Brown Mold

Now that the walls were painted Mr. & Mrs. Remodel could move onto painting the molding on the living room.

This is an old picture but it’s good for showing the molding in the living room.
We talked a lot about taking it all out or keeping part of it, or keeping it all. In the end we decided to keep the molding along the top but not along the bottom because too much patching was needed. We also decided not to use it around the new opening to the master bedroom and to take it down from the art studio opening but to retain it around the openings to the kitchen and dinning area. By the way, did I ever tell you that the molding, which looked like wood from afar, was actually made from polystyrene?
This photo also shows the fan, which was in the living room when we bought the house. We liked the look of it but, once the light was turned on, it would turn itself off and on of it’s own accord to no particular schedule. Well one can only take so much excitement of that kind so we decided on a new one. I’ve already spoken previously about my dissatisfaction with fan styles so it was really difficult to find something suitable.


This is what we settled on. The whirry around things (mind’s a blank) is tropical looking while the light fits the Tuscan look. If someone is looking for a tropical fan look (and they aren’t hard to find so must be fairly popular) you might think that the designers could come up with a light that complements this look.
The fan came from Home Depot because it was the most acceptable to us among all the others we saw. There were several fans at Lowes that I liked better but they did not come with a light. We really wanted the fan to have one, as it was the best place in the room for the main light.



The red on the molding was the strongest colour we were covering up but because the topcoat was going to be quite dark, we didn’t put too heavy an undercoat on.


The colour we chose was a brown called Oregon Trail which came from the Olympic range at Lowes. The molding was a bit awkward to paint because it has a rope design running along it, which is tricky to do with a regular brush so Mr. Remodel used a stencil brush for that part.


We thought the colour was strong enough to frame all the white in the room without being too dominant.




At some time in the future (a future that is getting further away due to rising remodel bills), Mr. Remodel would like a TV on the wall above the fireplace. Although it will be in a prominent place we wanted to minimise its impact by not having it sit against a bright white wall.
We considered black but that was a bit too stark for Mrs. R so she suggested a dark charcoal grey. But, as usual, Mr. & Mrs. R couldn’t quite find the shade they wanted. In the Olympic range at Lowes, we saw a shade called Black Magic, which was too dark, and one called Knight’s Armor, which was too light. So Mr. R asked Mr. Paint Mixer to mix a colour in the middle and so was born Black Knight’s Magic Armor.

Recovering from Painting

Mr. Remodel was very happy to get to the painting stage as he said it would go fast and would make a tremendous difference to how the house looked. The completion of the upstairs bathroom and kitchen had given us a big boost and gave us the vision that there was light at the end of the remodel tunnel but anything that helped that process along was welcomed.

We trotted off to Lowes to buy paint. For the undercoat, we bought a budget Lowes brand. For the topcoat we took their recommendation of Valspar. We chose the ultra white eggshell finish.

Mr. Remodel set about painting the undercoat helped by Mrs. Remodel who painted the corners and the strip between the wall and ceiling. Considering we were covering up some pretty strong colours, the budget undercoat did a pretty good job.

Goodbye art studio purple paint.



Goodbye living room green paint.




The same went for the master bedroom (which had been painted peach) and the master bathroom. Suddenly all the differences between old and new drywall, the purple board, and the cement board disappeared and everything was more uniform.

All was going according to plan. Of course in DIY that phrase can be the kiss of death (or at the very least a very nasty paper cut) and so it was for us when it came to putting on the topcoat.
Mr. Remodel started painting on the topcoat and from early on it didn’t look good. The paint covered very poorly. Now one reason could be the skills of the painter. Well Mr. Remodel is a very good painter with lots of experience in doing so. He painted the entire inside and outside of a prior home in Hawaii and did a lot of painting in our last home with no signs of patchiness on the walls. Another reason could be the undercoat but that didn’t make sense because there were lots of areas where the undercoat had covered the underneath colour perfectly and looked very even. Yet when the topcoat was put on there were lots of patches.

Back to Lowes we trotted. They hadn’t had any similar complaints about the paint and suggested we try contacting Valspar directly. They hadn’t heard about this problem either and asked for some pictures, which Mr. R sent them so they could look into the matter. That was a long time ago and we’ve never heard back. Thank you for the ‘great’ customer service Valspar.

Mrs. R thought we should go for another brand but Mr. R thought maybe it was just a bad tub of paint so he tried another one. Same problem. By this time, there was too much of it on the walls to change to another brand so we bought some more but we weren’t very happy. It’s over $100 for a five-gallon tub so the paint bill was beginning to add up. Mr. Remodel tried giving the walls a second coat. Same problem.
In the end, he developed a technique for laying it on extra thickly so it looked more even. It produced a better look although not as perfect as we had expected. We hoped that the play of shadows and eventually getting our stuff in the rooms would hide the patches. Ultimately, the painting took about three times the time we thought it would and, unhappily, cost a whole lot more than we would have wanted.

As I have said before, the pictures, no matter how detailed cannot adequately portray the passage of time (particularly delays and struggles) and frustrations involved in individual projects and the remodel as a whole. You will never get the full picture unless you have your own experience or you embark on this kind of venture yourself.


One of the frustrations was having the plastic sheeting on the floor for so long. It got covered in grit from the various comings and goings of work boots but couldn’t be vacuumed making the house, as a whole, dirtier than it needed to be.

All Fired Up

Today’s subject is the living room fireplace. The living room was not a room that we that we felt should have too strong a personality but we did not want it to be too blah either. An obvious place to give it some pop was the only real feature of the room, which is the fireplace.
Like the rest of the house’s original features, the fireplace was totally 70’s looking and, in our opinion, not in a good way.
Here is what it looked like to start with.

Like everything else in the house, we thought hard about the look we wanted, shopped like mad, and went through several changes in our ideas.
Originally we wanted to cover the whole fireplace with the same tile as we put on the floor in the kitchen, and entryway.


Mr. Tiler covered the bricks with cement to level the surface for the tile.


Then he started digging out the bricks in the front. Unfortunately, some of the bricks seemed to have been put in with the toughest substance known to man because they wouldn’t come out. So mortar was put in the area to level the area.


We went ahead with the idea to put the Gea Beige tile in front of the fireplace. However, for the front we wanted to have put in a tile with a lot more punch.


We had seen this slate very early on at Morena Tile in San Juan Capistrano because they have it in a large display in the showroom. We really liked it but never thought of it as something that we thought of using. One day we were in there looking for yellow tile and Mrs. Remodel suggested it as an idea for the fireplace.
It’s called Vulcana and comes in a certain square footage made up of medium and small squares and rectangles. It needs to be cleaned as dust obscures some of the beautiful colours. We over ordered the amount we needed so we could have more choice as what arrives is very random.
Sorry this isn’t a great picture but it shows how we decided what pieces to use.


This is a better shot of the final layout.


Here we are part way through. The side areas of Gea Beige had to go up after the front was completed.


The finished fireplace. We love it! Later on we need to seal the fireplace and replace the old log set that came with the house.

An Appealing Texture

We’ve already talked about texturing the walls when the kitchen was being prepared but I thought I’d show you what it looked like in the art studio and living room since they were a little more fiddly to do.
The art studio has a window, which had to be covered up. Then there was the light shelf which made the texturing a bit more awkward than just having a flat wall. Plus since we were keeping the wooden floor, that had to be covered up so it didn’t get sprayed. Before the texture dries it can be washed off but it’s messy and it's less trouble to mask what you want left untouched.

The living room was very awkward for various reasons. Again, the floor had to be covered up as well as the large window which looks out onto the back garden. The fireplace also had to be covered as we’d already started changing that (more about that next time).
We had decided not to keep the baseboards in the living room because of the changes we’d made to the doorway (we would have to patch it where we’d blocked up the doorway, plus it was quite bunged up) and we also took out the molding around the art studio entry. But we did keep the molding around the openings to the kitchen and dinning area and the crown molding along the top.
Mr. Remodel likes the molding while Mrs. R does not. So we compromised and kept some of it. But more of that another time. The molding’s bearing on this part of the work relates to the fact that we had to cover it up so it wouldn’t get sprayed. We also had to put plastic across the openings to the kitchen and dinning area, and across part of the ceiling. It all made quite a plastic squishy sound whenever you walked past it.


As soon as it dries we will be ready to start painting.

Mud Bath (& Living Room etc.)

With the upstairs guest bathroom and the kitchen now completely and totally and utterly finished it was time to move onto the other rooms downstairs. These are: the art studio pour moi; the master bedroom; the master bathroom; and the living room. When we last saw these rooms, (before we shifted our priorities to the kitchen) new drywall had been installed where needed and those areas were now ready for mudding and texturing.

You might remember that we had the kitchen installed by Mr. Installer and that we didn’t have a great deal to do so you might wonder why we were not busy working on other areas of the house? It would be nice to have done so but there were times when we had no room to work because the other rooms were often filled up with too much stuff.


For example the kitchen cabinets and what not filled up not only the living room but also the art studio, and part of the master bedroom. The art studio also held bathroom sinks, tile and other materials that were destined for the master bathroom.
It wasn’t until all the kitchen materials were installed that we could move some of the other materials into the middle of the living room and work on the walls in the other rooms.

Since it is has been a while, here is another look at the downstairs remodel plan.


That done, it’s time to get mudding.

In the living room.


In the master bedroom.


In the master bath.


In the art studio.


The picture above shows a little innovation that Mr. Remodel is creating for Mrs. R. Mrs. Remodel wanted to have the downstairs room as an art studio but lighting in that room was an issue. It is better in the summer months up to a point and pretty dismal in the winter after 7am. So Mr. R built this shelf to hide four fluorescent lights which would shine onto the ceiling and thereby reflect into the rest of the room, flooding it with a bright and even light.

