ALMOST...

The project is more nearing completion now, after a flurry of activity over the weekend and today's work by the crew. First, a review of the weekend. Leslie & I worked 8 hours on Saturday stripping the two original garage doors, which were to be cut down a little and reused as yard-side entry doors. She used the heat gun and a scraper, and I followed along and did some detail scraping, then primed one of the doors. We bought a quart of primer, which we had tinted a color close to the final coat, which will be the color of the house--Devoe's Espresso color.

Before I helped on the doors, I installed the inside lights. With energy saving bulbs, there is a lot of light inside the garage at night. So we were able to do one door and install the lights on Saturday. It also included a couple of trips to Lowe's.

Sunday, right after lunch, starting just before 2:00, we worked another 8 hours, and got the other door stripped & primed, plus Leslie stripped and spray-painted the hinges that were left out. Turns out the pins and one more hinge were in Ian Tate's toolbox. (I found out just today what Ian's last name is, as I wrote a check to him for the work over at Marie's house. I contracted with him to replace 4 aluminum casement windows with vinyl-clad double-hungs. She got home from Arkansas just as the crew was leaving. She's thrilled about the new windows.)

Back to the story. Seeing the light fading, I decided arond 4:00 to put up a coat of paint on the garage walls. I first did the back side, the one that faces the garage apartment--because I thought we might be storing hay back there. Then, with the light fading even more, I decided to paint the alley side. I wound up using up one can of paint and had to open a new can. (The colors didn't quite match, I found out this morning.) I was working in the dark at the end, with only the garage light of the Esters across the alley lighting the wall. I wanted the neighbors to see the final color on the alley side; that's why I felt I had to do that Sunday night. We finished up at 10:00 Sunday night, dead tired.

Might I add that our work was aided by record-breaking January temperatures? It was nearly 70 on Saturday, and I think 73 or 74 or higher on Sunday, shirt-sleeve weather.

Today I installed one garage light, just to be able to appreciate the final effect. I took a picture in the dark, which shows the primer coat on the doors and a strip of final coat above the doors and surrounding the light. The light is mission-style and matches the front porch light perfectly, although the light is so bright you can't see the mission-style horizontal and vertical lines. I will have to do some more work to finalize it, but you can see the effect. Here is what it looks like: http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?action=productDetail&productId=93188-17771-4484RT&lpage=none

One other thing: Ian ran a separate line for the microwave on Monday. After we bought the new microwave and had junked the old combination range and microwave, which ran on a 220 circuit, the new microwave created problems in the kitchen. Kitchens are supposed to be wired with 2 separate circuits, and ours had only one. Now that the microwave is off the other circuit, we hope that we will never blow fuses again.

Below you can see the finished back steps. We like it and can't wait till the treated wood weathers some before we can paint it.

Here are the pictures. Click on each one for enlargements.

As I write this, a storm is blowing up. It's 10:48 PM. We'll post up daylight pictures in a day or two, after the crew leaves for good. They are coming back tomorrow to put in three panes of glass, two on one of the garage doors and one in a garage window they broke while sledge-hammering the old steps.