PROGRESS. Feels good.

Here's a bit of an update on the dreaded stairwell. Details of the nasty before pictures can be found hereI apologize for the lighting. There are currently no working lights in the stairwell. I used classic taupe by Behr, because we had it already. It's okay. But in the wrong light it looks like the dusty rose I had in my bedroom ca. 1987 when I "designed" my bedroom. The pink bunny room. Not exactly what I was going for here, so I'll just choose to view it through taupe colored glasses.

I know, this hardly looks like an after picture, but it truly truly looks much better. We don't really want to put up new drywall or do a major overhaul, but the paint really brightened up the space.

I researched how to paint a stairwell and extension ladder safety, so I was pretty confident in my ladder technique, but I was still sweating bullets when I painted the stairwell. It was scary! And I'm not even really scared of heights. I was so tense that I felt like I had pulled muscles the next day. It was crazy. But anyway...

Set the feet of the ladder against a stair (or better yet a wall), making sure the feet are even and flat against the ground. Make sure it is not too vertical. And the top goes against the opposite wall. *DO NOT TAKE THIS AS EXPERT ADVISE. TAKE PROPER PRECAUTIONS WHEN YOU USE A LADDER*

I had to get rid of some mildew on the cement blocks before I primed (Kilz) and painted.

I sprayed this mixture of one part bleach to three parts water on the mildew and let it sit 10 minutes before wiping it of with water.

I've got some other plans in the works for the stairwell to make it a utilized space. I'm really excited about it, AND I got to use a table saw for the first time! Woohoo!