The Kitchen

The room that has proven to be the most work by far has been the kitchen. The walls took 6-7 coats of paint.


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Cranberry Punch

I originally was considering a color called Raspberry Couli, but I had a lengthy conversation one day with Sara about red paint. She painted her television room Cranberry Punch and after I examined it rather closely, I knew that this was the shade of red for me.

But the walls were just a small part of the challenge. The biggest part of the challenge was the kitchen cabinets.

Luckily, Becky had a great idea that made lots of work, but made the cabinets look a million times better. She noticed that the ugly trim work on the front of the cabinets was only held on with tiny nails.

After knocking off the trim work, the cabinets had to be sanded down and given 3 coats of primer and another 3 coats of paint.

Plus I put on new handles and hinges.


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Flat and clean. No ugly trim.

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New hardware. A silver metal finish to match the new appliances.

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New spring loaded hinges, so that we didn’t have to put all of the magnets back on.

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As you can tell, there still are a couple of doors that need to go back on.

The good news is that the kitchen is almost done. A little more paint and hanging up a couple more doors and it will be a finished masterpiece.

The Great Room

I actually struggled quite extensively with picking out colors for the living/dining room. I wanted to do the accent wall thing and I didn’t want to match any of the colors in any of the other rooms. Red, blue, gray, yellow and green were all taken. I was heading towards brown.

But another complication was buying an area rug. Shannon went shopping for the area rug with me. After I picked one out she noted that I could take the colors for the wall out of the rug. So I picked up even more brown paint sample cards.


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The brownish section of the area rug.

That night I was getting a haircut from Monica. I took the paint cards with me to get her advice because she is usually my color coordination guru.

After looking at the cards, she really liked Cocoa Brown and Bamboo together.


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I had to agree that they looked good together and I had finally picked out all of the paint colors for my house.

I also added a ceiling fan to the living room. I thought long and hard about this decision as well. Finally I settled on this beast due to its 60 inch blades.


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It also had a remote, but as it turns out, with a 3 way switch, this type of remote doesn’t really work. So I actually have to stand up off my couch and turn the fan on or off. It feels like I’m living in the middle ages.

The last new addition to the living room area was the new switch covers.


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Although I like the look of these covers, if you slip the slightest bit on installing these things, you take a chunk out of them with the screwdriver.

October Leaves

The guest bedroom. I view it as my library, but most people view as the cowboy room.

When I got around to picking the color for this room, I had already picked blue for my bedroom, red for the kitchen, gray for the office and green for the bathroom. I didn’t want to take away from the thunder of those rooms, so I wanted a different color.

A couple years back Monica gave me a sweet painting for my birthday.


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Monica’s Painting

I wanted to take a color out of this painting for the rest of the room. On one of the days that we went light fixture shopping, I showed this painting to Shannon. She suggested taking one of the brown tones out of it.

From these ideas, I ended up with yellow. I’m not sure how I got there, but I ended up with a color called October Leaves.


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October Leaves with the light switch plate cover that matches the light fixture.

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The first new light fixture I purchased for the house.

Some people have remarked that the yellow is so bright that it would be difficult to sleep in that room. I guess I’ve never really considered that to be my problem.

Moving Day

There are no pictures from moving day, but I would like to thank the people that gave some effort to make moving day work out.

The Friday before moving day had spectacular weather. The Saturday of moving day was not scheduled to have spectacular weather. I returned to work on that Friday to get caught up on a few projects that I had fallen behind on.

To take advantage of the nice weather, Jason and Carla moved some stuff during the day. Then at night, Jen and Derrick and Sara came over and we moved stuff that I wouldn’t be able to handle the projected rain on Saturday.

So after FNSC, Jay and Willy and Derrick and Jen and Sara and I moved a few things.

But thanks also needs to be given the people that showed up on moving day:

Jason Stensland
Jesse Howard
Steve Roberts
Roger Sebring
Toby Sebring
Jason Baier
Andree Jauhari
Russell Kennerly
Shannon Bardole
Becky Perkovich
Jen Gorshe
Sara Junck
Derrick Gorshe
Dan Dill
DJ Dill
William McAlpine
Jay Janson

Plus a special thanks to Scott Degeneffe who personally delivered my brand new stove.

After a good chunk of work was done, Monica and Jeff showed up. Jen, Derrick, Sara, Shannon, Monica, Jeff and I went to Jimmy’s for supper.

When we returned, Derrick and Jen stuck around. Derrick and I hooked up the new TV and Blu-Ray player. We watched The Warriors. Jen had never seen The Warriors before, but I have no doubt that she now probably considers it to be one of the greatest movies ever made. At least I don’t see another way of thinking about that movie.

My Favorite President

I’ve always wanted to paint my office gray. My inspiration for that has always been the gray card.

We all know that a gray card is a flat object of a neutral gray color that derives from a flat reflectance spectrum. Typically that would have 18% reflectance.

I didn’t want to get all that anal, but I wanted a color that was fairly neutral so that when I was working on matting and framing in the office I would always have a neutral frame of reference so I could see the “true” colors in a picture.

Since color is ultimately an illusion, I know that the above statement about the true colors, was complete garbage, but since color is a fairly consistent illusion I can go with it.

The point is that having this neutral frame of reference will help me to pick out mat colors that will bring out certain colors in a picture.

When I initially started looking at grays I liked grays that had blue in them. I didn’t want a color that was too similar to the color of my bedroom, so I steered away from my natural inclinations as much as possible.

It just so happened that the shade of gray that I enjoyed also had a name that I enjoyed.


