Clean Walls

My mom came to visit recently. Her time with us is usually spent in a semi-vacation mode but this time was different. My goal was to get projects done. One of the much needed items on the list was to do paint touch ups all around the house.  

Once upon a time, when I only had one child, I repainted entire sections of our walls every 3-4 months. Young children and husbands who can resemble rhinos turn white walls into brown walls with multi colored smudges. But I was diligent and our house was pretty much immaculate. I was quite proud of my accomplishment. Then I got pregnant with our second. No paint fumes allowed. Then we had a newborn. No paint fumes allowed. Then I had a toddler. No paint fumes allowed. Then I looked at our walls and was very embarrassed.....

My mom was going to do the painting but I found her scrubbing the walls instead. They were looking pretty awesome but I was still incredulous. She then told me a story:
"In my day paint was very expensive. Only the very wealthy repainted their homes. The rest of us cleaned our walls. My mom, your grandmother, had a maid who came once a month to only clean the walls. I loved helping her. Now, we can of course afford to paint. However, I find it rather discomforting to paint over dirt instead of cleaning it." 

She was right. Some of the "dirt" on our walls was actually food from little hands. I knew some stains by heart. The thumbprint of jam. The hand print of pasta sauce. The smear of cheese from mac and cheese, etc, etc. And dare I mention the boogers? 

My mom used Bon Amie, a clean scrubbing sponge and a little bit of water to scrub off the dirt. Then she wiped the walls down with a damp clean towel until the towel came off clean with no soap residue.  The entry hallway now looks spectacular. It even looks bigger! 

I absolutely love cleaning the walls!  I can do it with the kids around, that was the major draw back to painting. It's really hard to juggle open paint containers or wet brushes with two young kids in the vicinity.  I've continued to clean other walls in the house and remain fume free.  It's been glorious! It's amazing how far we've come in one generation. 

Mending Fences

Back in November, a week after we finished painting the house and staining the fence our dog, Penny, decided she wanted to play with Sam, our neighbor's dog.  Penny is a pit/pointer mix who digs. Sam is a St. Bernard, so a large dog,  who can head butt. Between the two of them the fence almost came down right then and there!  

Fortunately, we have great neighbors and the "mending of fences"was the most civilized, organized and helpful process I've ever experienced with anyone  Right away we started strategizing about what to do, what kind of designs, when to do it and how to move forward. Breakfast! Any project can move forward with food so we planned a breakfast to plan the fence rebuild!

Image courtesy of Seed Landscapes

Over waffles, eggs with chorizo, pan dulce, bacon, apple pancakes, juice and coffee we came up with a design, a budget, a start date, job tasks, etc.  We both loved the look of the concrete wall above but quickly realized it was outside both of our budgets and time limit.  It takes permits to build a concrete wall between properties, which equals money and more time. Our neighbors just had a backyard redo and we just repainted our house. Neither one wanted extended home builds or had more money to spare. 

We also had to think about the dogs. Seeing one another is Penny and Sam's motivation to knock down the fence. We had to build something that wouldn't give them even a crack of hope! It doesn't seem that hard except that any wood you buy shrinks with time.  Plus the dogs have ALL day long to find the one little crack that we missed. Then it's game over for the fence!  

Day after Thanksgiving was set as the demo day.  And so the process began on a rainy morning.  Both of our families have two girls.  Theirs are older.  Us moms and their youngest started taking down the fence while their oldest watched our two littles.  We did really well and the rain helped loosen up the posts.  Dave came home and continued with them to demo.  And then for the next two days the two dads rebuilt the one common section between both properties. The hardest part was keeping the dogs and kids inside away from the construction.  Well, the hardest part for me anyway.  Dave would tell you otherwise. 

The fence was built but we needed to finish putting up planks on our side and staining all the new wood.  Since November our backyard view has been of this:

Half the wood dark and half of it blonde.  I think what bugged me the most was that our neatly stained fence didn't last even a week before it was mangled and now it's been like this!  

On Tuesday I finally had had it.  I started staining the fence. How hard could it be?  Well, I got to paint for about an hour before I had to go in and hang out with G who needed lunch and some attention. I got this far:

Big difference huh?! Ugh!!!  I think I got through six planks.  In my defense, I was using a paint brush and it was going slow.  

