Painting Day – Take 2
I’m taking a break here from painting and wanted to gather a few thoughts about the experience.
- Painting is thirsty work. Drink lots of water.
- The extendable painting stick thingy is your friend. Shell out the extra four bucks cause it’s definitely worth it.
- Paint the your corners first using your cut-in brush (ok, that’s what my mom calls it… it’s this brush with angled bristles). Once you’ve done your corners it’s easier to go back using the roller and get complete coverage. This way the roller is going over any brush strokes you might have made painting the corners.
- Ceilings can be tricky. I started out using my extendable painting stick thingy (wow, that sounds abit obscene the more I look at it…) but it’s difficult to do the ceiling that way. I had better luck when I used just the roller, stood on my folding chair and did small areas. That’ll probably be how I do the rest of the ceilings unless I can find a better way.
- Don’t skimp on your paint supplies. I spent a bit more for a really nice cut in brush and it’s been slamming. It has a really short rubber handle that fits nicely in your hand and gives when you paint. Really easy to maneuver. Likewise with paint. The Behr is doing pretty well and it doesn’t splatter all over the place.
- Always look down before stepping off of chairs/ladders/etc. You never know what you might have put on the floor or where you might have put it. (I lost about a half a quart of paint this way… Oi!)
- Drop cloths are a good thing, and luckily disposable. Purchase a couple. (See above). Never think to yourself “I’ve not dripped any paint so far, I think I’ll just paint this section without moving the drop cloth. Bad idea.
That’s all for now I think. I’ll come back with an update before I quit for the evening and give the final stats and such for this session.
—Update: 12:46 a.m.—
I’ve finished my painting for the evening. The official tally:
- Time spent painting: 3 hours 42 minutes.
- Paint used: Almost 2 gallons. You might be able to call it one and a half gallons because I knocked the can over and spilled about a quart onto the drop cloth.
- I finished 3 of the walls in the back living room and the ceiling. I will go back and touch up tomorrow afternoon when I have better light (around the light fixture and the baseboards especially…). I left unpainted the wall that I plan to paint burgundy. No sense in making more work for myself.
- I sanded and added more spackle to the places that needed it (especially the corners in the hallway and the hallway arch). One more round of sanding should put this stuff where I want it to be.
The plan tomorrow is to go to Home Depot in the afternoon and pick up the burgundy paint and another gallon of white. I’ll finish the touching up in the back living room and put at least one coat of burgundy on the remaining wall. It’s going to take several coats. (I’ll “rinse and repeat” the process until I’m finished with the apartment, but I don’t want to get too ahead of myself because it becomes pretty daunting if I think too much about what’s left…).