Sunday

 

This afternoon we painted the trim under the roof, the attic vent, and the window sills with Chantilly Lace.

I worked high and John worked low on the trim.

Nice and bright with one coat. It was a nice 82 degrees. Then we got busy and painted the first coat of Swiss Chalet on the walls.

 John did the rolling and I did the cut in. We didn't completely finish, but we came close. We'll pick up the rest on the second round. I took this picture late in the afternoon so it's hard to see the color. 

Saturday

 

We caulked all of the cracks in the stucco on the upper level. Then we rolled primer where we had caulked and removed paint.

John figured out how to position the paint tray on the edge of the gutter to keep his roller fresh and speed up the process.

It was a beautiful day to paint.

It was a perfect 75 degrees once we got started.

We got our stretching exercise.

We primed the corner I spackled yesterday and covered the new stucco where the A/C wall unit used to be one more time.

I put another coat of primer on the stains and where the previous paint had worn thin along the ground and  a few feet up.

The upper portion and lower portion are now in good shape and ready for painting of Swiss Chalet. I think we'll start with the Chantilly Lace trim at the edge of the roof, the attic vent, and window ledges.

Friday

 

Cold day. It was 47 when we woke up and only got up to 63 degrees. The wind was blowing at 11 mph, so it felt even colder. Today's project was to spackle the corner on the southeast wall that was damaged from corrosion. 

The cavity was so deep that I did it in stages. 

I think it looks much better and is now sealed against the elements. It will be ready to be primed tomorrow along with the upper portion of the south wall that we had to scrape and pressure wash again.

Temps return to the mid-70s.

Wednesday

 

Our plan today was to paint primer on the damaged part of the upper wall where we pealed loose paint off. We thought we could finish before lunch. We had a system: I got the roller filled with paint and handed it to John to roll. When the roller was empty, he then he handed it back to me to repeat. It kept us from having to run up and down the ladder.

It was going well until it wasn't.

The roller started picking up old wall paint further than we had already exposed. There was more algae under the old paint, meaning it had to come off.

We abandoned priming on the upper wall. We had more scraping and pressure washing to do.

While John scraped the upper wall, I primed the lower wall.

Then I cut in at ground level using our 36" painting blade. I removed the hose holder so that we could paint under it.

I partially disassembled one of the gutter downspout to get to the damaged corner and more loose paint.

What a mess.

After lunch, John decided to use the pressure washer to speed up the paint removal process.  It was hot as blazes on the south side of the house, even though it was only 81 degrees.

The patch of bad paint got bigger and bigger.

We discovered that the original paint color was pink! Not surprised.

Finally, John got to good paint. I'd say about 40% of the old paint came off. But that's good. Our primer will have a good base. We did one more cleaning of the patch with the detergent and rinsed.

For this damaged corner, I applied Ospho which coats metal and prepares it for painting. (The corner bead is made of metal.) It needs to sit for 24 hours. Then I can prime and spackle this gap.

Our paint brush holder arrived. We'll attach it to our paint extension pole, insert a brush, and use it to paint the cut in for the tall parts we can't reach with the ladder when we get to that step.

"Amped Up" is the leading candidate for the front door color. (The darkest one on the right.)

Tuesday

 

The new paint is settling in.

It looks more blue in real life.

We think it works in Florida. 

Here are the door colors under consideration.

We're happy with the paint job.

We moved to the south side yesterday with a pressure wash. Today, we scraped and peeled loose paint.

John is scraping loose paint from the wall.

There were two patches on the upper portion of the roof walls that were loose.

It was blazing hot at 83 degrees this afternoon.

There was mold and algae that we pressure washed off.

This is the smaller of the two sections.

A third section is around the corner. We treated it and will let it dry before we prime over it.

Tomorrow, we will prime the rough spots.

Monday

 

We didn't quite finish the second cut in yesterday, but we finished it this morning.

There's a lot of detail on the front of the house.

A neighbor who recently had her house painted estimated that it would have cost $8,000 to have ours painted professionally.

I don't doubt it. 

We were slow but thorough.

I wouldn't paint someone's house like ours for less than $10,000, and they'd have to supply the paint and supplies.

It took us 18 days to pressure wash, scrape, spackle, prime, and paint two coats.

The next step is to work on the south side. We pressure washed it after lunch. We guessed that this would be the easiest side.

We scrubbed the gutter by hand to get the stains out.

Tomorrow, we plan to scrape any loose paint, fill cracks, and prime. John ordered a paint brush holder that goes on the end of our paint pole for cutting in at the roof peak since it's a bit out of reach of our ladder. It arrives tomorrow.