Paint the weekend "Milk Pail"

Long time no post. What a busy weekend! I rushed home on Friday (after a stop at Home Depot, of course) so that we could go to our annual anniversary trip to The Daily Catch in the North End. Gwen had been sick with a fever, and Chuck had a bad headache, so I wasn't sure if we would go at all, but we did, and it was fun.

I didn't have much time to appreciate my new lighting, just enough to flip some switches, then we were out the door. But I made up for it on Saturday, putting all the bulbs in that I had bought at home depot. It is so great having lighting! It is so much more than I have ever had before - can lights, under the counter, pendants, etc. I didn't think I needed so much light, and I didn't even want the under the counter lights, but I've been using them the most. They will replace my previous "night light" which was the fluorescent over the sink, but now it's the fluorescent flanking the sink under the cabinets.

I haven't included any pictures on purpose. I am going to limit the amount of pictures I share from now until the big "reveal" because I think it will be more dramatic. And you know me, drama queen.

Also on Saturday, I made coffee in the kitchen! I have water and now electricity, so I was able to run the coffee maker. Ya Hoo! Then I skim-coated the half walls for the colonnade on the hall way side. They had really been chewed up in the work. Skim coating is hard!

From there I got to work on finishing the first coat of the paint that goes from the kitchen to the dining room and also spans the wall that the dining room and living room now share. Can I just say, KUDOS to the person who invented the plastic pour jug for paint! Maybe the same person who finally invented the upside down ketchup bottle :-) Seriously, I know I'm probably filling landfills more (although, I do think that the plastic jug is recyclable), what a joy to just be able to first shake the jug with the handle to mix up the paint, screw off the lid, pour it into the tray, and screw the lid back on. The one thing that would make it the dream option would be if the pour spout had a strainer so when the paint gets lumpy, it would strain the lumps out.

I only had 2/3 of the shared wall, the support beam, and around the patio door to do, so it wasn't too long. Lots of cutting in. On Sunday I sanded the walls in the hall, making a big, dusty mess. Then I put on the second coat from ~middle of dining room wall, shared wall, support beam, and around patio door. So, I finished the painting of the "Milk Pail" portion of the first floor. Now on to the rest of the living room and the hallway, including all the trim/woodwork on the colonnade.

In the middle of all this, we found out that our full, upright freezer is not working, so I had to triage a bunch of frozen food into the other refrigerator freezers and try to determine what to toss, what could be defrosted and just refrigerated, and what needs to be used right away. What a drag!

At the end of the day I "cleaned" the downstairs and the kitchen. I just couldn't take it anymore - there was so much dust and debris on the floors. I also needed to move the pile of construction stuff to the DR so that I can start painting the LR wall. I finished by cleaning the kitchen because although it's not a functioning kitchen, it had already gotten cluttered and messy.

As I was sweeping and washing the floors, I was hoping that maybe this would save some time or a step for the floor guys. I still don't know if they are coming tomorrow (probably not), but when they do come, someone would have to clean up all that crap before they start, right? They probably still will, but at least now it won't take them as long :-)

Ok, I am seriously beat. I'm going to bed.