A Cute House

Cute House From Pinterest Cottages

Hello Dear Ones,

Yesterday I enlisted the help of a little one (and other short people) to paint the house. We caught the morning shade and painted until the sun hit the area, so we got one outside wall done. My goal was to get from the west corner around to the south but we ran out of paint and energy. The house is a far cry from that cute house at Pinterest, but I am making some progress. 

(after)

Here is a "before" of that wall.  Notice the gate has been moved and is being used for some sort of traffic thing, with the orange cones in place. One of the employees at the Dollar Tree said they were selling an unusual amount of these traffic cones and wanted to know what we used them for.  The children enjoy using them to make lanes in the driveway, when using their trikes, bikes, pedal cars and their speedy little hot wheels. 

 These pictures are before the wall was painted.

(after)

The dry weather permitted all my helpers to finally  paint those railings and get them dry in a day. I sure am enjoying seeing that lovely latex house paint when I open the door. 

I am hoping to paint the porch soon, but I need to squelch the urge to be sentimental over the layers of ancient paint and the history connected with them!

Ruins:

Another view of the side railings, painted.

I am fairly certain I got the fences wedged in to the porch backwards but I like the way they look so I will leave it that way. When you are not in an exclusive neighborhood you can do what you want, because there is no code.

Oh, wait! I AM in a "gated neighborhood"!

 Now I can take pictures of tea sets on the porch and not apologize for the terrible shape the fence is in, or tell you I am going to paint them "someday."  The neat thing about being older is that the children and grandchildren. think you are going to die soon and are more urgent about getting things painted and repaired.  They also think you can't do much yourself. 

I had about given up on getting time and energy to paint these railings and was looking for some vinyl ones, but these were custom made for this porch by a neighbor, and the fit was perfect.

The fences being painted:

They cleverly painted most of these railings with the roller brushes, which was made short work of it!  Very little brush work was required, but we let the younger ones uses the brushes...until they discovered the rollers.  Their summer sandals are now also painted, but they will wear them as a badge of honor and declare they are painters. I'm sure people at church will notice their English Meadow green paint-splotched summer shoes.

There are some new blossoms in the flower beds.

If I can get the paint job finished, maybe the Manse will be Pinterest-worthy.

Here is the "before" picture of the porch fences:

I think a lot of people thought it was nice and trendy to have them so rustic looking but it got tiresome and I like the new look.

Another cute house from Pinterest...

Am I getting closer?