Floored

Aside from painting, one of the other "whole house" projects we've tackled on the beach house is flooring. The house previously had sheet linoleum throughout....about 4 different patterns. While super easy to clean, it's a much more "industrial" feel than I wanted....especially in the bedrooms.

Originally I wanted ceramic tile in the kitchen and bathrooms (my husband has done tiling for many years and I have coveted some of his client's floors from afar). Imagine my surprise when he said no. After he explained his reasoning, I agreed.

You see, our house sways. It's on stilts in a hurricane-prone area. Last year we stayed in another house on Ocracoke (right on the Pamlico Sound). A wicked storm kicked up during the night and the house was a-ROCKIN'! And not in the fun way. In the lay-motionless-in-bed-clutching-your-spouse's-arm-envisioning-who-shows-up-at-your-funeral way.

While I was busy hyperventilating, Contractor Husband was attempting to explain to me how the house's architecture is such that swaying is not only OK, but necessary. If the house doesn't flex, it will break.

So, while flexing and swaying are good for the house's longevity, they're not great matches for ceramic tile--which tolerates zero flexing. Cracked tiles, loose grout, and the sound of walking on crunchy eggshells are likely results when you combine movement and ceramic tile.

Sigh. So....no tile for us.

For the bathrooms, we are going with sheet linoleum again. The color choices in this were not great but, again, Contractor Husband nixed the square sheets for being too prone to water damage at all the seams. I'll share the bathroom flooring in a later "Bathrooms Post."

The bedrooms will get a nice gray Stainmaster carpet. That I will also share that at a later date since we're still working on getting installers to the island after the Hatteras/Ocracoke ferry shut down due to shoaling.

So enough about what isn't....don't you want to see what is?

For the main part of the house--the living room, kitchen, dining room, and game room--we went with a Pergo laminate. Initially I was worried that it would have that hollow sound, but it seems they've eliminated that issue.

The color is (fittingly) called, "Driftwood." Look how much cuter than the old linoleum:

It's pretty easy to install, provided you throw out food for your crew at regular intervals:

The overall effect....with the aqua paint, the high gloss trim, and the white washed ceilings...is pure beachy perfection in my opinion! What do you think?

Cute, right? (I mean, minus all the stuff laying around.)

Bonus: It hides tracked-in sand beautifully and shines right up with a little wet Swiffer action.

Like Contractor Husband said, "I couldn't imagine this floor in any other house, but it's perfect here."

What can I say? When he's right....he's right.

(Just don't tell him I said that!)

~Betsy xoxo

P.S. We are almost fully booked for the summer months....only 1 week left in June and 1 week left in August. Grab 'em quick if you want to come have a fantastic summer beach vacation!



With Apologies to The Stones



I see a red door and I want it painted black
No colors anymore I want them to turn black

 

- Paint It Black, The Rolling Stones

 

All week I've been humming this Stones song. Only modifying it butchering it to reflect my current situation....which is Paint It White. Not very "rock-n-roll" but pretty darn beachy.

Here is a load of kitchen cabinet shelves, bathroom vanity doors, furniture, and mirrors (with one coat of primer already done) waiting to be sprayed within an inch of their lives:
 

More furniture to be painted (in our newly expanded spray booth area!):
 

 

See that little white table up there? The upside down one? Want to see a neat trick for painting furniture like that?

 

 

 If you drill screws into the bottom of your piece of furniture it creates nice little feet. Your piece won't get painted to your drop cloth and you can back the screws out when you're done and no one will ever see it. Neat, huh? (My husband is wicked smaht.) This cute table has metal plates on the legs....that's the tape you see.

And ta-daaaa!

 Cute, right? I love the little metal pieces on the feet. I think I paid $50 for this table at our local antique store, Cabin Point Mercantile. You could probably find one just like it Pottery Barn for 40 kajillion dollars. Yeah....no, thanks.

We also did a handful of mirrors. Here's one before:

Here's the during:

 



translated from English to English

We don't cover the glass before we paint because it takes too long. We use this laser sharp scraper after it's dried:

 

 

It is seriously so fast (and scary sharp). Just get a little corner started...

 

 

And viola! The after:

 

 

Way easier and faster than trying to curve tape or paper around all those bends in the frames. 

 

Wanna see some pretty after pics? Eeee...I know I do!

This headboard was pretty beat up. Now it looks brand spankin' new:

 

And here's a whole load of goodies all decked out in white--looking pretty good against those aqua walls and....oh...yes....on some new flooring!

 

 

 Oh my word....I just love it. Do you?

And here....just to keep it a little rock-n-roll edgy....a Paint It Black sunset over the beach:

 

 Oh, Ocracoke...you never disappoint!

 

~ Betsy xoxo

Just keep painting, painting, painting...

