Friday, January 18, 2008

no more blue...

The walls in Natsuki's room are no longer blue. I took off all of the wallpaper so step one is complete! Yeah! I'm almost surprised that I was able to keep at it. Anyways, I went to the hardware store today to price out some stuff and see if there was anything I couldn't find. I ran into two painter guys who were surprised that I was going to paint my own house. By myself. Without professional help. They were idiots. Except that I didn't want to get into a conversation with them, I wanted to say that what they do isn't that difficult, it's just time consuming. But they might've been offended by that and I'm trying to be nicer this year so I just wandered back and forth down the aisles until I had found everything I needed.

I talked with my dad yesterday and he gave me a lot of great advice about repairing holes in the walls and sandpaper, etc. He also said he would look for some websites for me to take a look at and after I got off the phone I realized that I can look up that kind of stuff by myself. Home Depot has an awesome website with lots of great project guides that include pictures and links so you can see what tools they're talking about. After reading all of that, I know that I can finish this project on my own. At least I'm willing to tackle Natsuki's room and get it ready for the girls. Then I'll stop and evaluate if I'm willing to do the other rooms, too.

Here are some pictures of the room minus the wallpaper. The next step is to take off the wallpaper backing.

My mom made those beautiful curtains when she came to help me with Sakura's birth. I'm still trying to decide where I'll use them next.



That's Natsuki's playpen that she's sleeping in now. I think she likes it better than her crib since it's not as noisy. I like it better because I'm not as worried about her climbing out of it!

One thing I discovered after I took off the wallpaper is that whoever built the house never finished mudding and taping the corners of the room. They just smoothed over the walls and then wallpapered over the whole thing. Home Depot recommended using a corner trowel when doing the corners but of course I can't find a corner trowel at the hardware store here. Probably because no one actually finishes the corners. My mom said she'll bring one for me, though!

This next picture is mostly for my dad so he can see what I'm talking about.

The white paper is the backing from the wallpaper but the dark line is where the two pieces of sheetrock meet. Probably all of the rooms are the same so this'll be good practice.

I'll update more as I get through the project. Thanks for everyone's kind words. They were very encouraging.

2 comments:

Kim said...

Hi Sarah!

Happy New Year! I can't wait to keep hearing about your remodeling projects! It is one of my favorit topics! Great pictures of the girls too!

Perogyo said...

I'm so proud of you for taking this on! I hate the wallpaper in Japan, it's so ugly and really unhealthy.

I used to paint during summers in uni and it is time-consuming!

I've seen corner trowels here- did you check the tile and cement sections?

I would recommend that you cement and sand the wall joints and then tape them up. Tape is hard to find here though since most walls are finished with something different here. If I were you I'd ask your mom to bring over a big roll of drywall tape!