Repainting Thing 1's Room, part 1...

Time flies. It seems we have been in our house for 19 years (!). Hard to believe. That being said, we have repainted various rooms at various times over the years, but we are at the point where we feel like most of the rooms have been in their current colors for a while now. So...time to go on a painting binge.

Julia's room has had yellowish white walls for a bunch of years. She and mom decided that her room could use crown molding and a repaint. The yellowish walls would be replaced with three walls of a neutral beige color and one accent wall of a bright dark pink (behind her headboard). After I installed crown molding, of course.

Step 1 was to install the crown molding, spackle and sand, and then caulk everything. All moldings and trim were then painted in a bright white semi-gloss (two coats).

Step 1 - Crown molding and trim

Step 2 was lots of cutting in (in two coats). Beige on the walls. Brighter white ceiling paint. And dark hot pink ("Exuberant Pink") on the one wall. This is the tedious and time consuming stage, but the prep work and careful cutting in will make the final steps of rolling out the wall colors (and the end result) much better.

Step 2 - Cutting in everything

Step 3 - Two coats of brighter white ceiling paint. The original was a gray-tinged white (an MAB paint called "Arctic White" if I recall). The new paint is a Behr "ceiling paint". The difference is noticeable.

Step 3 - Painting the ceiling

Step 4 (shorthand version) - Two coats of "Casa Blanca" Sherwin Williams color on three walls, and a first coat of Sherwin Williams "Exuberant Pink" on the one wall. The dark pink is going to take several coats to go over the old light colored wall, as can be seen by the roller marks.

Step 4 - one coat on the walls, one coat on the accent wall

To be continued...

Fourth of July Weekend, Poconos

Amp has made some really good friends in her years on the costume crew for the Performing Arts Association, and two of the families have houses up in the Poconos, one on Crystal Lake and one on Lake Naomi.

With no other particular plans for the holiday weekend, and a pair of invites to stop by and join in on some holiday parties, we decided to book a room at the new Kalahari water park resort hotel nearby and spend the weekend.

Crystal Lake at Sunset

The water park at the Kalahari is already huge, and there are additional sections still under construction. When complete in 2017 it will be double the size it is now, and will be the largest indoor water park in the world. Needless to say, the kids loved that part of the weekend.

Equally enjoyable were the two evenings at the two different lakes for barbecues, in the company of 4 or 5 families from the Drama crew.

Sky on Fire at Crystal Lake

The food was good, as was the company, the conversation and the scenery. There is always something about water...

Having started with a day off on Friday, we left for home at around 10pm on Sunday, and were home and in bed by 12:30am. The Fourth of July holiday itself will be in the comfort of our own home (and there is a large pot of short ribs braising in the oven as I type - barbecuing is the typical meal of the day of course, but we are barbecued out).