Monday, January 7, 2008

life is too short

Well, plans have changed. Remember the big hubub about refinishing the baby's room? I've decided that taking on a project of this size at this point in time is just not feasible. I was talking to the local old house guru not too long ago and recounted the pain of trying to refinish my wood. After he learned the wood was originally painted, I grinned in agreement when I heard the words "life is too short". The decision had already been made, but it made me feel a little better about my wasted effort.

Basically there is no way I can work on this room in such a short period of time with a pregnant woman in the house. Despite my efforts to block off the room & work on it only when my wife was out of the house, it proved to be a bit too much. For those out there considering this, trust me, it's no easy task. Several days of my doing nothing else but working on that room yielded nowhere the progress I anticipated. Alas, such is life. As a bit of consolation, the wood is definitely paint grade. I found some dark streaked wood and knots. So I'm not going to lose too much sleep over it..

Maybe someday, but as of now it ain't gonna happen. I still plan to work on the downstairs refinishing, so don't fret.. There's still much wood to scrape. Instead I've decided to refocus my energy to work on the cracks in the plaster walls. First course of action is opening up the cracks a bit. You can see some quarter sized holes. Those will have to be patched up several layers thick to prevent any future cracks. Actually at the time of this writing, I just finished putting the 3rd layer of joint compound in the cracks. Next, some quick sanding and I'm ready for paint. This is good..

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I used to have a 1908 Denver square (I live in Denver, CO). Anyway - the trim in your house was never meant to be stained. Pine trim was only meant to be painted when it was used in your house. Soft woods were paint grade and only hardwoods were stained. Relax.

Omar said...

I've seen plenty of pine trim that was originally stained in my neighborhood, including this house. Hardwoods are easier to work with though -- they don't blotch as easy. However, as long as you use a wood conditioner or similar method, you can minimize that problem. But yeah, I'm over trying to refinish the wood in this room. I plan to concentrate on the rooms that were originally stained/shellacked.