Primed and Ready

What a cliche, right? Forgive me - we just finished the February issue of the magazine I work for, and I'm creative-headlined out.

Also, it applies in a very literal way. We got so much stuff done this weekend that I feel like a different blogger! Where's that lazy girl and her lethargic husband?

Saturday we worked on Millie's fence, and with the help of our friends/neighbors, got all the posts set and the relevant part of the old fence taken down.

Sunday we holed up in the master bath and scraped until our hands were sore. Also, Darwin installed those two boards he cut a while back to fill the holes from a couple of old termitey spots in the beadboard.

Monday Darwin planned to leave for some manly wilderness time at 1:45, so we got started on the bathroom early. I quickly determined that it might-just-might be possible to prime the sink/toilet wall (the largest uninterrupted wall) that day. With that goal in mind, I scraped and sanded and Bondo'ed nail holes with an unusual vigor.

Oh yeah, and Darwin helped, too.

Actually, we both worked hard, though Darwin as usual tried to redo half the stuff I did. I finally said, "It doesn't have to be perfect. If you're going to redo everything I do, I'll just go sit on the couch. There's no point in me working my ass off if you're just going to redo everything."

For once, he didn't argue back with some snarky comment about the quality of my work. He just blinked at me and said, "Okay" and tried not to do it again.

Like I said, who WERE these people?

Finally, the magic moment came. After washing down the very dusty walls, we applied primer to roller, roller to wall. Of course, it wasn't easy. Beadboard - especially old, imperfect beadboard - is a real pain to paint. Darwin showed me the technique he'd already learned on the practice section a few weeks ago - heavily load up the roller with primer, paint sideways, press hard to get the paint into the grooves.

Then he had to leave, and I finished the wall myself. I even cleaned everything up without his help.

Seeing that beautiful smooth white wall was reward enough for my stinging hands and hair full of lead paint dust. The best part was all the little imperfections in the beadboard - where I hadn't scraped quite thoroughly enough - didn't even show once it was all primed. I'm so freaking happy right now. The bathroom is halfway primed, and the other half just needs to be scraped a little more and sanded before it will be ready, too.



Oh, and I almost forgot the good news! We heard from the plumber about that estimate. Drumroll please .... $700 maximum, but probably more like $500-600! I'm fully anticipating $700, of course, but still - that's cheaper than I was imagining. I'm thrilled, Darwin's pleased, and they're hired!

They are busy until the end of January, but that's fine because that gives us time to get everything ready. All we have to do to prepare is finish priming and painting the walls, patch the ceiling, paint the ceiling, and paint another coat on the floor. That's all easy stuff. We've drywalled and painted plenty of times before. There's nothing scary looming over us anymore!

So life is good right now. Oh wait, except I still don't know what color to paint the walls. I spent yesterday afternoon playing around with the Benjamin Moore Color Viewer, but sometimes I hate that thing. Most colors show up looking nothing like their actual selves - red is always pink or pale orange, for example.

Then I went back and reread Fixer Upper's post about bathroom color scheming and noted Beth's comment, "we tend to paint the bathroom whichever color is most flattering to our skin tones so that we don’t spend the mornings depressed."

So I started thinking about what colors look best on me. What Not to Wear tells me "emerald" is a good color for people with coloring like mine (brown hair, green eyes, pinkish skin tone), so that was my first thought. Then I went a little crazy. I cut out a picture of my overly pink-cheeked head from a New Year's Eve photo and pasted it on top of a variety of colors. This is what happens when Photoshop falls into the hands of the untrained:



Purple and green were my favorites, which is unsurprising considering those are the colors I wear most often in makeup. Red also looked okay. Beige, yellow and orange were downright revolting on me.

I love "emerald" as a clothing option, but the thought of applying it to my bathroom walls kinda freaks me out. I'm used to decorating in earthier tones. Bold but subdued - grounded might be the right word.

I plan to paint our adjoining master bedroom a mauvey-gray color, so maybe a different shade of purple would look nice in the bathroom. Not too dark or bold.

I'm being more cautious than I would normally because this paint will need to last a long time. Painting behind clawfoot tubs and wall-hung sinks is no easy feat. I don't need to get the bathroom done and then hate it five minutes later.

So what do you think? Is emerald too scary? Is plum too ... purple? Or should I stick with the sage green I considered back in July?

I know I should follow Fixer Upper's example and choose a shower curtain first, then select a paint color from it. But I don't want to leap into that purchase either. I haven't found the exactly perfect shower curtain, and I have a clear liner that will do indefinitely.

And this is no time for indecision! We're almost there!