Typing with primed fingers

Hello friends!

Have you missed me? My vacation was great, thanks for asking. I'll be posting about it later today over at The Ambitious Traveler... yes, I promise to one day combine all of my blogs into one (maybe).

Today I am typing to you with primer still on my fingers, as it is the most impossible paint to remove from your hair or body. I've spent a ridiculous amount of time in my living room lately, preparing for (and then finally) painting. Let me give you the run down.

First and foremost, it was important to vacuum the walls and ceilings. The reason it is so important is because  I don't like to find paint fossils once I have finished. No, globbed up green spiders are not really my style. Following this step, I removed all of the screws, switch plates, 1990's country curtains and little window inserts that make it look like the windows have 6 panes instead of 1. Then, I removed the mold and mildew on the walls.

Now, that sounds like a ridiculous and simple task for a home that is barely 15 years old. To prove to you that it wasn't, I took this lovely, high-quality photo with my phone.

As you can guess, the top part has been cleaned, the bottom has not. Yuck.

After all of this, I patched the holes in the woodwork where the curtains had been hung, and patched the holes in the walls. There were many, of every variety.

This process took about 9 hours. Not kidding, 9 hours of prep!

Finally, (after another coat of compound on the wall holes) I was ready to prime. If you have not learned the importance of priming, let me stress it to you: PRIMING IS IMPORTANT. If you do not prime, you risk any number of things such as; the paint not ending up the right shade, the old paint bleeding through (especially true when you paint over a dark color), stains bleeding through, or, the paint not really attaching itself to the surface. If you are going to spend the time painting, do it right and prime first.

Yes, I learned all of that the hard way.

So I spent 6 hours on Saturday priming. This is how it looked:

No joke, that's all I got done in 6 hours (plus the trim on the floor, which you can't see). I was flabbergasted.  And I realized that this is going to take FOREVER.

So here we are, nearly 9 hours worth of painting later, and I have finally finished the first coat on all of the trim, the patches, and the "cutting in". As far as I can tell, I will probably need to do one more coat of primer, and then I can start actually painting. I'm hoping that when it comes time to add the color, only one coat will do the trick.

Here's another reason to prime, btw: Kilz is way, way cheaper by the gallon than Benjamin Moore. Sure, I could probably be OK with 1 coat of primer and 2 coats of "linen white" on the trim, and "iceberg" on the walls, but the difference is nearly $100. Possibly more since there are a ridiculous amount of windows and doors in this room.

Anyway, I just wanted to give you a little update and let you know that work has commenced at the new place, even if it sucks big time!