The "weed" free living room...

Where the couch sits is the South window...

After throwing, cleaning and sorting...I took stock of the living room itself...because of the water damage, the floor by the South window was buckled and mildewed, there were NINE layers of wall paper on the walls...with some of it peeling off in patches...especially under those windows...the South window was rotted and it was barely hanging in there....sooo...I started with measuring the room itself...I don't know why I did that...maybe to return to some semblance of normalcy...don't ladies usually measure for rugs and such? or maybe I was just stalling...it was 14x15...and then I went and got a scraper, my ammonia water bottle, a bottle of scrub free mildew remover...I had not graduated to Super Clean yet...a scrub brush and a pail of water...and I peeled off wall paper...I removed all of the molding from the windows and the floor...I was in love...the original 8 inch mop boards were still in tact...and all of the 1x4 molding around the windows was in fantastic shape... I piled it outside to scrape the paint off...well...it didn't turn out like that...It took me so long to prep the walls that by the time I got back to the molding it was one GIANT molding ice cube...it took me an entire afternoon with a shovel to dig it out of the snow and drag it inside to thaw out...
You would think that the snow would have some affect on the dirt...nope..just froze the filth to the boards...

The difference...first one was how it was when I got it...second one is washed and third one is with the paint scraped off...just a little contrast to show you how dirty it was...

7 layers of the wall paper were just normal paper ranging from 1930 maybe...to the pink and grey 1980's...the first layer was a layer of that cover paper that someone had just thought painting an erroneous shade of blue would cut it....but the bottom layer of paper...blue cardboard type paper...stuck on with something akin to hide glue...hide glue...anyone experience it? well it is like a combination of super glue and rubber cement...It was horrible..and hard to get off...I ended up soaking huge pieces 2 and 3 times and scraping with the paint scraper...not only did it stick to the wall? but as soon as it hit the floor, it stuck to the floor...after a couple of hours of scraping I would have to move on to something else...so I picked staples out of the ceiling for awhile and would then go back to scraping...it took two weeks of daily scraping to get that stuff off...I ended up with an entire 50 gallon garbage sack of  BLUE PAPER!  Blue paper has become the anti christ to me...NO MORE BLUE PAPER! EVER!  Not even to write on...I will take yellow or white thank you very much!


I saw what was under that paper...because the patches under the windows had come off...it was old fashioned ship lap...big 10 inch solid hardwood boards..

.I fell in love with them...scouting the net? People are paying big bucks to have walls like mine installed for that cottage charm that is so popular now a days...and charming they are...this is a small cottage after all and the rustic, vintage look appealed to me right away...

My thoughts were an English cottage style....the quiet, calming, cozy, comfort of a sun filled room brimming with overstuffed furniture and books...as my home is so small...I took the advice of the HGTV design crews and decided to paint all the rooms on the main floor one color...so that was a relief! I wouldn't have to go thru the nightmare of selecting paint color again! I was so excited to paint it...what I didn't bargain for was the many days I spent pulling tacks and small nails out of those boards...I don't know what they were thinking when they put that cardboardy paper on there...they not only glued it to the wall... they tacked it up there too...like it was going to sprout legs and take off...I pulled an entire 5lb coffee can of tacks out of the walls...if I ever get to finish the furniture for this room, I will NEVER have to buy furniture tacks..

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I also scrubbed and scrubbed until every miniscule particle of mildew was gone...
Next came primer...I didn't bargain for that either...I bought rollers...and ended up going right back for an itty bitty paint brush to slosh primer in all those cracks between the boards...

 3 gallons of primer later...

The amount of light that came out of painting the walls and ceiling white was incredible...it was like being outside on a sunny day in the snow! There used to be an old kerosene stove in this room...it was in the cabin when I got the house...the chimney hole is still there, haven't figured out quite how to cover it yet...I also took the windows out...it was 9 degrees outside, LOL! but the storm windows held it at bay somewhat...there was an inch of ice on them inside and out which really prompted me to stop painting the walls and work on the windows!  I have never tried to get panes out of old windows before...the glazing was rock hard and was terrible to chip off...Super Clean...that is all I have to say...amazing stuff...
I was terribly relieved when I got the North one done...it came out beautifully...I drilled a new window catch in it as I had taken the bottom of the South window(it was in better shape) and replaced the North with the South...does that even make sense? it did to me when I first thought it...hee hee...Maybe the paint fumes have gotten to me a little too, Sandi!


I replaced the molding before I painted the walls...why? impatience probably...and what little room I had to work with was being eaten up by storage items piled in the middle of the room...add really long lengths of molding and it was getting ridiculous!

I did think about not painting that beautiful fir molding...but the process of getting all the shellac off, sanding and then refinishing was a little more than I could take...plus the cottage look I was after demanded white molding! I don't regret painting them...