Adrian, Amateur Painter: The Front Steps, Part 2

Here's Part 1:  http://angjellockheart.blogspot.com/2013/10/adrian-amateur-painter-front-steps.html

I have been painting.  I have been painting.... a lot.  But it's something that needed done, and makes the house look a heck of a lot better.  I could spend some time talking about it, but let's just get to the pictures.

 

 

 

Again, it's quite a red.  It does have the tint of orange in it to look like Mario Andretti red.  My next job will be to paint the door.  Now I have to see if Lili (not her real name) wants it red or some other color.  So that will be another blog.  

Adrian, Amateur Painter: The Front Steps

Again, in a continuing series of me fixing broke stuff, I present another Amateur Painter series.  This time I am painting the front steps to my Girlfriend Lili's (not her real name) house.  I already tested out the paint primer and red paint on the back steps, and they turned out great.  So I got on a roll, and started to paint again.  (Sidenote: I'm actually starting to get good at this painting gig.)

So here's what I had to work with:

So first things first.  I put down the Kilz 2 paint primer first.  Again, I had it tinted gray so when I put the red paint on it, it wouldn't show up pink.  One thing to note.  Where there was already red paint, (in some places) I decided to not paint the primer over it.  I'll just put the red paint over it when the time comes. 

So here is the result of my hard work:

Due to the position of the sun, the photos can look a little washed out in places.  But overall, I got what I wanted painted.  Today was the perfect day to paint.  It was cool and dry, and those days don't come often in Florida.  Especially with a clear blue sky out. 

So here's the fun part.  I get to do it all over again tomorrow.  That's when I put the red paint on, and make it look really nice.  I'm not worried about the primer not being dry, as it was almost completely dry in places after only an hour.  And the other good news?  That means another great blog coming up. 

Read you then!

Amateur Handyman: Back Step Man

Yes, it's another new project given to me from my Girlfriend Lili (not her real name.)  As I've stated in the other Amateur Handyman posts, the people who lived in the house before Lili did their best to destroy the place.  So, little by little we are putting the place back together. 

In a previous post I showed how I added handrails to the back steps.  I had to do that before I painted them.  But in-between the build and the paint comes the paint primer.  We were in luck in that, the folks at Home Depot had a new converter for mixing the Kiltz 2 primer 2 gallon bucket.  Since we would be putting down red paint, we needed the primer to be a medium gray.  And they were able to do that.  It came out great.

So here's the back steps after the handrails.

Now it's time for a little paint primer.

I have to say, people either love or hate the Kiltz 2.  I love it.  It dries fast, and goes on easy.  I am excited about putting the red paint down soon.  And hey, that means I will get to post a "Part 2" for this blog.  Alright!

New Sloppy Art Day

I've done a few bad art/ sloppy art posts before, so here's another one.  Every now and then I get some time and decide to paint a few paintings.  But before I get into that let me explain my painting style.  Honestly, I can't paint life-like/realistically to save my life.  I learned that I am too impatient, and way too sloppy.  But then, I was introduced to impressionist art.  And it was perfect for me.  I found that the sloppier I was, the better I was.

So here's what I have been up to lately.

This one is called "Picasso's Blue Reef."  Of all the paintings I have painted, I think I like this one the best.  I wanted to do something like Picasso, where he had a "blue" period.  I thought, what if I took Picasso's blue thoughts, and used them to paint a coral reef.  So I used all sorts of blues on this painting.  It came out great.  Again, I am really happy with it.

This one is called "Around the Old Oak Tree."  I wanted to so something a bit different.  This was supposed to be part of a five part series.  I'm still working on the series, but this one was supposed to be "Earth."  The picture itself is a little brighter than it is in real life due to the flash.  I think it's a nice, happy painting that doesn't try to over think anything.  It's just nice.

This one is called, "The Little Red Admiral From Argentina."  The butterfly itself is called a Red Admiral, and the species that I painted makes its home in Argentina.  Again, this was something outside my comfort zone.  I actually started painting a butterfly, but it didn't turn out right.  So I painted over that painting, and came up with this.  I'm pretty happy with it.  It has a lot more detail than you can see in the photo.

