Staircase inspiration

Work continues.  No great pics to throw up today so instead I'm going to post about inspiring staircases.

I love this bindweed patterned wallpaper on the risers:

Source:  Ferm Living

These are my favorites however:

Source: Sugar City Journal

I really want to find a wallpaper or stencil to mimic this.  I love the blue and white, the classic damask pattern, and the slightly unexpected surprise of it.  I am thinking wallpaper would be best to hide all the dings and dents in the risers.  It's also easiest to undo (if the risers are primed properly).  

Then I want to add dust corners.  Are you familiar with these little bits of Victoriana?  They are small metal triangles that nail into the corners to keep the dust out and look like this:

Source: Van Dyke's Restorers

Installed they look like this:

Source: 5monsters

What do you think?  Opinions?  

Spring Break, Day I

We started early this morning by running to the grocery store, after a long hiatus.  I've gotten to the point that I really hate going.  I am not a fan of the new Martin's.  Kroger is undergoing construction makes it a pain to get in and out of.  So, I've been avoiding it.  Running out of toothpaste and toilet paper made it a necessity this morning.  Then we braved the rain and made it to the South-er the James farmer's market to pick up dog food. Then it was off to City Garden for their plant sale.  Picked up several types of basil, some Greek oregano, borage (for Pimm's Cup), and a couple of different peppers.  Hopefully those will get put in this week.

After that, we came home and each went to work.  P tackled her backdoor/fridge hole area and I went down to the basement to clean up the mess I made last week when looking for round nose pliers to string crystals on those sconces I showed you last week.  That project is still in progress and hopefully I'll have pics and a post on that later on this week.  In any case, the search for the pliers illustrated the mess that was the boxes of art crap I had piled up down there.  So over the past week or so, I've been trying to unpack, organize, clean out and tidy up.  Finished that this afternoon.  Unfortunately, it's not very picture worthy.  Suffice it to say, I can now find all my stuff and have cleared off both work tables down there.

P's project does have some photo evidence.  Here's one of the earliest before pics:

This was from our earliest walkthroughs.  The doorway on the right led into the sunroom.  The one on the left is the backdoor to the back yard.  Dig the plastic pearly brown tiles, floral curtain, and yellow/brown plaid wallpaper.  YUCK!

A middling pic before we moved in. I'd primed the plastic tiles:

Once we had stripped and repainted the back door:

Last week, P got excited and did this:

And pretty soon it looked like this:

And tonight it looks like this:

The box is the old built in ice box.  Sometime in the distant past, they removed the doors and drywalled over the hole.  We knew it was still there behind the drywall because the box is still outside on the back porch.  So, P went ahead and opened it up.  We need to wire an outlet there and then slide in a beverage fridge.  Thereby honoring the original architecture, but with a modern twist.  If we still had the original doors, we would have restored it, but they were long gone.  

I'm going to try and post at least once a day this week with updates on our progress, so keep checking back.

Spring Break To-Do List

1. Finish stripping banister, sand spindles, caulk everything, prime and paint risers, baseboards, and spindles, stain banister and decide top coat (wax?).
2. Insulate old door to patio from new bathroom and install bead board in old screen door. (pics to come). 
3. Caulk joints on the balusters on terrace and paint. 
4. Address giant hole in the wall in the kitchen. 
5. Pick up paint deck from Ben Moore and start deciding colors for guest room, foyer, vestibule, and master bedroom. 
6. Measure powder room for wall paper. 
7. Price out planned shelving unit for sunroom (inspiration here). 
8. Kill weeds and remove debris from hillside in front. Plant hill with herbs and strawberries. 
9. Drink lots of cold beer. 

More Miscellany

The long slog on the banister continues.  It's not fun and exciting and it's even more boring to photograph.  So, no pics of the staircase right now.  I will confess, I only work on it sometimes.  I'm not there scrubbing and stripping and sanding every weekend.  I have to gird my loins, wrists, and fingers and force myself to work on it every few weeks.  BUT, that will change when spring break rolls around.  I am planning to dedicate my week to finishing up the staircase.  I want that puppy stripped, cleaned, sanded, stained, caulked, and painted by week's end.

But, I have been out thrifting and doing some other fun projects.  I suck at taking pictures and the iPhone isn't any better at it, but I'm not a professional getting paid the big bucks...so, we have crappy pictures.

I found two of these candle sconces at Goodwill for $3.  Primed and painted, they will look great somewhere.  The bobeches have holes in them so I'm going to need to find some crystals.  Black ones perhaps?

I helped my neighbors with some planting issues they were having and in return they gifted me a vintage globe that they had a double of.  I've been wanting one for a while and took it with glee!  And painted that sucker with some chalkboard paint.  Now look at it!

I have also been picking up lots of frames.  I have a project in the works that I'll show you later once it's finished.  But since I had the chalk board paint out...(dangerous words)

I've already confessed to you my thing for chairs.  I have an equally rabid thing for lamps.  I love them.  I love to pick up a cool lamp at a thrift store and rewire and paint it and make it totally cool and unique.  Cool lamps are also prohibitively expensive.  I bought this brass lamp at the thrift store because of it's cool shape.  I rewired it and picked up a shade (it's a bit too big for it) and painted it with some spray paint I had on hand.  I like it!  I have a few more to show you but I haven't taken any pics of those yet.

And I've been framing and hanging art around.  Yes, I'm ignoring the fact that most of the walls haven't yet been painted, only primed.  I was sick of looking at blank walls:

I'm hoping to pick up a CraigsList couch soon so that I finally have some where to sit in my living room other than my half a dozen mismatched chairs.    

I really should start an etsy store to sell some of this stuff cause I don't have enough room for it all.

AND, I finally hung up this awesome, wonderful quilt a dear friend of mine made for me.  I just love it!