Back Porch

I have a tiny porch outside the back door, which opens off the kitchen - it shelters the back door from the worst of the weather and that's about it! I decided to paint is as the last outside painting job before the colder, wetter weather of winter. The rest of it - the back windows and soffits can wait until spring.
The porch looks very much refreshed with a few minor repairs, holes filled and the paint job!

Here's an update on the frog pond...….with everything growing nicely. No evidence of new permanent residents yet, but I'm hearing them often at night.

A New Front

I finally finished repairing and repainting the big windows across the front of the house and now the scaffold has been taken down, so I can see how it looks. 
I like the colours I chose - these blues go well with the terracotta bricks, I think. Orange and blue are complementary colours (opposites on the colour wheel) so they always look good together. It replaces a nondescript, rather pustulent shade of yellow, which did nothing to enhance the appearance of the house. Probably, the windows and trim would have been originally painted white, I think, although when I was scraping and sanding, there was evidence that a bilious green had been used at one stage. 

I'm going to paint the little back porch in coming days, weather permitting, then that will be it until next Spring/Summer, when I can finish the windows at the back. There is always more re-pointing to be done, which can be done at any time of year.

As winter approaches, I'm pulling out the last of the summer vegetables and digging over the remaining beds to plant things that can grow over winter...….the plantings I've already done are growing well - indeed, I've already started using some of the Asian greens.
Goodbye summer vegetables for a few months - these zucchinis are the last!

The last of summer meets the first of winter in one dish - stir-fried ginger, soy and garlic zucchini with Asian greens. Delicious!

Roof Fixing

Summer is drawing to a close, but the weather has stayed mostly warm and dry - ideal for getting onto the roof, biting the bullet and getting it fixed. It is a galvanized iron roof, like most of the rooves in Tasmania - a great, long-lasting and effective roofing material. However, after 50+ years in place, this roof was succumbing to the effects of time and beginning to rust, especially on the south-eastern side. Most people deal with problem by ripping it all off and replacing it, which is what I would have done if the rust had been too bad.  But it was very much only surface rust, which could be removed using a wire brush attachment on my electric drill, the metal treated with converter and then it could be primed and painted with special rust-guard paint. Also, replacing a whole roof is pretty expensive! It is a big job, because the area is large and there is are numerous of processes to be gone through properly to achieve a good, lasting final result. I decided I needed to do it is stages, in case the weather broke before I got done (I didn't want to leave bare metal exposed to wet weather for any length of time)..........I am well on the way. I'm only doing the side that is worst before the winter - the other side, with almost no rust, can wait until next summer.

 

 There is quite a good view from up on my roof - over the city to the north east and to the Western Tiers to the south west. I'm enjoying the view as I am up there working.

 

I did quite a lot of rock-climbing in a former life, so I feel fairly OK working at height. needless to say, I am being very careful!

 

Here is how things stand: the foreground section that is lighter in colour is completely finished, the middle section has been treated and primed and the small section in the background remains to be done. I'm getting there. I am enjoying it, but I'll be glad now when it's done!

 

 

 

A Paprika wall

I had to stop work on the spare bedroom before Christmas, because I needed it for a few house guests over summer..............they didn't seem to have too many objections to the fact that it was not quite finished!
All the summer guests have departed, like birds flying South, so I've been able to get back to work.

I have devised a plan of attack for the coming months.....apart from continuing with outstanding jobs inside, I'm about to start repairing and painting the roof as well as the external woodwork. This is something of a priority, because I want to get it done before the weather gets too damp and Autumnal, so I probably have until mid-April.

I've done a few small repair jobs around the house - my portable fan needed new feet, because the flimsy metal ones it came with got all bent and no longer held it up straight. It's now sporting sturdy new wooden feet! I also repaired the broken frame around a large mirror that was here in the bathroom when I bought the house. More about that later.

I decided the spare room needed a bit of pep, so I opted to paint one wall in a beautiful warm paprika shade - it goes really well with the mainly blues in the room.....

 

This is the mirror frame I repaired - sturdy enough after the repair job, but it was looking a bit grotty and tired, with a sort of dirty cream paint on it........so I went wild with a mottled painterly effect using all the colours that are in the room. It looks great and a real one-off. I'll varnish it later with a matte varnish to protect my artwork. True "designer frugal" style! I'll be putting up some shelves in the blank area of this wall, and I have a lovely old table waiting in the garage for some tlc. That along with another bentwood chair that was a gift and the room should be complete. Except for a second coat of paint on the white woodwork and another coat of oil on the floor, which will then be polished. I love this room!