Today I tried again with roller brushes and a little free labor. P joined me and within 20 minutes we got this far! The rollers made a huge difference!

Look at my girl go!  As with most of these projects they seem like fun at first and then they're not.  It wasn't long before she was complaining but she did get quite a bit done before she went back inside. 

 The part of the fence that's up is stained.  We still have the corner to go but we also need to build a cover for the pool pump.  Dave and I are still strategizing on how to do this.  And after staining the wood I realized I'd rather stain the next set of planks before they go in.  Staining them behind the pool pump would require a contortionist. 

At least the view is now like this:

It needs a second coat. It rained the day after we finished staining. The timing couldn't have been better!  We're getting there, one plank at a time!

The Difference a Door Makes

I love the new door to our garage!  It hadn't hit me how much I love it until I was taking pictures of the girls by the pool  I'm so use to shooting them from angles where the door would be out of frame because it was so ugly. I forgot how freeing it is to just take a picture without having to frame it just right.  

This is what the door use to look like. It's in the background.  I had to search hard to find this picture. Like I said, I did everything possible to avoid having that ugly thing in any picture! I don't even want to get into the details of how it got so ugly!

So, back to our pretty place!  I really love the door when I see a picture like this:

Or a picture like this. The door is not the focal point when it's pretty. It's a beautiful background feature but when the door was ugly. It became center stage no matter how in the background it was. 

The door is actually the same door that was there before.  The painters painted it white and then added the wood slats to match the rest of our wood fencing.  It's such a huge difference and the cost was minimal compared to buying a new door and minuscule compared to buying a new modern door. That was going to cost us a pretty penny;  in the $1200 to $2000 range! It wasn't just the door that needed help. It was the framing of the door that needed some major clean up work.  Fortunately, it was all taken care of when we had the house painted.  Note to self: when hiring a painter make sure they have a carpenter on staff or they know how to do great wood working.  

New Colors!

The house is finally painted!  We're so happy, relieved and excited to have our "new" house.  With the change of colors and texture it feels like a new house.  Walking in and out of our front door feels so good, kind of like when you get an amazing new haircut.  We all have a spring in our step!

Here are a few before and after shots:

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

Here are a few other picture from the exterior.  I'm not ready to take pictures of the backyard. The painters left it really messy.  We had a few changes and  our own clean up to do. However, I'm still cleaning debris left from the two weeks of work. The painting process is a topic for another day. I learned a lot. I would do things rather different next time and I want to share/remember my experience. 

I put off doing any landscaping prior to painting. The new colors are now giving me new directions.  I've started adding and moving things here and there already. 

This is a favorite new angle of mine. The grey really makes the trees and greenery stand out.  I can't wait for the purple flowers to bloom.  

 The colors of the wood and the border of the roof ended up matching.  It wasn't my intent. I actually wanted the wood to be a bit more red. I wanted it kind of like rust so that it would almost look like corten steel.  However, when they put the sample up I really liked how it all tied together.  

A detail that makes me happy is the slatted wood at the center of our windows. They had been removed when I attempted to fix it all myself.  For almost four years it was an awful hole. Now it's back to its prime Mid Century self again!

I absolutely love the contrast of the flowers and plants against the grey and dark brown now.  The house colors made the entire garden really stand out instead of blend away.  I just love it!

All Mine!

The paint job spurred a few projects.  If you're going to go through the effort of painting you may as well do it ALL right.  Our side gate didn't get redone when we did the fencing around the house.  The rest of our property has a stylish horizontal fence but the gate continued with the old vertical wood. I decided to take this project on myself.  To be honest it took me 3 days to get it done but it took about 2 days of juggling to get materials and the gumption to use a circular saw. Well, I also must say that I needed to juggle the nanny and push off all other appointments (dentist) and needs (sitting at Pete's enjoying a good book and quality me time) to make time to build a gate.  It's not so easy for us stay at home moms.  Plus, we have a mess all around the house because of all the work.  I couldn't find things like my protective eye gear, working gloves or wood screws so easily.  I ended up buying new wood screws.  It's these stupid, redundant purchases that hike up the cost of projects. I hate buying anything twice. But in the essence of time I had to do what I had to do.

