Lights

In addition to the painting and flooring changes in my living room I also wanted to change out the light fixtures. The hanging one by the door was clearly from when the house was built and looked it. The second light was very small and matches the lights in the hallway but it really did not look right in the room. Here is a look at the existing lights.

And a closer look at the small one.

I replaced them with matching semi-mount fixtures. Each one has two bulb which proves much better lighting in this area.

The next fixture to replace was the ceiling fan in the dining room. This was a new one put in just before I bought the house but was a shiny gold fixture that was probably the cheapest one they could find. Here is a look at the existing fan.

A while ago I added a ceiling fan in my living room, removing the old light fixture. I went with the same fan in this area. You would have thought it would be a simple task to just replace the fan however  when the old one came down we discovered that the proper bracket was not installed above the fan. What should have taken about an hour took most of a day including climbing in the attic to install the bracket.

Here is the fan coming down, it went to my parents house to replace their old fan which is beginning to  die.

The hole in the ceiling, we saw this for a very long time.

And here is the new fan installed. It is much more pleasant to look a at and is not nearly as gold and shiny.

Painting and Carpet Removal

The weekend following my New Year's painting extravaganza it was time to start with the living room. The big wall with tile flooring had already been painted the weekend before so now it was time for the rest of the room. The ultimate goal is to remove and replace the carpet so painting and flooring had to be coordinated.

We began Friday night by beginning to remove the molding, the goal is to reuse it if possible.

Here is a look at the before.

Once the molding came off it was time to start pulling up the carpet.

Under the carpet is a layer of foam and the tack strips.

Here is some progress.

Once the carpet, foam and tack strips were up the Dremel came out to cut off the nail heads.

The next morning we continued where we left off. 

Where the foam came up the glue and foam pieces had to be scrapped off the floor.

And the shop vac came in handy for cleaning up all of the scraps and other assorted debris. 

By Saturday evening we had worked our way almost to the other side of the room.

Eventually the carpet and foam were gone.

Sunday was time to paint. The 5 gallon bucket was still going but I added another gallon to be safe. This is after cutting the room in, it is ready to roll.

The finished room looked great. I used the semigloss paint that was left from the hallway in the bay window area. It is a high traffic area for Olive who keeps an eye on everything that happens outside.

The other side of the room painted.

Next up, lets add some flooring!