Tag: primer

Paint at Last

Marie Haigh1 Comment

In July, I posted about scraping the last of the primer and paint off of the oil paint in our dining room. Since then, I hadn’t the energy, enthusiasm, or courage to paint the walls again. Not to mention I didn’t have the time since I spent every free moment sewing in order to finish the dresses. So, for 3 months, our dining room has looked like this.

During the 3 months, we periodically had guests visit, but even that wasn’t enough encouragement to get me to pull the paint and brushes out again. I just couldn’t deal with the possibility of defeat again.

Yesterday, all that changed. It was time. The walls had started to annoy me. The carpet was shredding to pieces in yet another spot. It had to go, but it’s such a useful (albeit ugly) drop cloth.

So while Elly played at a friend’s house, I got to painting on a coat of oil-based primer.

When Dan came home and praised my efforts, I told him to not get too happy. If anything goes wrong, even so much as the stripes not being wide enough, I’m slapping up beadboard. No power on this earth could make me scrape those walls again.

Ecstatic over Ugly Paint

Marie Haigh4 Comments

The two layers of white latex paint and one layer of latex-based primer have been scraped off.

The original ugly gold paint is visible again. I never thought I’d want to see it again, but I’m thrilled to have it back.

Now I can paint these walls again, but this time I’ll do it right. First, I’ll brush on a layer of oil-based primer. Next, I’ll add the base coat, a white latex paint with an eggshell finish. Then, I’ll start drawing and painting the stripes on.

It’s my understanding that once I paint over the oil-based gold paint with an oil-based primer, I can paint the stripes in either a latex paint or an oil-based paint. As I have already purchased all the paint in latex for the stripes, that is what I am using. If paint peels off again when positioning the painter’s tape,

I will just curse, cry and reach for our gallon of port – not necessarily in that order. Afterwards, I will head to Lowes and buy beadboard paneling. I don’t care that Dan hates it. No power on this earth could make me scrape paint off a wall again.

 

Don’t let Elly’s smile fool you, it is not fun.

Crying Over Oil-Based Paint

Marie Haigh3 Comments

Assuming the original dark gold paint was just a high gloss latex, I scrubbed, sanded, and primed before adding 2 coats of a white paint for the base coat of my crazy stripe plan.

It was only after I drew all the stripes out and started to adhere the painter’s tape that I realized the original coat was a different beast altogether.

Paint shouldn’t bubble up and peel off.

It especially shouldn’t do that when I took so much time and effort to make sure it didn’t do that. Grrrr.

Come to find out it’s an oil-based paint. I used a simple test to find out. It never occurred to me – never even crossed my mind – that the high gloss was oil. Who puts oil-based paint on their dining room walls? It makes no sense.

How do I fix this problem? My local paint store advised me to sand the 2 coats of latex paint and 1 coat of latex primer off. Take it back down to the ugly gold oil-based paint. Then, prime it with an oil-based primer. It’s similar to the advice found here except for the sanding part. Afterwards, I can finally add my stripes in latex paint.

It sounds like a lot of work, doesn’t it?

Yeah. Despite being stuck indoors yesterday due to the rain, I made no progress. I dread the first step even though I have an electric sander.

Degreasing Cabinets

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Palmolive, hot water, a scouring pad and a little bit of elbow grease were all I needed to remove years of grease and grime.

If you want to preserve the current paint or finish, then I wouldn’t recommend using the same technique. The scouring pad removed a layer of paint with the unwanted grime, but that just saves me time and effort. I can now skip the sanding step and jump straight to the priming step.

The only challenge lies in how to keep Elly occupied with her washable paints while I paint over all the avocado green. Wish me luck.