Work on the house is coming right along! My husband Chris, his buddy Jamey, and my father-in-law John spent an entire week painting the interior. I was dying to see the results. I tried to convince the family that Santa would find us just fine in Ocracoke....they weren't having it.

Finally after several weeks of waiting (with only a few phone pic sneak-peeks to hold me over) I got to see this massive undertaking in person over New Years.

Oh, mama.

It is fantastic!

All the dark wood is now white or whitewashed, and all the off-white walls are now a pale aqua. The yummiest, beachiest, cleanest, crispest, pale aqua.

I was askeered of that color, too. I hate picking paint colors. Too much variation from the paint chips, too much room for error, too much oh-my-god-now-the-whole-room-looks-like-dooky-and-my-husband-is-gonna-flip-if-I-say-it-has-to-be-redone.

I don't have great pictures of it...we've still got holes where receptacles, switches, registers, etc. are getting replaced, but I can't leave you all hanging, so here's a little sneak-peek:

 

 

Whattya think? Do you love it as much as I do?

Those French doors were all brown wood, the wainscoting was all brown wood, the window trim was all brown wood....and it all had the effect of a mountain cabin for me. It also made your eye naturally stop on it. Now your eye skips past and it and sees right out the window. When we're talking fantastic sunsets from the dinner table that's what I want to focus on! 

 

There is still a lot more painting to be done. This past week we tackled the kitchen cabinet doors and drawers, the bedroom doors, and the louvered closet doors.

 

We started out by creating an enclosed paint booth under the house. Or as I came to know it: My cell.

 



 

 

We laid down a heavy blue tarp over the floor and secured it with boards and cinder blocks. We stapled heavy painters plastic to the rafters to create the walls.

 

Chris created a giant "easel" for us to lean all the objects against:

 



 

Here are all the kitchen cabinets laid out ready to spray:

 

 

Even the little spice cabinet and cutting board doors got space on the easel with the addition of a couple extra screws:

 

 

When you're mixing 5 gallons of paint a wimpy paint stick ain't gonna cut it. You need the drill with the paint stirrer attachment (I've been told this is actually called a "bunghole mixer".....I....err........right, then):

 

 

You also need to protect yourself from all the paint over spray (tiny little droplets that hang in the air and will land on your hair and clothes and in your lungs as you breath). A Tyvec suit and a respirator are not only necessary, but highly fashionable:

 

 

As an aside, that sprayer I'm holding (an air sprayer) was abandoned in favor of the big-daddy airless one. It was too cold in our garage and the paint was too cold and thick. We needed the big guns.

 

Here are the doors before:

 

 

That's a can of denatured alcohol on the ground. We prepped all the wood by wiping it scrubbing it with that. It gets rid of all the dirt, grease, and grime that prevents the paint from sticking to the wood.

 

Here are the doors after:

 

 

Bright, glossy white. ::swoon::

 

We did the kitchen cabinet doors and drawers in a semi-gloss white. I have no after pics of those...it was much too late and I wanted out of my cell.

 

Next we'll be painting the rest of the kitchen cabinets (the parts still attached to the kitchen walls), the kitchen ceiling, and lots and lots of furniture.

 

And, if all goes well, we'll be replacing flooring. (Which we picked up yesterday. I can not wait to show y'all the flooring. It's called Driftwood. 'Nuff said? Yes, indeed.)

 

It's starting to feel pretty beachy up in here!

 

Maybe it's just the fumes...

 

~Betsy xoxo

Wallpaper: Some of the Devil's Finest Work

We are back from our Thanksgiving work trip to the house and I have (sort of) regained the use of my arms.

I love our beach house. I really do. But, like all relationships there are ups and downs and times of....well.....questioning.

I wanted to break up with our house this last week.

There. I said it.

I'm not proud of how quickly I lost patience with our relationship. I mean, the honeymoon's barely over. But it is.....over.

And here's why: Wallpaper.

Hoo boy.

In the past I've been fairly ambivalent about wallpaper. My mother used it in all our houses and it always looked great. We did have to remove it in our current house and I hear it was a nightmare. Ahem. (To be fair, our kids were young and someone had to watch them. I did do a little bit...it sucked.)

So this was my first real "one on one" with wallpaper removal. It tried to beat me. (Think: "Hey hon, how much harder would it be to just re-do the drywall?" That, apparently, was not an option. Sigh.)

First, I tackled the bathroom. And after a hard-fought battle, I won! Here's the carnage at the mid-way point:

Buoyed by that success I went after the border in the dining room. I mean, how hard could one little strip be?

Holy smokes. It was like a giant sticker that your kid puts on the car door and you just. can. not. get. off. I had to walk away and try the kitchen back splash. Thankfully, that came off like a dream:

Eventually, every last bit of wallpaper came off. And I stopped wanting to break it off with my dear, sweet house.

