Hi guys! The last month or so has been all about those tiny little diy projects that we need to finish up.
This week it was the back yard and the entryway at the backdoor.
Oh and dirt and sand. If you truly knew how many times I am sweeping this area for sand because of the lack of grass in the backyard.
You'd probably shake your head and say
"Oh yeah I can empathize!"
So I had two objectives this week.
Do another wall with the metal wainscoting near the backdoor, and throw four thousand pounds of grass seed down in the yard and pray to mother nature it will grow.
So here's hoping for grass to grow so I can stop sweeping every single day.
You'll also get to see how the long wall is holding up to our everyday life of greg, friends and one 75lb puppy constantly running in and out of this door.
If you missed the install of the first wall you can read:
It will also show you what my backdoor used to look like. I think it'll shock you!
Or you can see it all dressed and styled here
Today we're working on the south wall. Which is already sparking a future winter project of elongating the small stairs that are currently here.
But that's another day! For this wall we're going to mimic what is on the West wall but also sloping to follow the stairs and to allow for a handrail in the future. Now, there was an obstacle we had to overcome for this wall. The landing is approximately 9" into the basement. So if you look at the bottom half of the next pic ?
Go ahead, I'll wait :-)
You'll see the concrete blocks that are basement are built with. That juts out about 1/2" farther than the drywall. To make a long story short, if we were to simply add the white pre-primed pine to the wall, there would be a gap.
So using an old door casing, we used that to build up the gaps on the drywall and around the door so that when we installed the pine 1 x 6"s, all was flush and we could say bye bye to the gap.
I know I am not phrasing this like some DIY pro would but hey, this blog is called Rustic and Refined.
Not High IQ Blonde. But I am sure you're getting the jist.
We continued the leftover wood over the top of the door too, Greg thought it would give it a bit of detail this door never had.
Since he was doing the cutting, I let him have this idea. I was just happy the cinderblock was finally getting covered up and that I can now have an excuse to paint this backdoor tomorrow!
Those black things you see on the wall were from some floating shelves installed back in 2007. This is Greg's drop zone.
Keys, cell phone, mail he doesn't want to read.
It all ended up here and quickly became the dustiest spot in the house.
So I am going to remedy that because we already have a kitchen drawer that can be considered a dead zone for "I'll deal with it later" type stuff."
I switched back and forth between painting the trim around the door and the wall. I had to finally skim the whole wall with paint. This kitchen hasn't been painted in 4 years, maybe even 5 and even using the same paint, I could see the color difference, so I grabbed a roller and just got it done quickly.
Oh and stayed the hell away from my curtains, the ceiling and anything else I didn't want cream colored paint on.
Ready to see where he gets to put his cell phone and mail now?
The door is my diy for tomorrow. I haven't quite made up my mind if I am going to write a blog post about that.
It seems kinda silly to me sometimes. Like I am on an ego trip or something. Seriously, does anyone really want to see ten pictures of me spray painting a metal door and how it looks on the hinges when finished?
Especially since it's just going a glossy white on both sides. Not exactly worth putting in a newspaper either. Sorry but maybe it's a humble brag, but I am not a Kardashian.
Headlines! Headlines! Christine painted her toe nails, alert CNN!
I'll pass.
I know once I get that door off the hinges and painted all white I am really going to love this space!
It's definitely coming along as far as updating goes.
The galvanized accessories I picked up at Hobby Lobby. I think I spent around $30 bucks, give or take a dollar?
The 2 bowls did not have holes in them so I just used the smallest spade bit of Greg's I could find.
Plus a drill that didn't have one of those impact driver "bits" in it. He has like 30 battery operated impact drivers and crap and I couldn't get the damn bit out to change it out.
Luckily I found one that was "empty" and could just insert the spade bit and tighten it down.
But in case of a zombie attack, maybe I should have him ed-u-ma-cate me on how to get the infernal thing out to change bits.
Seeing how it's prejudice against blondes.
The West wall is holding up very very well I am happy to report. We still have tons of coat and hat hooks.
I am still contemplating adding a huge piece of artwork here.
Using one 8' piece of leftover pine and we bought 2 others plus one sheet of galvanized metal just for the south wall.
$30 bucks to add the wainscoting and another $30 to style it up.
Not bad for a blonde if I do say so myself!
XO,
