The Room You Didn't Know Was A Room

In between sessions shoveling this:

(Yes, that's 26.5 inches of snow. I have a high school friend to described Maryland this way: Where the weather today is completely different than the weather yesterday.)

I've been tackling this:

 

"Tackling what exactly," you say? 

The hallway.  See that yellow hallway with the stained wood trim. And see how it does not go with our living room? Ive been taking care of that this weekend. Luckily I bought paint and supplies before the "Snowmageddon" came. You'd think that painting a tiny little hallway wouldn't be a big deal, and really it wasn't a HUGE deal, but here is the thing about our house. The previous owners kept the stained wood trim and doors throughout the first floor. I've slowly been painting it white in each room we decorate. Some might say this is a travesty. In my mind, the stained wood makes the house look dated. Other strikes against the wood trim and doors include: 

1. It's not nice wood. It's pine of some kind.

2. It is beat up. Which is kind of the point of trim, I know. It's a lot easier to replace trim than it is to replace the wall. But it's scratched and dinged all over the place.

3. It's been poorly stained. There places with too little stain/poly and other places with too much. There are spots where it's "alligatored" and places where it's chipping off completely.

I heard this motto once on some HGTV show: Just because it's wood doesn't mean it's good. 

So, when you paint the trim in our house, there's a lot of prep work involved. It all has to be deglossed (deglosser/liquid sandpaper is my friend). Some places have to be sanded. It MUST be primed. Straight up paint will not stick to our trim. Caulking is serious work with it, too. You can't really see finish nails and gaps between the wood with the stain, but once you paint it white, they just scream at you. Then it takes 2 coats of paint on top of the primer to cover everything.

The actual painting of the walls took all of an hour and a half. The trim, on the other hand, took about 3 days. That little T-shaped hallway has 3 doors, meaning beau coup trim. But, it's done and I'm really happy with it.

 

Ahhh, much better. Hanging the art helped too. Everything feels more homey when you've got things hanging on your walls.  Here's a closer view: 

The walls are Glidden's Natural Linen, trim is Sherwin Williams Roman Column. I'm still reserving judgment on the Glidden paint. I'll be using it in the guest room where it will be put to the test a little more (going from white to brown-ish, rather than yellow to tan).

I am not taking on the the doors yet. They have to be taken off the hinges to properly paint them, which means taking them down to the basement, which is somewhat freezing in February so they can wait until spring. I'm also looking into a new light fixture (the current one is U-G-L-Y...it ain't got no alibi) and maybe a rug of some kind, just for some interest at the floor.

Since I can't get out of the house (the plows haven't come to our street yet) the rug and light fixture are on hold. I think I'm going to start painting the guest room today. Can we say exciting?