Coming unglued
Or, this is why I hate wallpaper.
Paint really is the way to go. It's easier to figure out gallons versus how many rolls one has to buy; you don't have to line everything up perfectly to make it look good; and it's far easier to paint over something than to have to take down wallpaper. Which is precisely what I was doing today.
Before that, mom decided to go to the senior shopping hours at Jewel this morning. This meant I couldn't clean out the kitchen the way I wanted, since she would be bringing stuff in there (the wallpaper is only in the kitchen for this project), but I was able to clear off the half-wall between the family room and eating area, plus some items off the kitchen table and the top of the fridge. I also vacuumed the stairs and upstairs hall while waiting for her to return. She got back and I went about sanitizing what she'd brought in, but even though she was perfectly okay with that, she then immediately started touching things and moving them around. Mom. Stop. Let me do this. She was all concerned about the milk and creamer and ground beef. Look, it's okay if they're out for ten minutes. That is the length of time it would normally take us to get from Woodman's to here. It'll be fine. Meanwhile, she'd gotten a Mr. Chicken and wanted it left out since it was warm, then promptly forgot all about it. Dad found it on the kitchen table hours later. Nice. Well, we did disrupt things after that--once I'd wiped everything down, including the counter, we then had to move the microwave to get at the wallpaper behind it. We put it on the counter next to the stove so it could be by an outlet, but that meant moving a few other things. However, we've realized that, hey, that might not be a bad place for it. We could put the coffee maker and the toaster on the other counter. Hmm. Something to think about.
Around this time, a female duck appeared in the backyard. She was there for an hour and a half. We think she could see us through the kitchen window. She disappeared once we moved the fridge and dad put a music channel on the TV; guess she's not a fan of classic rock. But it was nice to have her there. I love having ducks in the yard. (And yes, dad, I'd be okay with ducklings.)
We only tackled one wall today, the one with our pantry, fridge, and a small counter. I set about scoring the wallpaper first. The next step was to spray on this wallpaper remover gel that dad bought when he took down the wallpaper in the master bath a couple years ago. That takes a good 20 minutes to work, and I only did it in the area above the pantry, so in the meantime I grabbed the steamer, which I recall using in *my* bathroom back around 2008. I recall having good luck with it. Well...it's not that it was bad; it's that the wall behind the paper isn't very good. It sort of disintegrated in one place, yikes. Like, the plaster or whatever softened enough near a corner that my father will have to patch it. Hmm. Not good. And the gel didn't really work, either. The good news is that a simple sponge and warm water had the best effect, so that and a scraper did much of the job.
There were two hard parts. One was the area above the cabinets. I have a stepladder and needed to use it, but you only have so much room to work and it's a little awkward at times--especially when the paper folds under there since the cabinets are slightly recessed. There was about a two-inch space where I needed to remove the paper, and it was hard to get the sponge there since it was big and thick and the cabinet doors were in the way. Better was discovering a gap on one end. There was a good centimeter of space in the area above the fridge, next to the pantry, but on the other side it had narrowed to the point where I couldn't get the scraper in. Hmm. And then there was the part of the wallpaper that curved inside the pantry, where my father clearly had to use a different glue than just what was on the paper, because no matter how much water I put on it, it did not scrape off. Dad went and got his heat gun, which worked a little, but mostly I ended up spreading it around. There were a couple places like that. Just sand it, spackle it, and move on. There are definitely places in the pantry that already need spackling so it's not like that's the only spot needing work.
We finished right about three, and none too soon. He'd washed the walls and ceiling of the family room, which is 12'x18'. Back when we closed my bookstore, I'd gotten custody of a Pledge Grab-It mop. Dad wanted to try that out on the ceiling. Alas, while the packaging claimed "New!," I've had it since 2007. A chunk of the rubber mop base had come off and there was no salvaging it. Trying to use it with just a cloth on the bare plastic made it too floppy. We have a similar, sturdier mop for our kitchen floor, with reusable, washable cloths, so he used that instead. Either way, by the time three rolled around, we were done for the day. We're both sore, but we get to do the rest of the kitchen tomorrow. At least there are only three walls total here, and the one is done, but I'll be spending a good portion of the day back on my ladder.
