Getting ready for company! And baseboards. #stanley90sreno week 21 progress

Getting ready for company! And baseboards. #stanley90sreno week 21 progress

• 3.06.2017

We took a huge step last week and installed BASEBOARDS. It's amazing what some white painted wood will do to a home!

Looking around the family room, dining room, and front hall, I see a home now instead of just a fixer upper house. This looks like the kind of property you want to buy!! No more ragged floorboard edges and old edges and holes exposed, now a pretty finished room ready for decor!

I have been dreading installing the baseboards but this wasn't as bad as I imagined. My generous parents came by and I took a day off work to get started. It's definitely faster than flooring and you only need one saw (chop saw) so takes less setup in the garage (though you do need the nail gun and air compressor, not great to haul around). And then there's caulking the edges--also a pain but looks SO. GOOD. when done!! Oh, we also need to touch up the nail holes--maybe when all of them are in.

I had been waiting for the baseboards to install the pocket doors we have in several rooms, but then it turns out I can't put baseboard behind the bracket because it makes the bracket stick out too far and the doors don't close. So we'll do tiny baseboard pieces outside the brackets, and I was free to install the doors that have been leaning against walls for months! Covering all the mess inside the office closet (not yet organized) and the pantry shelves made both rooms look better and lighter, reflecting the light back! Such a good feeling to get these up.

We also had company over on Saturday night which meant we cleaned. We haven't cleaned around here much, sad to say, because there are still tools and dust everywhere and no baseboards so it won't look good anyway. But we really got our act together Saturday and organized things, cleared off the mail on the dining table, put stuff back in the garage, even cleaned up our tool area which had been on the entry table, and then did a good dust and vacuum everywhere. It's so nice to be in a clean home.

We also did little things like install the dishwasher finally (just the screws; has been working fine but not mounted) and open up the vent hood box to plan for install once the backsplash is done. (Thank you, Jason.)

Stay tuned, this week I will share my kitchen backsplash thoughts and you can help me decide!