Tag: Trim

Puttin’ On My Painting Clothes

Published on by Our Humble Abode17 Comments

Welp, over the last four days I did a lot of prep and painting.   Thought it may not look like I did.  You know, the main bathroom is deceptively large and then factor in the trim detail I had to work with.  It took most of my weekend, but we’re one step closer to a finished bathroom.  Last weekend, Ben installed most of the trim.  He finished up on Tuesday, installing the cap and details around the vanity.  I spent a few hours filling nail holes and caulking the seams on Wednesday.  After that, I packed up the boys and we took a trip to the lumber yard to search for the perfect crown molding.  Five samples came home with me, but I had a clear favorite.  That one, at the top of the pile.

Ben agreed, and it was the second cheapest option.  Hooray!  Thursday I sanded everything and started priming.  Then on Friday I put on the first coat of white paint.  After our home-made waffle breakfast, our little family made another trip to the lumber yard to buy our crown molding to finish off the bathroom.  Ben installed it once we got home.  Of course that gave me more nail holes to fill and seams to caulk, but the end was in sight.  While letting the caulk dry, I put a second coat of white on the lower half.  Bright and early on Sunday morning, I sanded the crown and gave it a quick, heavy coat of white.  Luckily, one coat covered the crown completely, so I let that dry and worked on the entertainment center.  (More on that project soon!)  Then I taped off the white trim to give the walls and ceiling a second coat of gray.  And so I did.  Because I worked my butt off to get this all done, I thought it be best to tell you every detail of the process so you feel like you’ve painted with me.  Haha.  I told you all of that to show you this; our (almost) finished bathroom.

While I’m biased, I’m completely in love.  And it’s nice to see the trim one color.  So much whiter and brighter.

We’ve got a few little things to do, like build faux drawers for the vanity, paint the door (which means the rest of the doors in the house will get painted as well-I think I’ve landed on a color), and spray paint the fan cover.

The rest is d.o.n.e.  As I mentioned, Ben and I had a few disagreements about trim placement.  Lucky for me, he agreed to add 1/4 inch detail trim around the side of the linen closet.

The rest of the room has a decorative trim (which also functions to hide the peeled sheet rock).

The same trim wraps around the vanity acting as a back splash.

Details make me happy.  While this trim is simple, I think it works well with the modern meets traditional aesthetic we’re going for.

Simple square door casement with a touch of detail.

And let’s talk about the crown.  We had the option to use traditional crown, similar to what is in the rest of the house, like this for 55 and 75 cents per linear foot.

But it all felt too formal and traditional.  Instead, we landed on a door casement with a slightly detailed, but still clean lined profile.  For us, this works.  We used casement as crown in our first house with great results.  And, this trim is only 45 cents a linear foot.  At that price, for our 8 foot square bathroom, the crown cost only $11.25.

Big impact for little money.  And the casement is easier to work with that true crown.

What do you think of our almost finished bathroom?  Did you work all weekend?  Or did you take some time to relax?  I’m off to work on the entertainment center now.

Nailed It

Published on by Our Humble Abode9 Comments

Well, almost nailed it.  Guess what?  We’re thisclose to finishing the main bathroom.  Over the weekend, Ben put up most of the trim.  Then he ran out.  Of course I couldn’t wait, so I filled holes and caulked all the seams I could.  It’s looking a little rough, but we’re getting there.

But nothing is ever simple with us.  That plan we had talked about a few months ago must have been forgotten, thus causing an argument or two.  First off, the door trim.  Ben cut a piece of the casement for the top, but it looked wimpy, and I insisted suggested he beef it up to five inches.  (That’s what she said.)

While annoyed, he must have agreed because he didn’t protest.  The toilet nook (doesn’t that sound cozy) was easy to agree on.

However, the vanity area had many issues.  For starters, Ben forgot that I wanted false drawers on the front of the vanity.  Sure, we could cover it with a flat piece, but I think it needs some more character and bling.  Good grief, I want to use pretty drawer pulls.

Until Ben decides he wants to work on that, we’ve still got this going on.

He cut a piece of trim to go along the side of the counter top, and I’m just not feeling it.  Just too bulky.

And I really don’t like the way the end looks against the linen closet.

Most likely we’ll add 1/4 inch thick by 3 inch wide trim instead to make a border around the closet end.  Because the walls aren’t perfectly straight, we’ve got a gap to fill at the back of the closet.

Basically, the visible side of the linen closet will have shaker style details similar to the kitchen cabinets we built for our first house.  And faux drawers to match, please.  Then we still have to cut thin strips to cap off the chair rail.

To cap it off, we’ll add crown molding, which I still have to find.  Something simple with a little bit of detail would be great.

Gotta sand down the filled areas to get ready for priming and painting.  Perhaps between scraping wallpaper off I’ll find some time.

I know Ben gets annoyed, but I’m fairly certain he likes the results, despite my uncanny ability to request changes.  Hey, I have a vision and I’m not good at compromising.  Haha.

What differences do you and your spouse have about projects?  Did you get a project almost done over the weekend?

Trim Tutorial: Master Bedroom

Published on by Our Humble Abode7 Comments

Shame on us.  We haven’t shared a trim tutorial in quite some time.  What were we thinking?  Obviously, we weren’t.  How would you like to see our master bedroom and bathroom trim?

Let’s get started.  We (well, Ben) started with 4 foot by 8 foot MDF sheets.  One that is 3/4 inches thick and another that is 1 inch thick.  He cut tons of 2 inch wide strips, several 3 and 5 inch wide pieces out of the 3/4 sheet.  Then, he cut 1 1/2 inch wide pieces from the 1 inch thick MDF sheet.

