Frog and Goat

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this before but our master suite consists of the master bedroom, a bath, two closets and a bonus room (over the garage with steps that go downstairs). When we moved into the house, we decided to use the bonus room as our master and the actual bedroom as a lounge/tv room.

Here’s what it’s looked like for years, except we did have a small bookcase along that long expanse of wall, but we recently moved it into the guest bedroom:

Here’s a look-see from the other side of the room:

Yes, the TV has sat on a glass-topped coffee table for years. That was supposed to be a temporary solution and at some point we had one of those 400lb tube TVs sitting there instead. It’s a wonder the whole thing didn’t explode.

We are donating the futon to the better-half’s aunt’s church’s yard sale this weekend. The couch is from the apartment. So here’s the new view (and I didn’t realize Lucy was in the room when I took the photo):

I painted the bookcase and we put it along that expanse of wall and look at that(!!) the coffee table is a coffee table:

We went to the dump on Saturday and, kids, most of the stuff went into various recycling bins. That was awesome. Now, if someone would just figure out a recycling mechanism for stanky cat litter, I’d be very happy. By taking the gazillion corrugated boxes and other assorted mixed paper out of the garage, we were able to move a bookcase the better-half built a couple of years ago into the garage.

He built the bookcase for the college town apartment and since he built it the day (or two days) before we moved in there nothing had ever been done about the finish. I’m a bit embarrassed to admit there was an actual footprint on one of the boards. You couldn’t really see it unless you were standing in an awkward corner of the apartment so I ignored it. But, clearly, if we were going to use it in the house, I could not have something quite so dingy.

This morning I sanded the bookcase and then applied the first coat of paint. I emailed the better-half to tell him it was sucking up the paint like a drunk sucks down a forty. That first coat of paint was nearly invisible. I just finished the second coat and it looks like something I can live with. Tomorrow I’m going to roll a coat on all the shelves, sides and top. When I paint furniture, I apply the first couple of coats with a brush to really get the paint in there and then I roll the final coat(s) to ensure a smooth and even surface.

The bookcase’s underbelly is just going to have to deal with one coat because, seriously, who cares what the paint looks like on the bottom of the bookcase? If the floor is that picky about its view, it should have volunteered to be the ceiling instead.

Have you tried Home Depot’s paint that is a combination of primer and paint? So far I’m digging it. It seems a bit thicker and since the bookcase was very thirsty I feel like the combination is working better than I imagined. Also? I’m only doing three coats instead of four. That counts for something in my book.