Back in Business

Painting season is upon us once more. Last summer came to a close with just a little more than 1/4 of the house finished. My HOA likes to have started projects finished within a year, which pretty much means if any judgy neighbor walks around my house, they are going to realize I have my work cut out for me.

I'm trying to work out just how I can make serious painting progress with two kids home with me this summer. I could have them help. That sounds fun if I want more paint on them and on the lawn than on the right parts of the house. I could ask a neighbor to watch them from time to time. Which would get irritating pretty quick for my neighbors. I could paint during nap time, and give them heavy doses of Benadryl. While this has merit.... okay, no.... no, it doesn't really have merit.

Alright, so I have a few kinks to work out. The point is, painting needs to get back on track.

The good news is, it began this weekend with some power washing... back to being armed and dangerous!

... well... only if you happen to be a sploodge of bird doo on my siding...

Progress!

Oh, the things I have failed to report! Really, you'd be almost as ashamed of me as I am.

I do have some great news. My parents took pity upon me! Hearing about hubby's travel plans, and sensing a month's gap of serious progress in the painting project without help, mom and dad came to stay for 10 days to help paint and watch the children! Well, it was eventful, as always, complete with a horrible concussion for my six-year old, but fantastic progress was made.

As you can see, by the time my parents departed, all that remained was the section above the large lower level windows. That area was still rather tightly occupied by our small Robin family.

My folks really were a huge help. Yes, they spent some time with brushes in their hands, but largely their contributions were in other areas- minding the kids, readying food and drinks, coming up with ingenious and terrifying ways to paint the high up parts. I never really imagined I'd be convinced to climb a ladder on a sloped roof, but there didn't seem too many options.

Dad did as much brainstorming as he could to get things as safe as possible. A metal wire lashed the base of the ladder to each of two eye hooks which were solidly planted into the heavy trim boards. It lent a bit more security to the situation. Well, maybe it was just psychological. When a heavy gust blew, I still shuddered a little.

At one point, there was a squabble between a squirrel and our Robins. Squirrel must have gone too close to the nest. I heard manic flapping, and panicked a bit as the squirrel ran across the roof towards my ladder, with Robbins in hot pursuit. Could they have shifted my tender ladder's footing? Fortunately, my nervous screaming struck the squirrels attention, and he changed direction. Whew.

You'll all be happy to hear that mommy Robin, donned "Robbie" by the house minors, produced for herself four little fledglings, all of whom departed this residence approximately three weeks ago. Their survival and successes no longer critical to this establishment, we wished them the best, and power-washed that brick ledge free of bird remnants. I'm quite sure I saw Robbie hopping around my aspens the day after I removed her nest. She had a sort of "what the hell!?" look about her. My twinge of remorse passed quickly.

So the front of the house is so very close to being completed. Really, that's the most important part. Alright, I guess I still have a good 3/4 of the work still to do, or close to it, but the rest of the siding will not be nearly as difficult as the rough cut cedar. I don't know. I'm almost tempted to just stop now. I mean, who is really going to look at the rest of the house anyway???

Setbacks and Delays

The power washing left the house sparkly! Well, for a couple of weeks. By now it could pretty much use it all over again. We'll do what we must, but for the time being, I have been trying to carry on with next steps.

To scrape the house, we purchased an insane 3 or 5 or 47 in one tool that seems capable of just about any household chore short of babysitting my kids. But we haven't used it. Why? Because it's too much tool for the job. Turns out I'm not actually trying to strip my house of all prior paint before repainting it, so my 52 in one tool is too much muscle. Instead, we've scraped with a plain old wire brush. It has seemed to do the job.

One can of primer looks like it is probably going to do the job too, since I am only priming areas of bare wood... or, as I look carefully at my siding... bare cardboard. Wow, it's pathetic material. Moving on.

I find that my house is growing. It seems that every time I think I have completed all of the priming on one side of my house, I walk by it the following day to find an entire section of bare wood (or cardboard) that must have sprouted overnight (there's no WAY I could have missed that much, could I?!).

The caulking is quite another issue. I caulked. It cracked within a week. I caulked again with a fresh tube. It cracked again within a week. Colorado has a way harsh climate, but something had to work. My husband informed me that my dad (the DIY guru) swears by Marine 5200 caulk. Yes, marine as in, for use on boats. WATERTIGHT. So. I've caulked a third time. So far, so good. I am not going to bash products here that I find aren't working for me, I'm just going to tell you what IS working for me, and so far the 5200 is doing great. Added bonus: in the event of Biblically proportioned flood, PARTY AT MY PLACE!

Most of the scraping, priming, and caulking is done. I would say I'm at 75% completion right now, after hubby's help with caulking this past weekend.

Of course, we did find another slight obstacle this weekend.


"Did you see the nest?" Todd called to me from outside on Saturday morning.
Can you see it? Right there atop the brick pillar? Would you like a closer look?



Well, I can't rightly displace a little growing family! This is going to set me back some, I think.

Power Washing

Alright, well, there has been a large gap in my writing here. Though not as great as the writing gap implies, there has also been a large gap in my painting adventures. Those of you who are likely reading, understand many of my obstacles: small children, school year coming to a close, the many snowstorms of a Colorado springtime. I've also been editing a community newsletter most recently. These things slow a mom down. I could berate myself, and admit to great shame in the delay of my house painting, but the truth of it is it's all part of the process. Life doesn't stop just because you want to do something big. I knew that when I bit off this mouthful. You want to paint your house when you're a mom of small kids, and there's cooking, and cleaning, and laundry, and yard work? Maybe you do or don't have a job? Maybe you do or don't volunteer at the school or in other local organizations? It's going to be a time consuming ordeal any way you cut it, if you’re not paying someone else to hurry up about it.

