Annual Leave - Let's do this 🤸

So I've got 3 weeks off work and a long list of "things to do". First and foremost is getting the cabinets, doors and drawers painted. 

If I could only make a decision on paint color and stick to it, things would progress a lot quicker. Shane has been working away from home so I'm pretty much left to my own devices. 

I'm paranoid of course of getting paint on my beautifully laid laminate planks so I taped up the edges, layed newspaper where I could and made use of a drop sheet whilst shuffling around.

Undercoating plywood is the most non gratifying task. As therapeutic as spreading honey on dry wholemeal toast. 🍞🍯 2 coats and a sand down inbetween. Watch out for splinters ✔️.

Ready for colour.

Stop procrastinating.  Use custard and mustard, no use mint and menthol OK use both.

I got the 2 top coats on the lounge bed and cabinets.  Lucky I taped up that floor.  There was no way I could have gotten a straight clean line without getting it all over the floor.

After pulling up the tape, I nearly had a fit.  The paint had gotten under the tape and was . . . . . . . stuck to the floor. The master painter would have a lot to say about this fiasco.

😮

I picked at it with a screw driver and it was chipping off. Yeh ! Eventually after 3 hrs lying on my side and picking at the edges and the grooves of the laminate with a sewing unpicker it was clean of paint.

The master painter was SO IMPRESSED ! He never suspected a thing. 

😉

Doors and Drawers

This took forever.  The Semi Gloss paint just wouldn't cover the white.  I even managed to mix up some of the door colours and had to repaint them.  It took 2 full days with 2 coats of undercoat and 5 coats of colour. But they look awesome if I don't say so myself. 

I found the piece of fancy panelling on a clearance table at Bunnings.  It adds a romantic touch to the cabinets I think 👍 

I can safely order the benchtops now which will take a couple of weeks so will have some time up my sleeve to get back to making curtains.

Splashback

No fancy splashbacks this time around.  Sorry Eugenie, your'e getting floor panelling on your wall.  

The kitchen wall is not the sturdiest of material due to the area where there had been leakage and had been repaired by the previous owners and also by us when it leaked through the window just after we had patched and filled it ready for painting.

Being an old hand at cutting flooring to size I attacked this job full on only to come unstuck on the first turn.  It took a few goes to get the measurements correct, taking into consideration the pop rivets and joins that it has to cover over.  The beading around the window isn't real straight either but I got there in the end.  I haven't glued them on yet.  I will wait till the benchtops arrive and see how they look against them.  I may have a change of heart and I may have had just a little peak at Tic Tac Tiles on ebay . . . . . . .

So those late nights on Ebay paid off.  I sent away for 2 different colours and chose the cream colourway.  I procrastinated for a few weeks as we have had a lot of rain lately and I was concerned that the leak under the kitchen window would rear its ugly head again.  But we were all good to go. Ive cut them and stuck them on loosely with Painters tape. So Eugenie got her Tic Tac Tiles afterall.  

Wallpaper

The pattern I chose for the wallpaper and the paint colours have always seemed right to me but when it came down to actually putting the wallpaper on the wall I started doubting my creative self. Was it going to clash with the patterned curtains ?  Would it make the "bedroom" too small ?  So one panel at a time . . . just to see how it looks. Shane put up the first drop on the back of the wall.  It looked OK.  The rest of the wall stayed un wallpapered for nearly 2 months while I procrastinated about covering over the pop rivets, covering the whole wall or just either side of the joins.  I ended up painting the join strips in a semi gloss white and giving the pop rivets a sanding to make them smooth. 

So happy with the end result.You can't even notice the pop rivet "bumps".  It turned out just as if not better than I'd imagined. Tick that one off the list.  Next job . . . . the faux tin ceiling.

Drawers & Cupboards

Finally after two long months of heat we had a cool weekend, so I spent every spare minute working inside Eugenie, with my main objective to line the drawers.  When we had the cabinets made, the base panel of the drawer was laminated ply but the sides were raw wood and some of the surfaces were a bit rough.  The easiest way to get around this and also to protect the surface from moisture was to apply some sort of vinyl. (I don't know what will be put in these drawers at this stage) I saw an Instagram post a few months ago of some tropical patterned contact.  I searched high and low for the post but couldn't find it so I searched Ebay and Etsy - no luck.  I was at Bunnings recently, browsing the DIY aisle when I spotted it. I purchased every roll.  You can never have too much tropical patterned contact 😀

I started off with much gusto and found it wasnt as easy as I thought it would be.  That contact is sticky stuff.  I think attaching the Tic Tac Tiles was easier.  Bent over the drawers at weird angles, sticking down and resticking and pulling it up and straightening it (the drawers were so not straight).  It took me 2 hrs to do two drawers. 😠

I wasnt till later in the morning that Shane suggested that I remove the drawers . . . . .  Duhhhh !.  I had thought of that earlier but when I tried to pull them out they wouldn't release and me being independent and stubborn, I didn't want to admit that I was struggling.

After 8 hrs of contacting over two days I had 2 rolls left over.  Hmmmmm what can I do with this ? That cupboard looks like it needs a visit to the tropics too.