Project Time!

We have slowly been painting our house since we moved in.  We moved in 5 years ago with flat, white, cheap paint.  Over the years, I have learned that flat, cheap paint does not clean up well.  The result is that with 2 dogs and 2 kids the bottom 3 feet of our walls were permanently discolored or the paint had been scrubbed off in my attempts to clean them. We finally faced the reality and decided to repaint the living area, stairway and hallway... Thank our lucky stars our great friend Nate, former professional painter, was will to help with the simple bribe of dinner and beer.  Our luck got better when Weston agreed to come man a roller (apparently food and beer is an effective bargaining tool for the male species)!

We got the walls bare and moved all the furniture the couple nights before the "fun" began.  Then the boys started painting and Karley and I were on kid duty.  Our plan was to get the upstairs hall and stairs done then Buck and I could tackle the downstairs over the weekend.

Nate on a crazy ladder contraption painting the upper wall on the stairs.
Buck is standing on the banister getting ready to reach some spots above the stairs. 

Buck then stepped across with one foot and painted
the top edge on the wall to his left.  I had a picture of
his acrobatics from below, but either I didn't really take it or
I lost it!  I was silently praying it worked out and we were
not making a claim on our homeowner's policy!

The contraption - not sure what you do if you
don't have a professional painter friend and a
husband that manages a paint store?

Karley - always smiling, always an angel helping me with the kiddos!

Storytime!

Weston runs a mean roller!

After we got the kids to bed, we realized we could knock out the downstairs and get this project DONE, leaving the weekend free. So we kept working away.  I was slowly but surely cutting in around some base boards and Nate and Buck were finally taking a dinner break at about 10 p.m. when I heard Hyat whimpering in the hallway upstairs.  When I got there he told me he didn't touch the wet paint, but he didn't feel good.  When I was putting him back to bed he was really distraught, which is not at all like him.  I asked him if he wanted to snuggle and he said yes.  Since he doesn't snuggle much, we curled up on my bed.  I thought I would lay with him until he fell to sleep, get him to bed and get back to work.  This is how Buck found us at about 11:30.  Apparently, laying down for me after 10 p.m. results in sweet dreams.  Buck was wondering what had happened to me and if I had really bailed out to go to bed - well, not intentionally!

Happily snuggling my sweet boy!

Yup! Snoozing when I should be working!

I am so glad this project is done!  Only problem is that is has now been weeks and I still don't have our pictures back on the wall!  I need to get motivated! But I do love the fresh coat of paint!!!