To start, we installed the 5 inch baseboard around the perimeter of the room.  Then, we started placing the 2 inch wide verticals, placing one centered on each wall.  From there, the verticals have 12 inches of wall space before the next edge.  The horizontals are also spaced 12 inches from edge to edge.  With the grid in place, we added the three-inch wide top rail, capped off with a 1 1/2 inch deep by 1 inch thick piece, to finish it off.

Now, onto the tricky parts, the doors and windows.  Ben had the idea to install lights above each window and door in our master bedroom.

Door and window casement starts out the same as the rest.  Rather than a piece of casement at the top, we’ve added three trim pieces.  First, a piece of 1 inch thick MDF, cut into strips and routered for a decorative edge.  Then, a piece of 3/4 inch thick MDF cut into 6 1/2 inch widths.  The tricky part was cutting the crown to fit against walls; both doors nearly touch the wall.  For Ben, the easiest way to tackle this obstacle was cutting, gluing, and nailing the crown to the flat trim, leaving a 4 1/2 inch reveal.  After the glue had set, Ben cut the pieces to size, installing the whole piece over the routered rail.

The lights tuck neatly inside the crown, glowing at night.

That concludes our current home’s trim treatments.  Anything else you want to know before closing day?

Cap and Crown

Published on by Our Humble Abode20 Comments

As I mentioned yesterday, we spent most of our weekend relaxing, but we did slide a little kitchen work in there.  Ben installed the crown moulding in the kitchen on Saturday.  We didn’t want to pull the good crown from the dining room, so Ben cut a small piece to fill the gap between the old crown and the new cabinet.  Then he wrapped around to cover the cabinet:

Remember the gap above the marble back splash?  Before Ben could put crown up, he nailed a filler strip in place.

Then tacked the trim to the filler strip, keeping it flush with the ceiling while covering the gap and a little more of the marble tile.

See how nice that finishes the tile off and makes everything seamless?  Love it!  (And, that’s a peek at the grouted back splash).

To match the other cabinet, we wrapped the trim around the upper cabinets.

For some reason, the small back entrance and stairwell never got crown moulding.

Problem solved.  After a few coats of the same blue paint from the stairs and dining room, everything will flow together.

One of the reasons we chose the vent hood we have is because we wanted the rest of the kitchen to shine.  To make the fan as un-noticeable as possible, we agreed (after some debating) to carry the same trim around the vent hood.

I considered adding different trim and painting the box white, something kind of like this.

But Ben persisted that this was the best way to go.  I have to say, I agree.  White paint on the trim and blue in the middle will give this side a splash of color, too.

Now we need to caulk the cracks and joints, sand everything smooth and slap some primer/paint combo and we’re done.  With the trim.

What kind of vent hood do you have (or like)?  Sleek stainless?  Painted white?

P.S.  I used my new camera to take these pictures.  On my desktop, the pictures look fine, but on my laptop, a strange gradation/solarized thing happens.  Is anyone else seeing this?

P.P.S.  A few more readers took the survey (thank you!!) and I got a few requests to share some Photoshop action.  Consider a post in the works!  Oh, and to the surveyor(?) looking for bookshelf decorating, check out this post, or this one, this one, and this one.

Trim Tutorial: Board and Batten

Published on by Our Humble Abode10 Comments

We’ve had a few requests to give a tutorial on how we created the trim in our boys’ room.  This is actually one of the most simple trim designs we have in our house.  To start, determine the height of the trim you want.  Our trim is 66 inches from the floor to the top if the shelf.

Start with your baseboards.  If you plan to keep your current baseboard, you may have to cut notches out, depending on the profile of the trim.  We had to cut out the designed area of the baseboard to meet the square stock pieces together.

Once you’ve determined your baseboard situation, install the top horizontal piece, keeping it level.  Our trim is 4 inches tall, but you can choose any size you want.  I think the verticals look better if they are slightly smaller than the horizontal.  To determine the spacing of the verticals, find the center of each wall and install a vertical, keeping the trim piece centered on the center line.  Here’s where you have a decision to make.  You can choose any width of spacing for your verticals.  We preferred the wider spacing.  We placed our remaining verticals half way between the centered vertical and the corners.  Then, we added verticals on each side of the corner.

We started with a traditional board and batten style trim.  A year later, we added a picture shelf, but of course, you don’t have to do this.

To create this picture shelf, cut (or buy) a piece of 1 inch thick material into 3 inches wide.  This piece will be the actual shelf.  We used a large sheet of MDF and cut it ourselves.  Cut (or buy) a piece of 3/4 inch material to one inch strips; this will support the shelf.  Securely nail the 1 inch by 3/4 inch piece to the horizontal piece, keeping the tops flush.  If you pieces are too short to span the entire length of the wall, cut your pieces at a 45 degree angle to keep them tight, rather than two blunt ends butted together.  Once you’ve installed the support pieces, you’re ready to add your shelf.  Place your shelf against the wall and securely nail the shelf into your trim pieces and the wall.

As I mentioned above, you can vary the width of your verticals to achieve the look you have in mind.  Here are a few more great rooms that have been updated with board and batten trim.

Jen at Tatertots and Jello transformed her Tuscan inspired bathroom into a beachy cottage with trim.  Karla at It’s the Little Things also has a great tutorial about her board and batten trim.

On a completely unrelated note, I did a little shopping at Pier 1 yesterday (more on that later) and had to share this:  Pier 1 will donate $1.00 for each person who likes Pier 1 on Facebook!  How cool is that?!