This is part one of a two part series.  I made this painting and the following one as a "fire and ice" theme.  This of course, would be the ice.  I call it, "Busy Day on the Blue Reef."  Here's a funny note.  I had an idea for a brush I needed, but they didn't make that kind of brush.  So I went to Home Depot, bought a brush, and cut it to the needed shape.  If you see the "seaweed" on the bottom, that's what I used the brush to paint. 

This one is called, "Maroon 5 Clownfish."  Yes, I am a bit of a smart aleck.  But if you look there are 5 Maroon Clownfish in the picture.  I also used my special brush in the middle bottom of this painting.  It's come in really handy.  At first, I wasn't sure how this painting would come out.  But once the finishing touches were put on it, it really started to pop out. 

So that's what I have been up to lately.  Stay tuned.  I'm sure I will spit out a couple more works pretty soon. 

Adrian: Amatuer Handyman/ Stairmaster

I am Homer D. Poe, the weekend warrior.  Instead of going adventuring in the forest and such, I go to Home Depot, and then start repairing my girlfriend Lili's place.  This weekend was all about building stair rails on the back stairs.  You see, Lili has trouble with her balance and has always worried about going up and down the stairs on the back.  So today was the day I started working on the rails.

This was going to be quite simple, but quite involved.  Due to the height of the 4X4 posts, I was going to have to first dig them in a hole two feet deep, and then use carriage bolts to hold the post to the stairs.  Again, it sounds simple, but it's lots of hard work and very time consuming.  I mean, who gets up at 7 AM on a Saturday voluntarily?

First up, it's time to dig the hole, and drop the post in.  But before that I am trying to get a shot of what I will be working on.  And then Monster the Dog gets in the way.

So here is a better shot.

Here's one of my clamps holding the post in place while I secure carriage bolts to it.

Next up, I will speed up the story.  Let's just say it's 2,3,4,5 more posts go in.

Monster the Dog just loves to get involved in the photo shots.

So next up was adding the rails to the posts.  And after that was that magical feeling after hours of work, you know the job is done.

 

I already see next week's job.  Laying down the primer on it.  And then the week after that, painting the stairs and rails a nice red color.

But that's not my only work for the day.  I also do small jobs.  Things like putting knobs on the bathroom cabinets.

And then there is putting the cover on the back door outside light.

I also checked in own garden.  I remember when those coleus plants were 6 inches high.  Now they are pushing two and a half feet.  I'm quite happy with it so far.

I did a few other things, but I didn't take pictures.  That will come in the next post.  But really, that's enough for one day.  Whew.  So hang on for more handyman adventures next week.  I think it's going to get messy.

Adrian: Amateur Handyman/ Bathroom Remodeler

As promised, here is my adventure in painting.  I truly feel like a weekend warrior, if that warrior was named Homer D. Poe.  (See previous post.) 

Here's the beginning of the story.  Like I have said a few times, my girlfriend Lili moved into a new place.  The people who lived there before did their best to destroy the place.  The bathroom was really hard hit.  The landlord repaired a lot of water damage and completely replaced the floor.  The bathroom was also painted, but it was painted in a dog shit brown kind of color.  And it looked like it was done in a hurry, so it was a piss poor job.

That's where I come in.  I had talked to Lili about painting the bathroom and doing a little remodeling on it.  She completely agreed.  Luckily, I have a lot of tools and such so we kept the cost down.  We only had to buy one gallon of wind swept blue paint, and the landlord will take the cost off the rent.  So really, we are keeping the cost of this project way down. 

As always, I have taken a bunch of pictures.  That way, you can really see the transformation.  First off we start with the "before" pictures.

So yeah, you can really see that it is just a terrible brown color.  Next up comes "the taping."  Honestly, we put painter's tape everywhere.

We decided to put the blue down first.  There was more of it, and all the trim was going to be white so it only made sense. 

 

Next up it was time to add the white paint.  Actually, it was more of a cream whitewash, but it blended nicely.

Of course there was a lot of things that happened in-between pictures, but I am doing the Cliff's Notes version of things.  That, and with pictures.  Next up is our finished project.  Let's look!

What an awesome outcome.  With a lot of hard work and elbow grease, everything just fell into place.  The bathroom looks really inviting with the new colors and a brand new shower curtain.  And I'm proud to say we did it without me and Lili trying to kill each other.  So in closing I want to say I am really excited about this, but would also like to thank my little helper.  That would be Monster the Dog.  (See picture below.)