all clear on the top floor

Since I’m sort of on a roll here, I thought I’d just run with it – sorry for the redundancy in some of these photos with older posts. We’ve made a concerted effort to get our act together and get organized around here, and a big part of that has been systematically working our way through the house. Sometimes you can live in an unfinished space for so long that you start to ignore your surroundings a bit. I’m ready to appreciate my surroundings a bit more this year, and this cleaning up and clearing out is really helping that.

M cleaned all three bathrooms – fixtures, floors, etc. and then I went back into the girls’ bathroom to organize and deep clean some other areas. I took down the shower curtains and washed them, pulled everything out of the cubbies and pared them down a bit, soaked and scrubbed the trash and recycling cans, and I even took the ABC cards down – for now.

I actually asked both girls about the cards, and I was surprised that they still felt really strongly about having them up on the ledge. But we still took them down to dust and polish the room, and I’m leaving them down for a week to see if we change our mind. I think the it grows the room up a bit, even with the bright colored stripes in there. (If you’ve only seen this room in the This Old House spread, then this might not make sense. They took the cards that usually sit on the ledge around the room down for that photo shoot.)

I’m really happy with this room, and I’m surprised that I’m not yet tired of the stripes in there. It’s quite a bit bolder than I normally lean, but it’s wearing well in there. The only small project I have for this room is switching out something over the toilet. I’ve had that photo of two-year-old E there for a decade – now I want E to help me out with something fun for the wall there. I took a photo of the ferris wheel at Cedar Point a couple of summers ago that I love. E and I might do a watercolor together of that image, or we even thought we might make a mosaic of it. (We got really inspired by our Yucandu Art Studio visit this morning – more on that later.)

That’s the light I mentioned using in our Master Bathroom downstairs. I keep forgetting to measure it to make sure this particular size works, but I’ll do that tonight and get those ordered.

There are bigger projects to tackle in the Stair Hall, but M got busy on some of those this weekend. We’ve had temporary treads on two-thirds of this flight for awhile – he trimmed and refinished the edges on the actual treads so that the treads float off the wall for an equal distance all the way up, and then he finished them with polyurethane and reinstalled them. As you can see, we still just have a temporary railing on this stair run. Completing that project is also on the sooner-rather-than-later list. You can also see the sheen change in the wall paint – we have to finish painting the wall and ceiling below, so that’s on the list too. But we’re getting there!

The girls still love to use this magnetic / chalkboard wall, so even though it’s been cleaned off for the moment, it’s usually full of stuff. When friends are over they really gravitate to this wall. (And that temporary railing looks really wonky in this photo, but it’s super sturdy and perfectly safe. Just not so attractive.) I’m really looking forward to how much a finished railing is really going to polish off this space. Then I might be tempted to repaint this wall white again and hang some great art on it – but I’m also not wishing away the years of drawing on the wall fun quite yet either.

Speaking of artwork – swinging back in the other direction, you can see we really cleaned up the hallway and installed some new artwork.

This photograph by Kim at Yellow Brick Home was one of E’s Christmas gifts. I framed it this weekend and hung it in this space where an underwater watercolor of hers used to reside. That picture fell sometime last year and the glass broke – then I made the mistake of leaving it on my desk where it promptly faded in the sunlight. I was so sad, but this is a nice spot of color to replace it.

The black frame ties in well with the background of the little gallery nook at the top of the stairs. We took everything off and gave it all a thorough dusting. If this spot isn’t carefully maintained, it sometimes becomes a dumping ground for art projects. We tossed some old ones, archived a few others, and installed some more recent work. The girls have some other cool projects in the works, so this will continue to evolve. It’s nice to have a place to put some of these things. (And those containers hold the magnet and chalk collection for the opposite wall.)

So this wraps up the current tour of the third floor – and here’s a run down of the current to-do list up here:

–Stair and Landing Railing
–Install Trim at Stair Opening
–Final Coat of Paint on Tall Stair Wall
–F’s Curtains
–Install New Window Sashes in F’s Side Window (A bird – or brick? – something flew into it and cracked the outer pane of the insulated glass. M ordered a replacement and is in the process of painting it in the basement.)
–New Artwork On Tub / Toilet Wall in Girls’ Bathroom
–Install Second Red Reading Lamp in E’s Room (it was discontinued, but I located a seller for one and should have it in hand this week.)

Next up – Second Floor!