De-popcorning and re-texturing

Removing the popcorn ceiling was one of th first steps of the remodel, completed almost a month ago now. The removal of the popcorn ceiling was insanely messy, but pretty easy. Apparently our ceilings were only painted once or twice and were initially sprayed correctly and professionally, which helps a ton in the removal process.

After all fixtures were removed and the floor covered with plastic, N soaked a section of the ceiling with water.

Just realized that the fan was still up in the pic above...this might have been our "let's just test it out" practice session. :)

Also, aren't those painted vines on the wall just lovely? It's the same type of vine that had all but swallowed the back yard, trees, fence and all. Nice.

After spraying and waiting a few minutes, you grab the paint scraper and just scraaaape off that nasty popcorn in one fell swoop.

It's a, uhh, messy job.

A few shots of the rooms, post-popcorn but pre-texture. Guest room, after contractor skim coated the area where we had removed a painted-over wallpaper boarder that RUINED the walls:

Guest bath, after contractor added the drywall patch where the soffit was, mussed and sanded, moved the electrical, and patched up all the dings in the walls from our wallpaper war:

Girls' bath after same soffit patch and electrical work, and practically a full skim coat on the walls. This room was the worst of all of them in regards to damage post wallpaper removal. It is what sparked us to have the contractors help with wall patching in the first place. :)

I know it doesn't look like much, but the clean white walls are such a huge improvement from what they were before.

Remember this?

Wait, here's an even better shot:

Ick.

The texturing process is even messier than the popcorn removal process. The amount of taping off and plastic, yikes. Needless to say, once we saw all of this, and their two-person team to handle the fancy schmancy texture machine, we immediately knew we made the right choice in hiring out the job.

"I wonder if I can put Addy down for a nap up there while they are on their lunch break today? Maybe I'll go take a look..."

Ha. Yeah. That didn't happen.

And here they are! Finished ceilings in all of their glory. Re-sprayed and painted. 

The baths are just begging for chunky new mirrors, fresh paint, and modern light fixtures and tile, don't you think?

Clean slates, ready to be built back up. It took us a long time just to get to

this point, and it feels good.

And speaking of begging, if these walls (in what will be the nursery) could talk they would surely say, "get these stupid vines off 'a me!!"

Next up on the agenda: ordering and beginning to install light fixtures, scouting flooring options, ordering the door knobs and hinges, and picking up all of our paint. We met w our decorator again yesterday and rearranged a few colors. Can't WAIT to get color on the walls. And of course trim painting will continue in the basement.