I also did lots and lots of powerwashing:

And my hubby took the downstairs bedroom from this (brown trim and off-white walls):

To this! Clean white trim and beautiful pale aqua walls:



(Yes, that flooring is going, too.)

Up next, the whole inside will be painted. Goodbye dark wood and paneling! Hello bright, fresh, and beachy!

And seriously, when you get to witness sunsets like this on Ocracoke Island, how can you stay mad at anything or anyone?

I still love you, house. Let's just never say the "w" word again, OK?

~Betsy xoxo

P.S. Even though it's only November, summer months are already starting to book up. Only one week is left in July, so don't put off making your reservations!

Island Time(ier)

is·land time  

noun \ˈī-lənd\ \ˈtīm\ 

The time vacuum created by the ocean's presence.

Similar to stoner's time, everything moves nice and slow.
This carefree aura even has the ability to travel with islanders and can engulf you in their presence.

* via urban dictionary *

* * *

One of the my favorite things about Ocracoke is the feeling of being on island time. The pace is slow and relaxed. The atmosphere is as casual and carefree as you desire.

Ocracoke traffic

Island time is really the only explanation for hundreds of cars lined up for the ferry in the hot summer sun for hours - and folks are still smiling, snoozing, or chatting like it's the best summer bbq of the year.

Island time is pretty dang good. Makes one feel happily "Stranded on Purpose."

Ahhhh.....

Even the political signs on Ocracoke are a bit more mellow

Unless, of course....

You need to get something done fast. Or there's another wrench in the mix....like, say, a hurricane.

As I said earlier, Hurricane Sandy was relatively kind to the island, but there were some regional repercussions. The main road through the Outer Banks (Rt. 12) had so much sand wash over it they had to close it in places. Route 12 is the road that leads to the Hatteras-Ocracoke Ferry. And while the ferry was back up and running within days, the other routes into (and out of) Hatteras were shut down.

Road delays on Ocracoke are minimal

Weeks ago we had contacted the Lowes in Kill Devil Hills to coordinate delivery of our roof shingles and other supplies. No problem! They'd run right down Rt. 12, hop on the Hatteras-Ocracoke Ferry, and hook us up.

Until that darn Sandy blew through.

"Sorry guys, you know how it goes here....can't get through 'til 12 opens back up," the nice guy at Lowes said.

"Oh, yeah,yeah....of course!" we said. Trying not to sound like total newbs who had owned a place in the OBX for all of one month. If.

No problem. We run a construction business. We've got trucks and trailers. We'll just take it all down there.

Except some of our intended projects needed more measuring to make a final material list.
There are two other ferries that run to and from Ocracoke to the mainland of North Carolina. We'd just have to find a Lowes near one of those and make a material run.

Run? More like a marathon.

A "quick" trip to Lowes took about twelve hours start to finish.

Plenty of time waiting for the ferry

Hoo boy. Island time.....and then some.

After a very productive week we were ready to head home via the 10:00 a.m. Swan Quarter Ferry. Until the ferry worker informed us there would be a slight hold up.

See, the milk truck was on the ferry coming from Swan Quarter to Ocracoke. He needed to deliver his milk around Ocracoke and get back to the mainland (without a 12 hour turnaround time!). So we all waited for about twenty minutes for the milk to be delivered and the milk truck to load back on.

Can you see the black and white cow flying by?

Bet that was the fastest milk delivery ever!

All in all, island time(ier) is just part of the package. And I'll take it!

I just don't expect overnight delivery.

Betsy xoxo

Storms and Silver Linings

Well, we have officially survived our first hurricane and a nor'easter as Outer Banks home owners. Whew! Not for the weak of heart, I can tell you that. We were extremely lucky in so many regards....especially considering the devastation the northeast experienced.

We were already planning to replace the entire roof this past week. Good thing! This is what Sandy left us:

Of course, the nor'easter was bearing down on us and we had to put the roof work off until it passed.

Which resulted in this:

And this:

Nothing like waking up in the middle of the night to water dripping all over your bed!

With some quick patches during a break in the rain, we were able to stop the bleeding and work on some inside projects:

Good bye, non-working fireplace!

Hello, dust!

I can't complain...the sun came out, the winds died down and the roof is being completed as I type.

Oh, and speaking of silver linings? This is the view from the roof! Can you say, "crow's nest" in our future?! (By the way, that's the Pamlico Sound, but I hear you can see bits of the ocean in the other direction, too. Sunrises AND sunsets? Yes, please!)

Welcome!

Rolling out the new blog for "Stranded on Purpose!" Still working out the kinks (ginormous Title Photo much?!), but we will be starting our renovations in the next few weeks and want to have a place to share all our trials, tribulations, befores and afters, and the making of our dream beach house!

Thanks for stopping by! 

Betsy xoxo