Paint really is the way to go. It's easier to figure out gallons versus how many rolls one has to buy; you don't have to line everything up perfectly to make it look good; and it's far easier to paint over something than to have to take down wallpaper. Which is precisely what I was doing today.
Before that, mom decided to go to the senior shopping hours at Jewel this morning. This meant I couldn't clean out the kitchen the way I wanted, since she would be bringing stuff in there (the wallpaper is only in the kitchen for this project), but I was able to clear off the half-wall between the family room and eating area, plus some items off the kitchen table and the top of the fridge. I also vacuumed the stairs and upstairs hall while waiting for her to return. She got back and I went about sanitizing what she'd brought in, but even though she was perfectly okay with that, she then immediately started touching things and moving them around. Mom. Stop. Let me do this. She was all concerned about the milk and creamer and ground beef. Look, it's okay if they're out for ten minutes. That is the length of time it would normally take us to get from Woodman's to here. It'll be fine. Meanwhile, she'd gotten a Mr. Chicken and wanted it left out since it was warm, then promptly forgot all about it. Dad found it on the kitchen table hours later. Nice. Well, we did disrupt things after that--once I'd wiped everything down, including the counter, we then had to move the microwave to get at the wallpaper behind it. We put it on the counter next to the stove so it could be by an outlet, but that meant moving a few other things. However, we've realized that, hey, that might not be a bad place for it. We could put the coffee maker and the toaster on the other counter. Hmm. Something to think about.
Around this time, a female duck appeared in the backyard. She was there for an hour and a half. We think she could see us through the kitchen window. She disappeared once we moved the fridge and dad put a music channel on the TV; guess she's not a fan of classic rock. But it was nice to have her there. I love having ducks in the yard. (And yes, dad, I'd be okay with ducklings.)
We only tackled one wall today, the one with our pantry, fridge, and a small counter. I set about scoring the wallpaper first. The next step was to spray on this wallpaper remover gel that dad bought when he took down the wallpaper in the master bath a couple years ago. That takes a good 20 minutes to work, and I only did it in the area above the pantry, so in the meantime I grabbed the steamer, which I recall using in *my* bathroom back around 2008. I recall having good luck with it. Well...it's not that it was bad; it's that the wall behind the paper isn't very good. It sort of disintegrated in one place, yikes. Like, the plaster or whatever softened enough near a corner that my father will have to patch it. Hmm. Not good. And the gel didn't really work, either. The good news is that a simple sponge and warm water had the best effect, so that and a scraper did much of the job.
There were two hard parts. One was the area above the cabinets. I have a stepladder and needed to use it, but you only have so much room to work and it's a little awkward at times--especially when the paper folds under there since the cabinets are slightly recessed. There was about a two-inch space where I needed to remove the paper, and it was hard to get the sponge there since it was big and thick and the cabinet doors were in the way. Better was discovering a gap on one end. There was a good centimeter of space in the area above the fridge, next to the pantry, but on the other side it had narrowed to the point where I couldn't get the scraper in. Hmm. And then there was the part of the wallpaper that curved inside the pantry, where my father clearly had to use a different glue than just what was on the paper, because no matter how much water I put on it, it did not scrape off. Dad went and got his heat gun, which worked a little, but mostly I ended up spreading it around. There were a couple places like that. Just sand it, spackle it, and move on. There are definitely places in the pantry that already need spackling so it's not like that's the only spot needing work.
We finished right about three, and none too soon. He'd washed the walls and ceiling of the family room, which is 12'x18'. Back when we closed my bookstore, I'd gotten custody of a Pledge Grab-It mop. Dad wanted to try that out on the ceiling. Alas, while the packaging claimed "New!," I've had it since 2007. A chunk of the rubber mop base had come off and there was no salvaging it. Trying to use it with just a cloth on the bare plastic made it too floppy. We have a similar, sturdier mop for our kitchen floor, with reusable, washable cloths, so he used that instead. Either way, by the time three rolled around, we were done for the day. We're both sore, but we get to do the rest of the kitchen tomorrow. At least there are only three walls total here, and the one is done, but I'll be spending a good portion of the day back on my ladder.