Jewelry For The Doors and Doing the Floors

Our floor refinishing situation is coming along quite nicely. We are doing it a little bit at a time.  

(these are the spots on the floor from removing a goofy doorway configuration and restoring it back to a wider opening)

Each step of the way we need to let things dry out before progressing to the next step.

Below are the first three steps of ripping off the glued down carpet section on each side of the doorway, then removing the glue with the product called "Undu" adhesive remover. It's some really great stuff! Then we had to let it dry. Next, we took turns taking the sanders and working our way down to the raw wood. 

Take note- all of that is done on our KNEES or on our BUTTS! 

This evening I started doing a small section at a time with stain. It's better to do a little bit each time in subsequent coats than all at once. That way I don't get it too dark. Each time I was letting it soak in and then wiping it off. 

We will see tomorrow, in the light of day, if I have it dark enough. Then I have to let it dry good before I add a layer or two of satin polyurethane. 

I've done this before at our house in Chilton, as well as on the half bath doorway in this house. Small steps give good results. 

Half bath:

We need to wait a few days before we can actually install the French doors. Steve needs to plane off the side edges of the doors about 1/4 of an inch on each one to make them fit properly. He is going to borrow his dad's electric planer and it will take a couple days to get it over here to use it.  

So in the meantime, he's fixing on a couple other little projects. Near the front door there were two areas of plaster that needed to be repaired. So he worked on that yesterday. After it was dry I took care of painting them.

Steve has been under the weather for a couple days with a horrible head cold. So far, knock on wood, I haven't gotten it. I have been making him soup, making him drink juice, and stay in his jammies.  It's been a struggle, that is for sure. So our outdoor projects are put on hold for a while. If we can do a few little inside things, then we still feel productive.

While we were waiting for the ordered french door hinges to arrive, I decided to try something on the bright brass caming pieces between the beveled glass. I wasn't nuts on the bright brass, especially when everything else in our room is either oil rubbed bronze or dark brown.

First I tried a couple Sharpie liquid paint pens in deep gold and brown. The gold looked the same thing as the brass to begin with. The brown had a very decidedly pinkish mauve tone color to it. It wasn't very brown. 

So I thought and I thought. I figured maybe a good enamel paint would work. Then I thought some more. I happened to look down at my newly polished toes from my pedicure the other day. Eureka! What about using dark brown enamel fingernail polish!?! 

It's enamel paint, it's a bugger to get off anything that it ever gets on to, and the bottle has a perfect little neat brush for easy application.

Why not?

I hopped in the Saturn and buzzed on over to DollarTree and Dollar General. I finally found the right color at Dollar General. We live in a small town and we only have a couple choices. Or else travel 30 miles to the nearest Walmart.

This is turning out excellent!

I bought three bottles so I have some on hand for any touch-ups. It seems to be sticking perfectly and doesn't rub off. It's slow going but I managed to get most of one door done today before I lost good daylight. I will do more tomorrow. It's easier to do while the doors are still flat on the saw horses out in the garage.

We are having some unusually warm days up to 60 degrees, so it's perfect to sit there in the garage, with some nice music playing, and paint the brass strips of these doors with little fingernail polish brushes.

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Later this afternoon, the mailman dropped off a special package. When I ordered the new door knobs, I also placed an order for some of the smaller cabinet knobs too.

It's beautiful "jewelry" for my bi-fold closet doors and the cabinet in the bathroom!

There are sparkling and beautiful. Steve felt good enough to grab the drill and start making the larger holes necessary to mount these in place of what we had before.

Here are the bi-fold cabinets in our master bedroom, and there is another set in the office room. They just had plain old white ceramic door knobs. Pretty boring.

Wowzers! Now they sparkle and shine,  

with a little touch of class... errr glass? 

I ordered four more extra knobs to go on the cabinet in the bathroom. I have a crystal chandelier in there hanging over the claw foot tub, so this just kind of adds to the ambiance of the room. LOL

While I was out and about, I grabbed a can of hammered brown Rust-Oleum paint. I had a few things that I wanted to change from black to a hammered brown. One was this lamp that we keep in the living room. The other was two locking bracket latches for the French doors. They go on the top and bottom edge of the door that can remain stationary when locked down, and they were bright brass.  Then I added in the little handle from our fireplace cubby, as well as the little matchstick holder from the side of the fireplace. Now everything has a coat of hammered brown and kind of coordinates.

Awww

Ain't that cute?

Steve thinks he's starting to feel a little bit better this evening. I sure hope so. The last thing he needs is to end up with a sinus infection or pneumonia. It's just that tough time of year when you never know if you get sick, if it's covid or not. I'm glad that he thinks he's on the upswing and coughing a lot less, and feeling less clogged up in his head. Hot steamy showers have helped, and a good night sleep last night.  He is already in bed now watching Hogans Heroes. 

Maybe tomorrow with the nice weather we will get out for a little walk around the block with the dog. There's not too many nice days left. Sure wish we were camping right now, but not if Steve was sick. So we will make do, and do a couple more projects at home instead.   The french doors will have to wait till later this week when he feels good enough to get the planer, and help his dad out with a few other projects.  He and his brother Pete are planning a "work day" at Pops to get a few things done for him.  

I have a few projects on my "to do" list that are waiting patiently. One is a loom restoration for my sister. I have it started, just ran outta time. I sure wish there were 72 hours in each day, and we only needed 8 hours of sleep!  

Speaking of that, be sure to turn your clocks back tonight, and sleep in that extra hour and smile.  In the spring, you will lose it again.  So enjoy it while you can!