Cliff May Restovation

...a fascia board party! A milestone has been reached. All of the fascia boards on my house are now the same color -- and it's even a color I like! When I moved in my house had a near rainbow of colors: white, pwoder blue, medium blue, dark blue, and "peeley" (not really a color, but worthy of its own distinction). And now I have that nice satin-silver. Here's the final stretch:

BEFORE

AFTER

These things take a while if you want to to them right. First you have to scrape any loose paint (my ears are still bleeding). Next, you have to remove any hooks or other superfluous hardware and fill any holes (my house has a lot of them). Then you get to prime (thanks again, previous owners for the smurfey blue). Finally, you get to paint. Fun fun fun.

GARAGE DONE (ish)

I don't know what to do about the windows. Originally, the house came with the clerestory windows just like on the front. Some idiot garage door installer decided he (or she -- I'm a gender-equal h8ter) needed wood in the middle for some piece of the garage doors and they now have these terrible wood things with plexiglass. Estimate to return to original $2000 for front and back of garage.

COURTYARD PAINTING DONE, TOO

I've been delaying and hemming, and hawing but I finally finished painting that last window. One of the things I also learned is that clean glass is important in completing the glass-house effect. My neighbor's thought I was crazy when I told them the windows and doors would be the same color as the body of the house. Now, one has already defected and started to paint her house the same way. With the courtyard painting done it finally completes the look and the house seems so much sleeker and fits in better to its surroundings. I'm truly amazed at what a difference it makes visually.

I also discovered something very important: there are many different types of spackle and it's important to use the right one. About a week ago I discovered "light weight" spackle. This stuff is light and fluffy. It's 10x better than regular spackle for smoothing wood surfaces. It gets into small crevices and "stick" so much better. It's also sands away easier too. Highly recommended as a "go-to" spackle and only use the heavier stuff for heavier duty jobs.