This past week I was finally ready: tools in hand, measurements done, nanny set and so I tackled the gate door.  I ended up asking our painter how to use the circular saw and I saw the look of fear on his face.  He did the cuts for me...out of pity, out of fear. I lied and told him I had less pieces to cut than what I actually did so I could cut some wood myself.  I do have pride you know.  And let me tell you it was the best feeling ever.  I still fear the saw like nobody's business but at the time I grabbed the bull by the horns and did it! As P says "easy peasy lemon squeezee"!

I started out the project having peaceful time to myself as Dave took the girls to school.  I got as far as making all the cuts before he returned with Gemma.  He gave me another hour but I knew he had to be at work so I felt under the gun. I hate working under a time constraint...specially when doing something new. I make careless mistakes.   But I did manage to get one of those anti-sagging tension things on the back side of the gate and 5 boards up before he came out and said I had another 15 minutes.  I got a another two boards up.  

The real juggle began as I continued putting boards up while tending to 18 month old Gemma. She doesn't wander off but she does want to do EVERYTHING I'm doing.  She was incredibly helpful;  she passed me screws and held the opposite side of each board as I screwed it in.  She was incredibly unhelpful;  she dumped out multiple boxes of screws into one giant pile and moved the drill bits around in the mud.  But through it all she seemed to have fun and like my dad taught me, building is not just for the dudes.  She is becoming comfortable with power tools.  I love that!

I finished the gate in one day.  Once I had all my ducks in a row it took about 2 hours.  It feels so good to know that as long as we are here I can say "I built my own gate".  I will look at that gate everyday and know I did that!  It's a great feeling.  

One of the painters cracked me up. He came over to tell me the gate looked good. And then he said "I didn't think you were really going to do it. You've been walking around that wood for days just looking at it but not touching it!"  I told him I had to face my fear of the saw and do something with the kid.  We laughed.   

The pictures here will give you a little sneak peak into the new color scheme of the house.  As of today the house is basically done. There are a few details....important details that will get finished next Saturday.  I also have a huge trek ahead of me to clean up, throw away and reorganize things outside.  And then and only then will I take pictures!

Out with the Old

Our house is finally getting painted.  It's been a long project in the works, from thinking about it, selecting colors, saving for it and finding the right man for the job.  Every time were ready something else of the utmost importance popped up.  We had insulation put in back in May (where the holes came from).  At the time we didn't have money to paint so for four months we lived in a polka dotted house. Funny....not so funny.  

We loathed the texture and color of the house since the day we moved in. We should have had it painted from the start but we had grand plans for construction and add on space.  Our eyes were bigger than our wallets.  Our plans of what to do have also changed in the six years since we've been here.  The first thing to do had to be the paint and texture.  My soul was hurting every time I came home.

During one of it's previous flips, the house had gotten a horrendous coat of stucco.  It would have looked like a frosted wedding cake if it was white. Fortunately, the brilliant fools who redid the property didn't know how to apply stucco.  It was falling off in sheets on just about every wall. You can really see it on the picture below. The dark part is the old stucco.  Unfortunately, the entire house wasn't done the same way. The windows were not flush to the exterior walls so they grated the difference down with cement.  Cement was also used in other places to make up for bad architecture.  

Fortunately for us, our painter Martin knew how to make it all right. He is in the picture below with Dave discussing all our house issues.  We found Martin from a friend who is a prop master with the most equisite taste and amazing craftsmanship.  I need to post pictures of the house he redid. It's just amazing.  So, if anyone is good enough for Sebastian then they are good enough for me. 

My inspiration for the new colors was a house I saw on the west side.  I prefer dark colors but with our summer heat it's not ideal. This color scheme could work because of the white and dark used.  Perfect for our form and needed function. 

Another thing that bothered me about our original color scheme was the lack of contrast.  In the back yard specially, I felt I looked out into a sea of hot stone.  The fence and floor are essentially the same color. In the summer all I feel is heat.  The wood fence needed to get restained as well and a good contrast is what I wanted.   

Over the last six years I have strategically taken pictures so as to frame out the really awful parts of the house.  I couldn't always do it but I know I never fully revealed the awfulness of how we were living.  But now that the end was in sight I took many pictures to document the before. Here they are. And the after is soon to come!

House Colors

In recent pictures it's pretty evident our house needs to get painted.  In person it's been evident for about 5 years now and definitely for the last 3.  Three years ago I fixed the wood on the south side windows and beams. I planned on painting the frames and then the house.  