 

Beginning The Living Room

Well...........I recently realized that two months have slipped quietly by since I last posted here - I haven't been idle since finishing the bathroom (..........and HOW much am I enjoying it?) I've simply been busy doing other things, mainly getting my online business back on track after some serious neglect.

I needed a break after the bathroom effort, but I have been surreptitiously sneaking up on the living room renovation. The biggest job in this room will be stripping back, repairing and repainting the huge window. I've already prepared the corner one - its now ready for painting. The rest of the room just basically needs a clean and a re-paint and I'm going to tackle making a set of roman blinds for said huge window.

The room has a fireplace with a built-in Saxon wood-heater in excellent working condition, but some previous owner had slathered a thick, textured coat of white emulsion over the bricks and mantelpiece. A combination of stripper and chipping and scraping got most of it off the bricks, but it was looking like a much harder job on the mantel itself, so I opted for a trompe l'oeil stone look, which I think looks pretty good! 

 

 

Here's the fireplace before and during the process of cleaning it up.

 

..........and a couple of close-ups of the finished mantel.

                                                             Here's how it looks now

 

I bought this 70 year old two-seater couch recently. I'm planning to refurbish it in the summer, along with a few other pieces of vintage furniture I have. This couch is still as solid as a rock - I love it!

 

 

The cats approve of the new couch.......separately! They still only just rub along together.

Now I'm just waiting for that painting urge to hit again so I can finish this room completely........I can feel it coming! 

 

 

 

 

 

The Dining Room Refreshed.

After an almighty push, I got this room done in two days……..and my aching body attests to the fact that I possibly overdid it! Painting ceilings is quite physical work, I've found.
So that's another room down and a lovely, light, clean dining room to enjoy. I will start seriously looking for curtain fabric this week. The room needs the warmth of a lovely fabric to lift it and echo the warm orange tones in the adjoining kitchen. Hope I can find the right one.

Now I am relaxing, drinking wine and eating chocolate to reward myself for this effort - I love this room!

The time is rapidly approaching when I have to face the mammoth task of tackling the bathroom - I will post some "before" pictures soon - it really is a bit of a horror show, but I think I can create a bathroom that will be delight to use.

Back To Work!

After almost a month away from any work on the house, I've been raring to get back to it! I did manage to put in a microwave box in that time, so it's now up off the bench and out of the way in its own little cubby-hole……….with a bonus shelf on top for coffee pots and so forth. Last night I cleaned down the walls and ceiling in my little dining room and sanded back where I'd previously filled a zillion nail and screw holes (The previous owner sure liked to cover the walls with itty-bitty stuff…….with a big old screw-hole for each bit!) I also took off a rather jerry-built pelmet that was only held up by a couple of screws - I had a hard time stopping it from crashing down after I removed the screws. Sometimes an extra pair of hands would be "handy".
This morning I have painted the cornices and I'm about to tackle the ceiling. Needless to say, breakfast was a bit chaotic with furniture moved, ladders and paint tins to avoid.

I'm keeping my eyes open for some suitable curtain fabric for these windows…….I have something quite specific in mind, so it might take a while to find it. I have contingencies if I can't find exactly what I want.

Tackling The Kitchen

I love to cook. I love baking. I make my own bread. The kitchen is an important space to me, because I spend quite a lot of time in there. The kitchen I "inherited" with this house was dirty, smelly, with an oven that only worked partially, mismatched drawer and cupboard door handles and a lot of damage to cupboard doors and walls. (It looked like they had endured a few fits of temper!)

When I first moved in, the most important job was scrubbing everything down (multiple times) until I was satisfied it was at least clean, even if it still looked shabby. I had to put up with it like this while I got on with a few other more pressing things, but once I was able, I started repairing the holes in the walls, the kicked in cupboard doors and replacing broken catches (ALL of them!) I bought a new oven and had it installed by an electrician (definitely NOT a diy job!) Oh, the joy of simply being able to bake again!

Walls, ceiling and cabinets painted and the kitchen started to feel fresh and renewed.

Before - old oven on the way out!

Starting the tiling on the old/new splash back

 I could have called in a company and had all of this old kitchen ripped out and replaced with a brand spanking new *bland* one, but I really wanted to see how well an old kitchen like this could be refurbished and repurposed. These drawers are made from dove-tailed hardwood - you won't see that in your melamine-coated MDF flat-pack kitchen! And money is an issue - I'll save it wherever I can.

On ripping off various stuck-on finishes etc, I uncovered these lovely burnt orange tiles on the wall behind the stove and above one of the benches. I really wanted to keep them, but of course, the tiles could never be matched and I needed more  because the newer stoves don't have that high back like the older ones and I also had to take off an inch-thick melamine splash-back that was worse for wear. So I chose some tiles that were a contrast in both colour and texture and went to town employing my  skills as an artist to design a graphic interplay between the old orange shiny tiles and the new grey-toned matte ones. In my head I could see how it might look, but the reality, when it was done far exceeded my expectations……I LOVE it!

