Tag Archives: stone floor

Looooong Weekend…

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So, three whole days working on the house, we’ve made progress, but of the preparatory sort rather than interesting sort so I apologise sincerley for the dullest entry to date!

In no particular order…

1. Painted the lounge windows, three coats and counting! I came across a photo from Christmas 2013 earlier, it looks so different now…and the tree hides the worst of it! 

 2. Painted the cloakroom, white, in preparation for our photos to be put up…maybe next weekend? 

3. Grouted the cloakroom floor. We hope to get it cleaned and sealed during the week.

 4. Masticed (it’s a new word, ok?!) the floorboard gaps in the lounge. We matched the colour to the wood, it needs another sanding, another coat of colour and then we start on the yacht varnish.  The mastic will be invisible after all that and will really help with the insulation of the room, and, it leaves little smiley faces on your fingers!

 

5. Dad and I painted the support under the bay window, after it had insulation added. 

6. Finished painting coving in hall. 

Over and out for this week, hopefully some prettier photos soon!

Where Did January Go, Again?

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This time last year my post was entitled ‘Where Did January Go?’ And a year on, it’s happened again! It’s been nearly three weeks since my last post, oops. We’ve both been ill with coughs and colds, so progress has been slowed – and let’s face it, it’s hardly rapid at the best of times.

Anyway, on with the positives, I’ve had another day class on my dreaded upholstery project, amazingly though I came home and worked some more on it, I only need to put the back panel on and I’m done!

We started the grouting of the kitchen floor yesterday, which we should have done about a month ago, but sometimes life just gets in the way. Turns out grouting floors is a lot more time consuming than expected.

2015/02/img_5135.jpg As the tiles are so deep we’d half filled the gaps with the runny adhesive left-overs, this has made the grouting easier, but still takes forever. We found it was best to discount the manufacturers instructions on drying time and leave the grout for a good few hours before attempting to smooth and clean up. There’s a quick before, during and after above. I’ve pushed an 1888 penny which we found under the floorboards of the bedroom into the grout where the dining area wall meets the floor, it’s joined by a 2013 coin, the year we moved into the house.

2015/02/img_5138.jpg We’ve no idea where the old coin came from, but feels like it should stay in the house having been here so long, it’s certainly here for keeps now!

We’ve also started planning the downstairs cloakroom, viewers of a nervous disposition look away now.

2015/02/img_5136.jpg We love to travel, and this room is going to be our little adventure gallery…with a chandelier and vintage mirror. Probably.

Ceilings, Floors and Something For The Wall…

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There’s been quite a lot going on this week, we finally have the central heating installation booked to commence a week tomorrow. In preparation we collected our beautiful school style radiator for our bedroom from Coventry Demolition. It’s amazing…Given the choice I’d have these everywhere, but Ronnie (aka the budget police) has put his foot down and we’ll be having ‘normal’ radiators throughout the rest of the house…boo!

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The main job this week has been replacing the kitchen ceiling after we took it down to run electrics and insulation through. This was a job we’d put off as we thought it would be a nightmare, in truth, it was fairly painless. The plasterer has finished phase one, and left his tower with us until we’re ready to complete the library & attic conversion, so that bit of kit came in handy, he also recommended getting some props, we’d thought these would make the job easier, but dismissed the idea expecting them to be really expensive, they are actually only around £20, so if they are never used again, we’ve had great value from them! First task was to mark, measure and cut the boards, inc. apertures for spot lights.

IMG_3650.JPG Once these were cut, they were manoeuvred into position by Dad and I, held by the props, while Ronnie tacked them to the joists.

IMG_3651.JPG We had to make a few additional cuts here and there, but the whole job only took a morning. Last job for now was to scrim tape the joints and put on some plaster. We need to repeat this a couple of times until we’re ready for mist coat.

IMG_3653.JPG Ta da! It’s made a huge difference and the room already feels brighter and warmer.
In the cloakroom and lobby, we’ve got the ceilings ready to take pipework during the forthcoming heating installation. I’ve spent this afternoon stuffing in more insulation to any gaps.

IMG_3657.JPG We’ve received the beautiful stone for our kitchen floor, it’s currently sitting outside, we were planning on having this fitted professionally, but as we (I) blew the budget on the stone, we’re thinking of fitting it ourselves. You’ll notice there are a few of the stones broken…we don’t talk about that, it wasn’t me is all I’m saying!

IMG_3656.JPGIn the lounge and hallway we’ve been beavering away working on the cracks in the ceiling and preparing the coving and plasterwork for painting, it’s looking good! More on that next week. Finally for this week I bought a gorgeous kiko frame which I’ve been trying to find for a while, strangely enough I found one on Ebay. Mine was from Indico-Wendy and I love it.

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