My dad got very sick and passed away three years ago. I remember working hard to varnish and protect the wood before I left for Florida. It was January, the rainy season was hitting hard and I wanted, at the very least, to keep the wood from rotting.  My dad passed away on that visit.  When I got back the last thing I thought about was painting.  It's all stayed the same since.  There's been a number of pregnancies and miscarriages in these last three years.  I feared being around any kind of paint fumes.  Then we were blessed to have Gemma, who is happy and healthy thank God. Painting again has been the last of my worries. 

However, with the installation of insulation...that's a mouthful, we're now at the point of no return. We need to have the house painted!  I've started getting estimates. Everyone has a different opinion about what the house needs.  Plaster, stucco, some sort of latex covering, sand blast, take it down to the studs, etc. etc. There's definitely more than one way to skin a cat.  

There's a few things on my mind with this job.  One is our budget.  Two, is that no matter how much stucco or glue or plaster you use on these houses they all crack.  This neighborhood is built on basically a sand foundation. Every single house in this hood has cracks. Big ones. Doors open in one season and get suck in another.  Sounds awful right? Well, the flip side is that when the earthquakes hit these houses have minimal damage.  They shift and handle the movement.  So, I'll take the cracks over big damage.  Everyone suggest fixing the cracks but it's not a big thing for me. In fact, I consider it money down the drain. 

Anyway, I have a few ideas on the colors. It has to be a light colored house. Our summers are God-awful.  I don't want a color that soaks in the heat, although I really wanted a dark brown.  Also, the window frames are white. We can't change their color or the color of the roof and the lip that comes down off of it. The roof is a dark brown.  I'm also taking into consideration the wood element all around our house. I'm not sure I can afford to do the fence as well as the house at this point but I hope to have the whole house looking super spiffy in a year's time. So the pictures here are some reference ideas of what I want. I have a vision in my mind. Lets see how well it executes! 

The House is My Canvas

This is how we roll on a Tuesday afternoon. We had 40's French music playing. Annika was hot and decided to only wear her bloomers while she drew on the fire place.  I'm on the couch laughing and cheering Annika on as she does the funniest dance! These are the days I'll be most proud of when I look back at the time I spent with my girls.  


I mentioned before that we had a problem with the fireplace.  I don't want to have it plastered and painted with a baby in the house.  There would be too much toxic stuff in the air and I don't want to go through the hassle of having to explain to people why this is important to me.  I always get the "you'll be fine, the baby will be fine" and then I tell them my concerns and they have no idea what I'm talking about because they've never read and understood the ingredients in a can of paint. 


So, until we go forward with a renovation I decided we should have fun with this space.  I got big fat Sharpies and we've been drawing on the wall. I know it's nuts. The best is watching people react to it when they walk in the house.  Most don't get it.  Oh well.  We're enjoying this freedom. I mean who gets to write on the house walls for Pete's sake?!?!

Exterior Color?...

I've been thinking about paint colors for a while.  It's the next big thing to happen to the house. Dave and I always had a dark brown in mind.  After a couple of summers we're thinking that might not be the best idea.  We're working against two major factors:  no insulation in the walls and our inability to plant trees where we need them to block the summer sun. Adding a color that sucks in the heat is probably one of the worst things we could do. 

Recently I've been considering white.  But then again, I need to work with the color schemes already established.  The roof is dark,dark brown and the framing around the windows is white.  Soooooo, I have no idea.  I'd like to add a color to contrast with the white of the frames and complement the brown of the roof.  I think I'm too worried about this because I've seen other houses where the wrong shade of brown makes the house look just awful.  It's like nail polish, the wrong shade of gold will make you look like a stripper but the right one can make you look like you walked out of Channel.  

I'm also having a hard time visualizing what a color will really look like because of the current stucco on the house.  It's so awful!  Who invented this horrible technique of making a building look like it's covered in cake frosting?  Seriously!  If you change the color of the house to white it looks like a wedding cake and pink it looks like a little girl's birthday cake!  Even designer cakes don't use this kind of coating anymore!  Smooth fondant has replaced the whippie stuff! That's something else to add to the bill: re-stucco the house.  

