder..he was nervous...I was nervous...but he did it! He only let me show this picture if I blocked out his body lol. He had his shirt off because it was so hot and humid today and he was sweating bullets up there!

Then I took down the living room curtains...They had 8 anchors per window...AND they drilled right into the METAL frame supporting the window...which explains the cracks and uneven-ness of the walls surrounding the holes....Why would they continue drilling through the metal frame (instead of moving one inch up or out..) when they saw the walls bending and breaking?! It was a bitch to get those anchors out in one piece. Filled the holes--will sand tomorrow. 

Tomorrow's task:

I hate the bathrooms...always find unfinished work. Tomorrow's first tasks will be:
-sand hole patches in master bath
-touch up baseboards under/around vanity
-paint main (mirror) wall
-attach lighting fixture
-sand hole patches in Living room
-paint kitchen, start cutting living room
-clean out bath of debris
-call plumbing...
So, after all the work when we were getting ready to leave, I brought all my brushes to be cleaned in the big kitchen sink...I went to move the faucet head to rinse out the other sink, and something popped and water sprayed everywhere....Everything in this house is retarded. We got mail today saying we have an automatic 1 yr home warranty so I called to schedule a technician to check the sink out-it says we have a $100 deductible, so I think it's worth it. Pretty much everything needs to be replaced...and we probably will, little by little. At the price we paid, it will still be worth it.

John's tasks:
-finish taping up foyer/living room
-take out master toilet, plug hole (he's an expert at that ha..ha..)
-tape up master toilet room
-spray paint pantry shelves, linen shelves
-begin cutting kitchen
-remove washer/dryer (put in garage)
-tape utility room
-remove lights from half bath.
-replace light switches/dirty plates.

And the "wanna-do, but don't know if we can afford yet..in time or money" list:
-replace all door knobs
-replace locks
-replace blinds
-get new windows
-get air ducts cleaned/checked
-install garage opener
-new mailbox
-buy new bathroom mirrors
-remove all doors and repaint/spray them
-clean out all drawers and shelves and put down clean liners.

will think of more tomorrow I'm sure.