Let's talk about paint

I'm still reeling from the death of my friend. It was so unexpected, making it different than normal. Most times, I have an idea that things are going downhill fast and I can sort of prepare myself. This time I knew she hadn't been doing great because her abdomen was swelling with ascites, but I didn't know that she was about to die. I wish I'd known.

This weekend has definitely been an emotional roller-coaster. Maybe that's sort of good: "this too shall pass" doesn't just mean that bad things will end but that everything, both good and bad, is temporary and will end. And the sadness defines the happiness that much better.

So, moving on to happier things... we did decide to paint part of the house. After the carpet cleaning guy asked if the seller had been in the military because the paint looked army green in that light. I discovered that Once you see army green you can't unsee it. So we picked up fabric samples for the couch, went to the paint store, and got help choosing paint colours. We took the chips back to the house and checked them in the house itself and went back and bought paint (on sale) for the great room, bathroom, laundry room, and kitchen.

The laundry room is painted the same colour as the rest of the house but they painted the ceiling as well, making it very dark. It's a small space leading right to the garage and it just doesn't feel nice.

We spent the rest of yesterday and this morning prepping the kitchen for painting. It would have gone more quickly but the counter and wall were joined by silicon caulk. It comes off the counter with no problem but it seems to bond to the paint and drywall and is really difficult to remove. We're going to tile a backsplash so that we don't have to deal with the silicon again.

Prepping took much longer than painting the kitchen. I love the new colour! It's kind of a creamy beige colour: Benjamin Moore CC-330 (Hillsborough Beige), which will also be used as the ceiling colour in the main bath, which is currently a hideous dark yellow. The great room and main bath will be Benjamin Moore 2164-30 (Red Clay Brown). Finally, the laundry room will be Benjamin Moore CC-310 (Dusty Road) with a white ceiling, because we wanted it to be bright. Plus that colour goes really well with the tile in that room. These colours all go with the current paint colour and with the fabric we're using for the couch and cushions.

The CC-310 (Dusty Road) colour is similar to the colour I've been thinking of using for the sewing room. We'll see how it looks in the laundry room and go from there.

Ian's parents stopped by for a visit this afternoon as well, which was awesome. They hadn't seen the house in person before and we were excited to show them around. They took some tomatoes and helped identify some of the plants in the backyard. It looks like we're going to have to do quite a bit of pruning and tree maintenance in the spring. Some of the plants seem to be quite fussy so they may not last that long. We haven't tried to grow that many plants before, let alone fussy ones.

As I was showing Ian's parents around, I discovered that the room in the basement with the crazy floor had a very musty smell. When I looked underneath the floor there were wet spots and the underpad was noticeably damp. Sigh. We think that the sellers had washed the patio and that it's no longer graded properly so that the water heads to the house rather than away from it. We also noticed some sawdust at the bottom of the wooden window well. Termites? Carpenter ants? Sigh.

We weren't able to get a second coat done in the kitchen but we'll do that tomorrow morning. I see my oncologist in the afternoon and aside from those two activities, I think we're going to take it easy. This weekend has been very busy and quite physically (not to mention emotionally) exhausting.