On another note.  The house behind/beside us is now up for sale after a major re-do.  I went over one day to say hello and be neighborly.  The contractor showed me all the changes, etc  he was doing to the house (none to the Mid Century Modern taste). When I went to leave he TELLS me that they're going to paint one of our walls and landscape part of our property.  Doesn't ASK, if it's ok with me but TELLS me that's what he's going to do. I informed Dave and he talked to them.   Dave has a better way with people who have that kind of stupidity audacity.  Last week they had an open house so I went over to see the final work.  The realtor says to me "Did you see they didn't paint your wall or put plants on your side? They really wanted to." I replied in the kindest way I could "Yes, I did and I appreciate you not changing MY property." Then she started asking me how soon we're going to repaint the house and tried selling me the contractor and his services.  I can't help but laugh. 

Dwell 2011 Finds

Every year we go to Dwell I come back loaded up with brochures. I stash them on my desk until the next year or until the pile is so high I just throw EVERYTHING out. This year I had an epiphany! I have a home design blog! So instead of keeping all this stuff physically on file, in a mess in the house, I can file it here virtually for me to easily find and for you to see.

So, these were the vendors I found most interesting this year and pertained to future project on our house. It's also vendors I found in our price range, or relatively close. There were many amazing products but we don't have a million dollar house over looking the beach and a comparable budget...someday though, someday.

 Modfire:

They're based in Phoenix, Az and makers of pretty cool outdoor fire pits.

Greenform:

Modern planters made out of natural products, not plastic. Manufactured in Switzerland.

 Underearthed:

Pure natural paints, plasters and wood finishes. 100% VOC free made with fully disclosed natural ingredients.

 EIS Studio: 

They make "pebble seats" for indoor and outdoor use. They are super cool and I'd love to have a set in our front yard. Based in Venice Beach.

 

 Cerno:

LED light fixtures. Beautiful and functional light fixtures. They have a sconce i loved and could possibly work in our bedroom. Based out of Laguna Beach.

Bright Green:

An entire line of non-toxic, biodegradable phosphate and petroleum free cleaning and household products. I find it interesting they are carried by Vons, Safeway, Tom Thumb but not Whole Foods or Target. And it states what they are free of but not what they're made of. Not a good sign to me but I do want to check them out, although I'm rarely in the stores they're carried in.

A couple retail stores I liked:

 Mason Bertet:

Located on Beverly Blvd in LA and on Park Place in El Segundo they have outdoor furniture, bathroom vanities, Eco-fireplaces, home decor and tile. We almost bought a hanging egg chair right off their display. Then we decided we needed to get through our essential purchases first...although the need for that chair is starting to feel essential now. The owner was really kind which is always a bonus.

MidCentury LA:

Located in North Hollywood. I remember shopping here when I was in the film industry. We did lots of rentals from them. What drew me in to their area was a children's chair they had which was beautiful and I thought really reasonably priced: $200. Then I saw their beds, tables, etc. Always beautiful things there.

 Blu Dot:

Located in West Hollywood. Man! I love their furniture. I saw a bed, bookcases and lamps I loved. All pricey but not crazy expensive either so a few key pieces would be do-able.

Dwell felt a lot smaller than it had in previous years. I hate to say this, but except for the first year, Ive always been rather disappointed with the show. I give any event leeway for the first year.  I'd like to see the big standard vendors like DWR, Room & Board, CB2. But more important, I want to see small independent manufacturers and designers. In fact the whole showroom should be divided by these two categories: large vs small mass produce.

Ive always found the show to be hit or miss with what we're looking for. We went with friends who needed outdoor shade screens and there was not one vendor in that category. We were looking for modern kids bunk beds and we found not one vendor either. So in a way it felt like a wasted trip...except for the above finds but they are all for future projects.

This show should be THE place to see, compare and purchase all your modern furniture, materials, services etc. Instead it feels like being in Home Depot where your left with only a few selections. Except it's not by ugly default but by financial default. Meaning, in Home Depot I can skim through the isles and "say no, no, no, yes" because so many options are ugly. But at Dwell it's "no, no, no, yes" because so many options are ridiculously expensive. 

You'd think by this day and age everyone knows there is something for everyone at every price point. It's not how much you've spent on your home that makes it beautiful it's whether or not you have taste and style.  And that is something money can't buy. Well, I guess it can buy you a designer if you've got none.

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