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Honest Abe

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New light switch plate cover that matches the new light fixture.

Besides the color, I was also particular about the light fixture for the office. I wanted something that put out an ample supply of light.

I found a light fixture that puts out the luminary power. It has special ballasted fluorescent bulbs that blast out the equivalent of 200 watts of incandescent power.


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Plus it is pretty.

What does that all that power mean?



It is bright is this room! I almost need shades.

For the record, no post Photoshop work was done on that picture.

The Master Bedroom

The very first color I decided on was for the bedroom. I was kind of partial to Dutch Boy paint because an old high school chum used to wear a Dutch Boy hat around. Plus, I like the plastic paint jug with a pour spout. Plus, I picked up paint samples from Menard’s and they carry Dutch Boy.

I wanted a light blue for the bedroom because I wanted something that was serene. I initially had a difficult time not picking colors by their name alone. I really wanted to paint my room a color called Picasso’s Blue Period, but it was a very dark blue and my intention was to stay away from dark colors, except for in the kitchen and the accent wall for the living room.

After I gave up on Picasso, I became fixated on a color called Sense of Time. I knew for sure I had a winner when Jesse compared it to lavender. He thought it was effeminate.

Jesse has long standing sexual insecurities that make him make proclamations like that.


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Sense of Time with the new light switch plate cover.

I had many aids in helping pick out the new look for the house, but I don’t know if any were more helpful than Shannon. She volunteered to go light fixture shopping and we spent many an hour in a hardware superstore standing in an aisle looking straight up at the ceiling.


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The master bedroom ceiling fan.

I don’t know if ceiling fans are a big passion of mine. But I am very pleased with this ceiling fan. It is a Hunter and it can blast air at full speed and you never hear a thing.

The light switch plate cover (and the not pictured outlet covers) were purchased to match the chrome finish of the ceiling fan.

Primary Painting Day

Although Carla and Alexis did a wonderful job of taking pictures, one of the downsides of not having taken any pictures myself is that I didn’t get pictures of everybody that helped.

So thanks to my incredible painting crew on Primary Painting Day:

Jason Stensland
Carla Stensland
Alexis Stensland
Jason Baier
Jeff Daniel
Amy Yin
Jen Gorshe
Derrick Gorshe
Sara Junck
Teresa Kahler
Monica Henning
Nader Parsaei
Jay Janson
Jesse Howard
Shannon Bardole
Becky Perkovich
James Strachota

I’m sure I’m forgetting somebody. They all did a wonderful job and if it wasn’t for the stupid moisture, I’m sure we would have been completely done on that day. With everything except the kitchen cabinets.

My mom also cooked up a wonderful lunch and supper. I think a good time was had by most.

Some pictures from that day in no particular order:


Primary Painting Day
The Master Bedroom

Primary Painting Day
The Office

Primary Painting Day
Roger taking the tile out to make room for a shower.

Primary Painting Day
Shannon painting the entry way.

Primary Painting Day
Jen working in the kitchen. Notice the swanky green color that kitchen cabinets used to be before the horrible antiquing.

Primary Painting Day
Jesse, possibly high on something, working in the kitchen.

Primary Painting Day
Jesse doing some primer work in the kitchen.

Primary Painting Day
Sara and Alexis toiling in the kitchen. I do not know what I am doing.

Primary Painting Day
Alexis and I painting the living room wall. It might be the accent wall, but I’m not sure if it is still considered an accent wall if you paint two walls that color.

Primary Painting Day
Carla painting in the master bedroom. To the left of her is the family heirloom, our Grandpa Bennett’s painting stool.

Primary Painting Day
Painting the living room. Jesse, Alexis, Me and James.

Primary Painting Day
The guest bedroom.

Primary Painting Day
Jason painting the living room.

Jason and Carla came over on Sunday to do some more painting.

Jen came over and did quite a bit more work in the kitchen as well. I just don’t have any pictures of that.

Friday Night Paint Prep Club – Part B

More pictures from paint prep night.


Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
I got those green chairs from my Aunt Linda to with a sweet white table she was throwing away. Those chairs are surprisingly popular. That is also Shannon showing off her taping skills.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Carla painting the bathroom.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Life Lesson: When working on a ceiling fan, don’t ask for the fan to be turned on when your heads are still in the blades.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Eric dumping out a bucket.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Eric taping it up.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Willy, Jay, Me, Becky, Shannon and Alexis.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Alexis and Teresa washing walls.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Becky and Teresa in the basement.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Teresa and Becky priming the cupboard doors.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Becky on curtain duty.

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A stack of cupboard doors.

Another health amount of work had been accomplished. The house was ready for painting day.

Friday Night Paint Prep Club – Part A

Day 3 of home ownership consisted of paint prep and lots of it. Her are some pictures in no particular order from that night.


Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Teresa eating.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Shannon would want me to point out one thing in this picture. Well maybe two things. One she is a master taper. Two she did an incredible job taping around the rounded corner of this wall.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Suzie showing off her taping skills.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Taking down curtains in my bowling shirt.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
A good supervisor/leader takes time out from ruling with an iron fist to get to know the people on their staff. As opposed to this looks like I’m not doing any work.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Jesse working on the living room ceiling fan. This ceiling fan did come with a remote.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Shannon, Becky, Teresa, Jesse, Yours Truly, Suzie and Scott.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Jesse and Scott got shocked on more than one occasion. I noted their ability to take a shock, in case I ever need somebody to jump in front of a taser for me. I think I have a couple of candidates.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different
Jesse and Scott hanging plastic.

Day 2 - Things Start to Look Different

I was blessed with a phenomenal prep team.