Threshing About

Today we are taking another (and probably the last) step back to see a couple of final steps that were needed to completely and utterly finish the kitchen.
It probably goes without saying that the threshold for the door from the kitchen to the garage was funky and needed to be replaced. Another reason was the kitchen floor was now higher due to the tile installation and the old threshold had been fitted for flatter vinyl flooring.
As with almost every other job in the house, it took much longer and cost more than we were expected. It had become a given regardless of what the job was.
Mr. Remodel bought a threshold but it wouldn’t fit as is so there followed much cutting, adjusting, trips back to the shop for advice, and more cutting and adjusting.


There is a piece of wood at the bottom.


Followed by a custom wood threshold piece made by Mr. Remodel.


Followed by the rubber shop-bought but customised threshold piece.

The first time it was fitted together, it at too high so the door wouldn’t shut properly. After Mr. R took it all apart and cut the wood down a smidgen and put it all together again it looks and works well.

The last job to finish in the kitchen was to put in the new door surround and paint the door white. We had discussed whether to put a new door in here as well as in the rest of the house but decided to forgo the expense. It’s a fire door and so would be more expensive than the other doors we’d bought. We took a chance that a new surround and a few coats of paint would be enough.


This is the door without a surround and reminds us the original kitchen colour.


Even just with a bare new surround it is looking better already.


We think we made the right choice.

Dishing the Dirt

Some decisions have very small effects on your life. What you have for lunch usually isn’t a big deal unless you eat something that’s contaminated with some sort of nasty bacteria. Who you choose to marry is up there on big life effects. Buying a dishwasher is one of those decisions that you generally don’t expect (or at least hope) will be a big deal.
Appliances are generally supposed to be timesaving products, which is why we buy them. Unfortunately, there are occasions when the time they save you gets used dealing with the product’s company who refuses to quickly and adequately deal with the appliance when it has a problem.

Mrs. Remodel expressed interest in a Maytag dishwasher to match the new stove, fridge, and microwave we were buying at the same time. But Mr. Remodel thought the GE had better features in their model with a latch opening. The reason Mrs. Remodel needed a dishwasher with a latch opening was that she found it easier to open with her dodgy neck than the models with handles. Mr. Remodel’s opinion prevailed and the GE model was ordered, delivered and installed.


Five minutes after it was installed we realised that there was a rust hole in the stainless steel interior wall. We called GE and they said a technician would be sent. He came, pronounced it was a manufacturing defect and that GE would call us after the weekend to arrange a replacement.
Well GE didn’t call so we called them. They said that they didn’t think it was a manufacturing defect that we would have to keep the one we had since they weren’t going to replace it. They also said that the technician didn’t say what we said he said.
We were able to reach the technician and he said that he HAD reported that it was a manufacturing defect and that GE had over-ruled him. Which means? That’s right. GE LIED to us.
So we called them back and told them what the tech had said and they still would not budge. We would have to put up with the damaged dishwasher they sent us and it was tough on us. So there. (They didn’t actually say those exact words but that is what their attitude and decision said to us).


So we called Home Depot and asked them to lean on GE, which they did. GE was supposed to call us but we ended up having to call them again.
Finally after many calls, a new dishwasher was ordered for us and a delivery date arranged. But when it arrived and the outer box removed, one corner was smashed. So after several more days of calls and more calls to the company, another dishwasher was ordered and sent. This one looked fine and so actually got installed. But the motor made a disturbing noise and it wouldn’t work properly so it was removed and taken away in disgrace.


At this stage, even Ms. GE Lady that we were dealing with couldn’t believe we needed to have a fourth dishwasher delivered. When the fourth dishwasher did arrive it looked fine and upon installation, it appeared to work correctly. To date it still works and seems to do a good job.


Even so, I am less than happy with GE and it’s interpretation of customer service. There was no real apology and they only did something because a major distributor of their products made them do it. In addition, the mind boggles that it took four dishwashers to get one that wasn’t damaged or non functional. Were we just unlucky or does the company have some serious quality inspection issues at the end of the production line?

Best Fronds

Well dear readers Mrs. Remodel back from Europe having had a totally spiffy time with family and friends. Now that the unpacking, washing, and pile of post has been dealt with, it is time to return to the tale of the remodel. This has been continuing while I was away thanks to the hard work, dedication, and lack of available vacation time of Mr. Remodel.

For the first posting upon my return, I thought I would start small (mostly because I have to catch up with where I was in the tale before I left).

I am also taking a small step back to show you a further development in the guest bathroom upstairs, which was unveiled as the first finished room. To be honest it wasn’t quite finished but was good enough to show it off. However, the final detail has now been added so here is the room again – completely finished.


If you are going to do a little grass shack then you have to have some grass or at least some palm fronds which are used for the roof in traditional Polynesian buildings. You might remember that our ‘finished’ room didn’t have any – until now.