I never want this to be a whiny space, because that gets old real fast, but after saying that I must say that every muscle in my body is screaming at me in capital letters today.  If you listen real closely, you can hear it, "WHAT do you think you are doing?  You're not 20 anymore! Blah blah blah"

They're saying a lot more, but basically, it's more of the same sort scolding tone.  Whatever, muscles... all the scraping, sanding, demo, etc., is complete and I spent all day Sunday painting and I gotta say, I am happy with the result!

I love, love, love the clean, perfectly white paint and how clean it looks.  Don't you agree?  The previous owners got paint on the beaded ceiling when they painted before, and I gotta be honest, it irks me completely, but not enough to remove it.  Therefore, I just didn't add to it.  I have a real steady hand with painting and a great sash brush that I love, so not so bad.

I really can't believe how much better it looks already.

Two coats of paint with primer - I chose a flat finish rather than satin or any type of gloss because honestly, I was a bit worried about how those other choices show up any imperfection that exists and believe you me, there are plenty that exist.  However, I feel I must say this now - none of this woodwork I've scraped and painted have lead paint.

If you think you have lead paint (there are lead paint tests available at your local building supply place and I don't believe they are expensive), please be safe.  Purchase a kit and if it tests positive, you're should contact your local government to learn how to safely deal with this.  This is especially important if you have small children or dogs who might ingest paint chips.  It's just not worth it folks.  Nothing is more important than your family's health and well being.

Stepping off the soapbox... I am at a point where I am going to have to go down to my township office and apply for a building permit.  Even though all I am doing is screening it in, my township requires it.  While I can ignore it and just build the thing, I'm running the chance that one of my neighbors complains or simply that the code enforcement comes around - and I would be forced to take it all down.  Kinda worth the $75 it is going to cost to avoid such heartbreak.

I'll be able to build the railings while I wait for the permit to come through since I must have one.  So next up... railings!  Now, I'm going to go soak in the tub for a while.  Maybe pour a glass of wine... candles... bubbles...

Porch Project - Scraping, Sanding, Washing...

Ugh!  That's all I can say!  What a hot, sticky, miserable job to scrape all the loose paint.  About 1/2 way through, I was tempted to go in the house, snag one of my daughter's beers and burn the paint off with vile curses I hurled at it from the comfort of my air conditioned living room.  But alas, that will not work in this universe (I'm totally putting in a request for that super power), so I persevered, urged on by the constant mosquito strafing and finished it up.

After I finished scraping, I gave the whole porch a light sanding with a medium grade sanding sponge, switching up when the sandpaper seemed gummed up (it took three altogether).  Once that job was done, which seemed like a walk in the park compared with the scraping, I swept up all the debris and got ready for the next step.  By getting ready, I mean getting a hoagie for lunch and watching an hour of HGTV in the air conditioning.

After dragging myself  eagerly returning to work, I filled a bucket with warm water and a healthy squirt of the blue dishwashing detergent preferred by oily penguins and started to work scrubbing the woodwork down.  Up until this point, I was just sweaty with decorative paint chips plastered to my cleavage (and in my bra as I later discovered), but as filthy nasty water showered down on me I moved into a whole new area of funk.  10 years of dirt and whatever all loosened up, I then turned my hose on the wood and got it all rinsed until no more suds were seen.

Since I got the wood pretty saturated, I decided to wait until tomorrow to start painting.  I went inside, got a nice long hot bath and took my daughters out for dinner at Kraftwork in the Northern Liberties section of Philly.  If you're ever in Philly, you MUST go to this place:  great beers, wonderful food in a great atmosphere.  Shameless Philly plug finished.

Oh one thing I have to replace is my house numbers.  Even though I tried to very carefully remove them so I could put them back (not that they are exceptional or anything - just didn't think about replacing them), this is what happened:

Poor little tiny number one.  He used to be big, but snapped right in half and then some.  Oh horrors... now I will have to find some on the intertubz that appeal to me.  Darn.

Next up... Painting!  But now it is time to feed my kitties before they eat my soft bits.