It's not as though there has been no progress, however. So, it’s update time.

Color decided and homeowners association approved, it was time for me to take the next big step and power wash my siding. The Home Depot down the road offers a power washer rental for something like $60 for 4 hours. I did my power wash prep- moved furniture and toys away from the house and took down all of the screens from the windows- then dashed to Home Depot to squeeze the power wash in before a late day lightning storm. I opted for the least powerful washer, and I went for a big bottle of simple green cleanser to go with it. It turns out I only used the simple green on the front of the house. I didn’t notice a great deal of messy gunk coming off, so I didn’t think it made much difference. In the interest of time, I went with a simple power rinse over the shampoo and rinse. I don’t regret it yet.

The tricky part of the power washing seemed to be reaching high. Safety disclosures are sure to inform you that you should not trigger a strong propulsion device of any sort from a position off of the ground. Physics is rather tricky in this way. The equal and opposite reaction of the power washer power washing could send a person to gravity’s mercy. One thing with which you will soon become intimately familiar is my fear of heights. I, for one, was not going to risk being thrown from a ladder. My washing job will suffer? Fine with me. I’ll carry a sponge up later if it’s that bad.

Now, there are two things that I recognized as errors once I returned my power washer rental. First, I probably could have climbed on a roof for some portion of the second story and done a better job higher up without crashing off of a ladder. Second, after I returned my rental, a neighbor (and dear friend) informed me that I was a dope because she had a power washer I could have borrowed.

So, your lessons at my expense: power wash from rooftops as best as you can safely reach, and for heavens sakes talk to your neighbors about the tools they might be willing to loan you BEFORE you go wasting close to $100 at the big orange home improvement center.

I love you, Ben.

It has long been my opinion that the very hardest part of painting a house is the very first step- picking the paint. I might be touting a very different story later in the life of this blog, but so far I still hold that if it is not THE hardest part, it is certainly AMONG the hardest.

First, let me say that I am a believer in the power of paint. I think it is a relatively easy way to make a vast difference in any space, regardless of the brand or color used. But now that I've been nice and admitted any paint is better than no paint, it is a distinct truth that not all paint is created equal. I've tried Lowe's paint. I've tried Sherwin Williams' paint. I've tried Home Depot's paint... and even the ritzy lines they carry. Yeah. They're alright. Some are more 'alright' than others. But I noted today, while passing through my friendly neighborhood ACE Hardware, that I positively swoon just by reading the words Benjamin Moore. *sigh*

To me, there is no better paint. Now, maybe I'm tainted by my upbringing. Mom and Dad sang praises to Benjamin Moore when they bought me my first paintbrush, but I have tried a lot of different brands, and I still stand by Benjamin Moore. It was a hard brand to come by in Colorado Springs before ACE starting carrying it. Oh, thank HEAVENS ACE started carrying it!!

So, If you're looking for my recommendation, that was it.

As for color recommendations, you're on your own. If it takes me less than two weeks to pick colors, divinity has intervened. Now, it just so happens, with this task, I decided on Benjamin Moore's Aura Affinity line almost instantly. I painted my house a rainbow of sample shades.




From there, it took maybe four days to come up with
The Gospel according to Benjamin:

House Body Color: AURA Affinity SPARROW
House Trim Color: AURA Affinity FRENCH PRESS

Want to know which of these many shades are, in fact, SPARROW and FRENCH PRESS?!?

Which ones do you think they are?

A very good place to start

This is my house. I have lived in this house for almost exactly five years. It has needed painting for not less than exactly five years, and likely more. Painting a house exterior is neither a quick nor an inexpensive project. There are many things to consider, and there are always many home projects on the 'to do' list. It's easy to take something that is time consuming, pricey, and labor intensive and throw it to the bottom of the priority list.

The thing is.... they come. Always this time of year, they seem to march through the neighborhood- the college students looking to paint houses. It just so happens my home precisely fits the profile that these college students seek for their top marketing campaigns... ugly and weather battered. They are a constant reminder to me of the upkeep required.

It just so happened that the unkind message of their fliers sank in this year. In addition, I attended a homeowners association meeting where i saw the influx of approval requests for spring home projects. It lit a fire under my tail. As a final straw, I began noticing the recently painted homes in my neighborhood, and the truth took hold... I could choose to ignore this project for another year, let other projects continue to take priority, but there will be no clean and easy time to do the painting. I needed to simply buckle down and do it.

So, here I am. Buckling down and doing it. Myself. Well, and with the help of family, where available. Having two small kids whom I care for full time adds some complexity, but I can't afford to pay thousands of dollars for someone else to spill primer on my roof. So, I have decided to make it work. I share my adventures in house painting at the suggestion and encouragement of a couple of friends who also have considered painting their own homes. They claim that a positive outcome might be the weight that tips them into this same hot pot. I think they just want me to spill the beans on the blood, the laughter, and the tears for their personal amusement... but you know... either way....

Here, then, begins the journey of a mom, a house, and a paintbrush...

(... and paint samples, and a homeowners association, and power washers, and scrapers, and a wire brush, and primer, and paint buckets, and ladders, and drop cloths, and masking tape, and....)