The joys of Home Ownership

 Owning a Home

When young(er) people tell me they are buying their first home.  I always tell them, you will never be able to say "I have nothing to do this weekend".  You might say "I'm not doing anything this weekend."  Be warned, there is always something to do.

Some Saturdays, I cut the grass. (During spring and summer, more so).  Other's I do odd jobs around the house.  This was an odd job that needed to be done.

Before you start any job at your home, you should ask yourself a few things before you get started.  Kind of a self assesment.

Three Questions:

1.  Can I hurt myself

If I do this myself, could I hurt myself.  This should always be the first question.  Will I be working on a ladder?  How high up?  Is there a chance I could loose a finger, go blind, fall over, start a big fire?  

You may laugh, but you should consider this for all of the home improvement jobs you do.

2. Will it cost a lot more if I screw it up?

We all know the cost of having someone else do the work can be very expensive.  If you are trying to save a buck, you may decide to do it yourself.  Not to mention the satisfaction you get when you complete it yourself.  (You guys know what I am talking about)

But if you make a mistake and have to have someone else finish, what is the cost difference?  Or, can you live with the mistake?

3.  Will this embarrass the spouse?

I also ask myself this question.  Because, it is hard to embarrass me, however, the spouse may not be as forgiving.  I say spouse, because there are a lot of DIY ladies out there, and I say "Go Girl!!"

Now that the self assesment is over, and I have research some of the DIY "experts", lets see "How I did it!"

The Window Sill refresh!

This was a simple little item, that will take the good part of a day to do it right.  So, I made my way to the Home Depot.  

Materials:

• paint
• Paint Pan
• Paint brush
• Paint Roller
• Caulk
• Stir still 
• Painter tool (my old one was warn out)
• Tape (already had some)
• Plastic
• Cleaning stuff

Clear the area, prep the space and paint away.

In the video, made with iMovie, you can see the different stages of the project as I worked my way through.

Outline of steps:

1. Clear the area.  I had to remove all the stuff we keep on the sill. In addition, I cleared the area around the sill.  Did not want any paint on my coffee pot.
2. Clean the area.  I used a pre-smoked cleaning sponge.  I have used them in the past and find they are easy for cleaning small areas and do a good job.
3. Prep the area.  I taped off the window edges and the countertop where I will be working.
4. Prepare the paint.  I mixed it up, and poured into the paint pan.
5. I applied two coats of paint.
6. Removed the tape, and restored all the stuff

Simple project, took a couple of hours.  Check out the video: