Utterly Floored

So! While the outside of our house was in the process of being utterly painted, we were working on getting a few more things inside 'utterly' finished.

Next on the list? The downstairs floors!

While we were frantically painting the ceiling after the plasterers finished it, we didn't have to worry too much about drop sheets because the floors consisted of this basic yellow-tongue composite board.

Our goal was to try to get most of the walls completely painted too before the flooring guys were booked to come in, but there just aren't enough weekends for that So the white undercoated walls remained as the floorboards went in, and we would just have to use dropsheets or be extremely careful for the rest of the painting.

As with every decision we've made with this house, there was quite a lot of dithering involved before  coming to the ultimate choice. I knew from the start that I wanted a timber floor, to keep a bit of the Queenslander weatherboard house consistency happening from upstairs to downstairs, particularly since we opted for plasterboard instead of the VJ board walls in the extension, so we really needed to bring some timber in there.

We considered laminate flooring (on the cheaper end of the spectrum) that has a wood look about it, and although the price was good, I was struggling to come to terms with its plasticky feel. We then very briefly considered real wood floors, and then promptly scrapped that option, since it was about four times the price. After all, this is only a little granny flat under the house we're working with, not the Taj Mahal!

And then, we stumbled across bamboo.

Source

In my view, it was the perfect compromise. It's real wood rather than plastic, so it doesn't have that tinny plastic sound when you tap it with your fingernails, but because it doesn't take hundreds of years to grow (not even close) it's still very reasonably priced when compared with hardwoods. Plus, it's very renewable, which makes it more environmentally friendly. The one downside was that it only came in two colours (unless you got it stained, which we heard not-particularly-great reports about) - a very pale blonde colour, or the honey brown colour that comes from heating it and caramelising the wood a bit.

I had been hoping to come a bit closer in colour to the stain we used on the upstairs floors which was considerably darker, but we decided that we could live with the lighter colour of the honey brown for the sake of the real timber + lower cost equation.

So with the decision made and the boards purchased, the flooring guys turned up on Monday morning and snapped into action, pun intended!

And by the end of the day, we had a transformation on our hands!

How about a side by side before and after, just for fun?

It never ceases to amaze me how each little detail makes such a gigantic difference towards making it feel like a real house!

And the transformation in the other rooms was just as good. The master bedroom...

The corridor leading to the second bedroom...

And back to the lounge and kitchen.

In what was a complete fluke, the colour of the floorboards actually almost matches the colour of the kitchen cabinets perfectly, which makes everything feel very intentional and cohesive. Got to love unintentional surprises that make things look intentional!

I'm very relieved that taking a chance on a slightly lesser known product has paid off so well. I'm so happy with the bamboo. And as an added bonus, apparently it's also very hard-wearing and strong, so won't dent and chip as easily as our soft timber boards upstairs do.

Anyone else got an opinion on bamboo floorboards?

Transformation Time - Part 4 - Almost an Anti-Climax

After seeing the back, left side, and front (hooray!) of our house painted over the course of a few days, no prizes for guessing what came next.

The other side! Which was actually a bit of an anti-climax in my view, since I was still delirious with joy over the front of the house being painted, and didn't really care about anything else. Then again, I don't think I would have been particularly happy if the house had stayed like this.

Thankfully I had hired the painters to do the whole of the outside of the house, so my low level of enthusiasm for this fourth side didn't affect theirs.

And we were left with this. A fully painted house! Hooray!

It would appear that my ambivalence towards that side of the house is not a new thing. I had a lot of trouble finding in-progress shots of how it has changed over time since we bought the house. That has a lot to do with the fact that our side fence obscures most of the bottom level, so it's definitely not a very conspicuous side of the house.

Nevertheless, through sheer determination I found enough pictures to give you a little walk down memory lane for this side of the house.

And that brings us to the end of our epic house-painting week. Goodbye icky yellow house forever! Good riddance!

And don't think that because we paid painters for the outside we were resting on our laurels when it came to the inside. Stay tuned for lots more progress!

Transformation Time - Part 3 - The Best Part

The day has come! The day that the painting transformation FINALLY reaches the front of the house!

So it goes from this...

To this!

 

But let's back up a bit for all of the gory details, shall we?

First off was grinding the peeling paint off the front of the house, since it had been affected badly by the sun.

Allie and I popped our heads through the front door quickly to snap this shot, then quickly popped it shut again to escape the dust.

When they finished, the wall looked like this. Attractive, huh?

But then the real fun started. They started slapping grey paint up on those walls! I still can't get over how fast they go!

You may have also noticed a subtle difference between the top and bottom rows of pictures there. And that would be that the yellow panel on the verandah on the left disappeared. And that's because this monumental day included not only painting the front of the house, but also converting that front enclosed sleep-out into a verandah! Finally!

So, while the painters kept chugging away at making the house beautiful, railings started going up on the new verandah...

And in what felt like no time at all, they turned into a new balustrade!

 

 

I could hardly contain my happiness. This is what I've been imagining the house would look like for two years!

The little details are there... the black window sills and the crisp white trim around the little stained glass window...

The spot between the front door and the stained glass window has now been opened up with a balustrade as well...

And even if the new railings and "frilly bits" weren't pained white yet, it wasn't hard to imagine them that way!

Thankfully I didn't have to wait too long for them to undergo the paint transformation as well.

Although we did hit a small snag. When the painters were sanding back the little corner details under the bay window's roof (which I'm calling corbels) the one on the right corner just fell away. It was rotted through.

 

I gave it a good shot trying to find a matching replacement at demolition yards, but without success. So, my good old carpenter (who thankfully had long legs and wasn't afraid of heights) snapped into action and whipped one up for me. I was impressed.

And once it was all painted and gap-sealed, you'd never know it wasn't decades old like all the rest!

I'm a little disappointed that Allie isn't as excited about the transformation as I am.

But I'm thrilled enough for the both of us. Doesn't it look AMAZING????

And how about the proverbial trip down memory lane?

 

I can't believe this is my house!