I chose greys and white for my kitchen colour scheme - nice and restful, but with the zing of the surprise orange. As serendipity would have it, some of my best cookware is also orange. This was meant to be.

Same view showing the tiling job completed - before and after painting the cabinets

When I bought the oven, I also bought a range-hood and because it was one you just plug into a socket, I decided I could install it myself. This was a fairly big job - I had to make an MDF box to house it, attach the box securely to the existing cabinet and wall and install the hood. (It said on the packaging, that it was a two-man job to install it, but with a bit of ingenuity, I managed it by myself……two men = one woman?) All that remained was to fill in the space with a piece of plywood and paint it to match the cabinets. Astoundingly, is is all straight and neat!

This is what I was replacing………!!

New range hood

I would have liked to have put in some new bench tops, but because what I'd like is expensive, I decided to do a refurbish job on the old tops until I can afford new ones. There is a special laminate finish that is available, so I decided to give that a try - I got it tinted to a tone the same as the cabinet doors, but a shade darker and just followed the instructions on the tins for prepping and doing the job. There was one burnt, damaged area that I had to repair before I started. 

One bench top completed

The finish is so good, you can't even see where the repair is. It remains to be seen how durable this is once I start using it, but it probably only needs to last for a year or two.

So the kitchen is now pretty much done. For now. Except that I'm going to put in a microwave cabinet and some open shelving above the refrigerator. I love my kitchen!

Next job? not such a big one…….repairing and repainting the small dining room adjacent to the kitchen.

Up with the birds!

I was awake at 5:00am this morning…….with the birds (and the b****y cats!)
No point lying in bed trying to get back to sleep (it never happens), so I got up, had a quick cup of tea, watched the disaster show on TV (aka the news) and set to giving the kitchen ceiling its final coat of paint. I was on a roll, (or more aptly, on a roller, so to speak) so I prepped the kitchen window (I'd previously filled all the holes, so I only had to sand it back) and gave it the first coat of pristine, white semi-gloss paint. Also the architraves around the door. It fills me with joy to see it looking so much better that I thought it ever could without a major re-fit!

This kitchen, from the sad and neglected room it was, is now a pleasure to be in, with everything functioning and a bright, airy feel. Did I mention that I love cooking and baking? A kitchen that works is important to me.

Now it's 8:30 and I've completed the jobs earmarked for today. I'm having a well-deserved cup of coffee and a second slice of toast with Julia's delicious three fruit marmalade.

I've also made a start stripping off the thick coat of white paint from the fireplace - a more difficult job than anticipated, but I'll get there!

Looking through to the dining room - the next space to be painted. The dresser you can see there in the corner will be painted in the same dove grey as the cupboard doors, when I have time.

Stripping the fireplace……not enjoying this job very much - I might have to settle for a "slightly distressed" look!

Leila's Room

Leila is one of my grand-daughters. She works as a paralegal at a law firm in the city…….she couldn't wait for me to move into town so that she could become my housemate. This meant that the first room we had to make habitable and presentable was her bedroom. When I took possession, this bedroom (the biggest) had deep fuchsia walls with a flowery frieze below the cornice. It had several layers of rotting net curtains and some heavy floral drapes with swags and tie-backs. Half the old carpet had been ripped up and what was left stank of dog pee……..charming! The lovely large windows had never been cleaned and moisture had been allowed to ruin the paintwork on them. The general look was what I would describe as "tired bordello"!
The positives were:
*Good size
*No major structural problems
*Morning sun
*Huge built-in wardrobe with floor to ceiling mirror doors

It looked like this, but the picture is flattering and all that stuff in there is hiding a multitude of sins:

So we set to and ripped up the remains of the carpet, tore down the curtains, cleaned the black crap off the window-frames, removed the floral frieze and scrubbed, scrubbed, scrubbed. We then had a blank canvas to work with. All the choices in this room are Leila's - I am grateful that she has a classic and restrained sense of design and her preference is for the calm and uncluttered. 

The room didn't require any major repairs, just a lot of cleaning and a bit of patching and I removed a zillion tacks and staples from the floor.

Grey carpet and drapes

What a difference! When she first moved in, the room looked like this, now it looks like this with a bit more furniture and a touch more colour:

It's now a lovely calm space for a busy young woman to retreat to after a busy day.

The carpet was professionally laid, which was an expense, but all up, this room was about $1100 to transform.