Stairwell Redo
My 3 cats clawed the carpet enough it had to go. The stairs are wood, the bottom one obviously replaced once before and split down the middle. We don't know how we didn't fall through it.
I yanked the old carpet out using brute force, pliers, gloves and cursing. The tack strips resisted a bit but I had a small crow bar type thing. A flat head screw driver and pliers were the most useful in removing the old staples.
Everyone says start from the top down, and to be fair, they are right. If it wasn't for this pesky ADHD.... A vacuum is a good idea. Staples went everywhere and there is a lot of sandy stuff under the carpet.
A pox on the lazy jerk that didn't cover the stairs when they painted the walls. The drywall mud came off with soap and water, but there was still too much splatter to just refinish the stairs. Also a lot of chips in the wood. So I decided to paint them.
Here I am again not starting from the top down. I did fill in a few gaps with some caulk. Then it was Kilz primer.
I had to have the bottom tread remade so it's a different color
oh the dilemma... How to paint stairs and still get up and down them. I opted for doing half at a time
oh please, you fuzzy, run down the dry side, not the wet side
fuzzy did not listen. At this stage I went a different route and painted every other step horizontally with porch paint. It has sand in it so it's extra rhino hide tough. Only used about a third of the bucket which was $30. So I figure it cost me $10. Already had the Kilz and white paint so no idea what the total cost here is. $25?
I hope you are proud of yourself. I'm imaging the jerk looking at her soles and trying to figure out what the heck is on them. Yes she also then ran across my bed.
I kind of wanted to keep the paw prints at first but this just looked ridiculous.
Painted ferns and added mushroom stickers.I covered them with polycrylic, but at some point I bet they will come off. I might just paint some on after that. The white area disturbs me because it's already got smudges from shoes. I'm thinking of washing them and painting more green stuff using the porch paint which will be tougher.
toad lily
final thing I did was use gold paint to do stripes at the edge of each stair hoping it would help us see them in the dark. Thinking of going back with a bit of glow in the dark paint
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Awesome job! I love your writing also, sprinkled with humor.
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Beautiful job, Had you thought of coating the whole thing with two or three coats of polyurethane for protection?? -still could. Would be a shame for your beautiful art work and hard work on the stairs to be slowly (or quickly) destroyed before your very eyes... Just saying. Beautiful. :)
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