Do you remember me talking about my teenaged door?  Let me refresh your memory (or you can click here for a past post about it).  Our front door had acne and a bad case of it at that.  We assume that the previous owners had painted the front door in order to hide the fading wood when they put the house on the market.  But the problem came with what we suspect is the incorrect type of paint that was used at one time on it.

When we repainted it awhile back the paint went on fine but then the next day it started to bubble up.  And then more bubbled.  And more.  And pretty soon we were left with a hideous looking front door.  Or at least “I” think it is hideous. If you click on the picture you can see the acne better.

And it got even worse than that this past winter due to the horrible cold we had.  Sigh.  To the point that areas of it just peeled down to the wood part.

So Project Paint the House began last week (or the week before last??? Time flies.) and the door was definitely looming as the most difficult part of the entire project.

Since the hubby is home now we said “we can do this” and jumped in.  We have a ranch style house so no biggie.  Add in a lot of windows and the task did not seem impossible.  So we began.  We bought the paint.  We scraped. We taped.  We trimmed, We painted.  I got to balance on a board stretched across the window wells.  I got to paint the highest peak in the front of the house while Chris held the extension ladder.  It all seemed like things were coming together very well.

My final day of painting I decided to wash the windows since I had the ladder out and it just made sense.  So I did.

You know that moment when you are in the midst of doing something and you think “I should not do this”??????  Yep.  I had one of those and did not listen to the voice in my head.  The ladder folded up on my thumb.  I saw stars.   I may have said a bad word.  Just one.  I couldn’t look at it.  I stumbled into the house –grabbed a kitchen towel and held it on it not wanting to look. Pain coursed through my entire body.  Serious pain.

I made it back to the bedroom where Chris was and immediately he knew I had pulled a “Beth Ann” as I lay on the floor.  I am such a wimp when it comes to this stuff.  Seriously a wimp.  He looked at it and deemed that I would live but man—did it hurt.   Add to the fact that I had been using newspaper to wash the windows and my hands were as dirty as a pig in a mud puddle.  Ugh.

A week later I still can’t bend my thumb properly, writing is more of a joke than usual, and the windows are unwashed.  But–the door got painted.  Chris did it last. He sanded it and primed it and painted it.  It’s okay. Just okay.  I am  hoping that when I hang  the huge wreath it will draw the eye away from the bubbles that are the bane of my existence.

They don’t really show up in this picture but there are a few coming to life.  All in all the entire house painting project was a success and we can pat ourselves on the back for completing a job that was probably the most extensive home DIY job that we have ever done together.  It made me long for our family “work weekends” where we would all gather at one of the sibling’s houses to work.

So there you have it.  What I have been doing for the past week or so.  I can’t lie.  It’s a big relief to have that job done and not looming over us.  Never mind that I still have paint in my hair.

What DIY project have you attempted recently?  Was it successful or not?