50 Shades Of Grey (Or, In My Case, Brown)

F@$&(@! S&$&%@&!! C&$@)&*$!!!

That pretty much sums up my feelings towards my home at the moment (I mean, my house is not underwater and I have power and all that, so I do have things in perspective here. But still ... not currently a fan of the place nonetheless). Why? Because I’ve spent every freakin’ moment of the past – how many months? Or has it been years now? – painting gawd forsaken doors, the trim to go around said doors and, worst of all, the baseboards throughout the entire house. And we’re STILL not done. So, yeah, I hate those mother $(@&%($&ers!

In retrospect it would have TOTALLY been worth it to hire this work out. But we’ve come too far, done too much, to turn back now. And we’re stubborn as Hell so, you know, we’ll just keep on keeping on … and hating every second of it.

It’s all part of our “do everything we can possibly do on our own ourselves” motto we’ve been following these past 2.5 years of home ownership in an effort to save up our construction dollars for things we really need professionals to do for us – like plumbing and electrical. And it really is a good plan. After all, we’re not made of money here. But, even though I sort of love feeling like Tim Taylor while I’m doing it – grunting and beating my chest with (wo)manly pride – there are some times that I kind of hate doing all this work … especially when it comes to the “non-sexy” parts of home renovations – like installing baseboards. Oh sure, I’ll gladly take a sledgehammer to a hideous bathroom vanity and install a new one because, you know, it’s pretty. But new doors? YAWN! I mean, I want them, and they do improve the overall look of the house, but they just don’t have the pizazz … the panache … that, say, some gorgeous glass tile brings to our kitchen back splash.

Nonetheless, when it comes to painting, cutting and installing trim, sexy or not, it’s something we’re more than capable of handing on our own. We have to do it ourselves. I mean, we HAVE to. It’s not in our nature to hire that type of work out. It’s like hiring a maid – we’d be paying for something we can do ourselves (but that doesn’t stop me from wanting a maid either – desperately).

And so we trudge on with it … for what seems like ages now. Because, frankly, the work never ends and there is just so, so much of it to get done. It’s like an episode of “Renovation Realities” (I realize as I type this that perhaps you are not familiar with this program because you watch actual television programs that are shown on networks other than HGTV, whereas that’s pretty much the only channel we watch. Well let me sum it up for you – people attempt home renovations. They usually do not go as planned) where you THINK something should only take a matter of days but everything drags out much, much longer than you ever imagined and slowly the project consumes your life. Seriously. This trim work IS my life right now. And, while I really wish I had a better project to show you, like a cool new fire pit in the backyard, or the swanky wallpaper I plan to attempt in the laundry room some day, or even a (more boring but functional nonetheless) shower handle to replace the one we have that’s broken despite the fact that we just installed it last week that replaced the we replaced earlier this year (did you follow all that? Basically we’re on our 4th shower handle install in the same year for the same shower) – but I don’t. All I have is some baseboard, trim and doors.

Here’s the latest project – our French doors that separate the front of the house (which we never use) from the back of the house. They’re totally not a necessary feature of the house and serve no real purpose, but we decided to paint them just for kicks (because that’s the kind of crazy, fun-loving people we are). Here’s the “before” shot of one of the scuffed up, cracked, poorly abused doors (the photo doesn't really show how beat up these are).

First we removed them from their hinges (which were brass and got immediately thrown away - the above shot was, of course, taken after they were already off their hinges) and fill all the old holes and cracks with wood putty.

Then we power sanded the patched holes and all of that shiny 80s gloss that covered the entire door. (Admittedly using the power sander does sort of make the whole project worthwhile. Damn, I love me some power tools. And, top of my list of favorite power tools is the sander - grunting Tim Taylor style some more as I type that.) And we taped all those little panes of glass – front and back.

Before applying approximately 1 bagillion (I’m rounding, of course) coats of paint to each side (that manly hand belongs to GAR not, me. I know, you're disappointed but, never fear, you'll see my model worthy hands coming up soon).

Before finally hanging them back in their rightful position in our house (using new, less offensive looking hardware). And we touched up any paint that got dinged up along the way. But, finally: Ta-da!

Aren't they simply a-door-able (see what I did there - eh?? Eh?? Funny, right? RIGHT?) - the doors and the dog, of course. And here's a shot of them closed (which they never, ever are. Remind me again why we spent weeks upon weeks redoing them? Is it because we're masochists? But they do look prettier this way - once we removed the blue painters tape, of course. Oh, and there is all this weird old yellowing glue on each window pane that we still need to exacto off - carefully - and then windex the whole thing to make it nice and clear so we're not really, really done yet. And then there's still the other door like this that separates the dining room from the kitchen ... and the one that's in the guest bedroom that leads out to the pool which we haven't even touched yet. But, see, we're so close! Relatively speaking I guess. Or, like I said before, we might just be masochists ... which, frankly, is seeming like the most plausible explanation right now).

Although we're still deciding if we should paint the front doors this same dark brown color or leave them white (and we'd love your feedback because GAR and I disagree on this issue. Correction: I would like your feedback because I think I'll win this argument because, clearly, I'm right - I just need you to back me up on this one).

So now all we have to do is the trim around these doors which is ... well, it's Hell. Picture the same process all over all again, but with 8 pieces of trim per door. But, hey, at least I get to spend some more QT (quality time) with my power sander (*grunt* *grunt* *grunt*).

And, even if once upon time I was "discovered" as America's Next Top Hand Model I sure won't be getting any gigs now that my hands perpetually look like they belong to a paint covered weathered old man.

Check out that HUGE life life on my hand (that's a thing, right? It's one of those lines I'm sure). I'll be living for a LONG time to come. Which is good, because I need about another 70 years to finish this work on my house.

But, of course, I also secretly love it. I really AM a masochist, aren't I (GAR could diagnose me sure)? But damn, it hurts so good!

So, if you need me anytime in the foreseeable future you know where I'll be (*grunt* *grunt* *grunt*).