A man-cave fit for a man in a cave.

It's almost been a year since I put the flooring in the basement and I've never really done anything with it. Just a friendly reminder of what it looked like when I moved in:

 

And then I did all that work last winter so it looked like this.

And yesterday my electrician came out and configured all the plugs so we wouldn't have to run an extension cord from the dryer area to the finished portion of the basement. And now it looks like this:

It's starting to look like a real room! It needs baseboard and window trim but it's getting there! I grabbed the painting from the reveal that used to be over the living room mantle.

But don't look over there; when I do I get the theme song to Sanford and Son stuck in my head.

The boy and I have an agreement, stolen from a very smart friend, that we will keep everything we own for the first year of living together. So we have two beds and lots of duplicate kitchen gear that got boxed up and stored in the garage and basement. The last thing you want to do after a relationship ends is to have to buy a new bed (or a new cheese grater, or whatever) because you got rid of yours when you moved in together. So we'll reassess in a year or two or whenever we feel like it and then we can start to pare down our stuff. But for right now we have a mattress in the alcove.

Now I'm itching to paint the wood paneling that lines the stairs down to the basement and replace that nasty carpet.

And lastly, Hall and Oates will finally have to go.

Hall and Oates

We're in stereo!

Happy dance!

It came! The CanvasPop likeness I ordered of Hall and Oates came!

I still think the shipping rates are egregious, but it looks *really* good.  Highly recommended.

More progress on the basement

I'm finally at the point in the basement where I can paint. Huzzah!  The previous owner installed ceiling boards that remind me of carriage doors.

There's a lot of molding, all of which needs to be painted with a brush. As a result it takes five times as long. You probably did something fun for your three-day weekend, like go to the coast.  I did what I always do on long weekends: I covered myself in paint and went to the Home Depot without brushing my teeth or hair first.  It's just how I celebrate.

Have you really looked at the artwork on the fireplace?  It's amazing!  People have a lot of opinions on who it is--Beavis and Butthead, Hall & Oates . . .

I'm still trying to figure out what they were saying to each other.  I'm hoping it's something along the lines of, "Isn't this a lovely home, Daryl Hall?" and, "Rightly so, John Oates! Nary a ghost or critter here!"

I recently won a $25 credit at CanvasPop from Apartment Therapy.  CanvasPop takes your digital image and renders it on canvas, like a real painting.  I decided to have Hall & Oates committed to canvas.  I think they're worth it (though just barely--shipping was an unholy $14 for one rolled up canvas).

But back to painting, I had heard you want to use a saturated color in low-light areas like a basement because you won't have natural light to play it up.  My friend Mary has recently finished out her basement and used a lovely saturated seafoam color in her laundry room.  I loved the color so much she gave me the paint can so I could have it recreated at the paint store.  When I called the place where she had it mixed they told me it was $55 per gallon.

I just about fainted.  $55 per gallon?  I needed two gallons!  No way, nuh uh.  I firmly believe you get what you pay for in paint, but for $55 a gallon it should paint itself onto the wall AND mix me a martini while I watch.

I went down to Miller Paint instead and asked if they could color match it using Acro Pure as a base.  Acro Pure is zero VOC, low odor, and has an anti-microbial built into it.  Basically it's perfect for painting a basement with minimal ventilation.  The guys at Miller Paint were great and I'm happy to say that I didn't have another color-match mishap like I did with the dining room.  Lesson learned: get your color matching done at Miller Paint, NOT the Home Depot.  I had a coupon from my Chinook Book that was buy one get one free.  So I got two gallons of custom color paint for $31.

The coverage is great and the color is richly saturated.  The photos really don't do it justice.  I would absolutely use this paint again.  Two coats and I was good to go.

 

 

I'm still trying to figure out what color to paint the inside of the alcove.  It's presently white, but I think I want to do a chocolate color.  Then I just have to scrape the glue down padding, install the laminate my amazing parents bought me for Christmas, and this room might be usable.  Then I can move onto outdoor projects like the fence that's falling down in my backyard.  If good fences are an indicator of good neighbors, I am that homeowner with all the junkers on the lawn and the constant visits from the police.  But more on that later.