painting fail

(ironically, the entry I wrote last night is called parenting fail. but I didn't publish it because it's negative and whiny and not so fun for anyone else to read. But writing helps me unwind and reflect. Plus if I only publish the good stuff, it makes me look like supermom with endless patience and love and boundless energy and devotion. ha!)

onto today's story, painting fail...

Husband is averaging 60 hours a week at work. Plus 20 hours a week on dissertation. This means I have a lot of time on my hands. To keep myself sane, I go to the gym regularly (taking advantage of the free daycare), have playdates with friends and spend some weekends at my sister's house or my parents' house.

But this week, I decided on a "project".

I live in a beautiful house. The people who built it had very nice (very expensive) tastes and spent more than we would have (their loss was our gain right?) And when it comes to decorating, they had much more modern, bold tastes than us. But all in all, I like it. Slowly, we've been decorating and adding our own personality, mixing in more warmth and a more classic feel. One of the bathrooms was painted purple. It's a deep and rich purple, nearly grey. It's a beautiful color, but much darker than I would have been brave enough to pick, especially for such a small room. Since we moved in, there was a "nail pop" that cracked through the paint and assisted by two toddlers, tuned into an ugly hole. So Daddy patched it and eventually we got around to looking for the paint to cover up the white putty that now filled the hole. All the extra paint is stored downstairs for future touch up needs such as this. Unfortunately, there was no more purple. So we matched it as close as we could, thinking that we could do a quick coat on the whole wall if needed and no one would ever know.

A few nights ago, I got the girls in bed and assembled my painting supplies. I opened the can of paint and was surprised to see a much lighter color than I expected. This should have been my first clue. But remembering that all paint darkens as it dries, I primed and painted the walls. As I went, my nervousness grew--this was not the same color. The next morning, I checked my now-dry walls and lo and behold, not even close. Instead of a dark, nearly grey, eggplant purple, my walls were lavender, almost periwinkle. Which stood out as an obvious contrast to the deep purple that showed from underneath, around the fixtures, in the corners and the edges along the trim. My "quick coat" idea didn't work. Realizing that I would either have to try matching it again or could just resign myself to a different color entirely, I grudgingly taped the trim properly and carefully applied a second coat.

The next morning, I checked my handiwork and realized I still wasn't done. The first application had been quick, thinking that the color would match well enough that it wouldn't need careful attention to corners and edges. But since I was wrong, the corners and edges now only had one coat and needed more touch up. I also realized that the paint roller had left a streak of fuzzy flecks in only ONE swipe but it was glaringly obvious and ugly. So I sanded it down and applied another coat. That was round three.

This morning, I checked it again, desperately hoping I could be done with this stupid project and found that the section of the wall that had been sanded and repainted was not painted evenly and required yet another coat.

Next time, I hire a professional.


***2/6/2012
five. FIVE coats of paint and one stupid wall still looks bad. I'm using a semi gloss paint (thought it would be easier to keep clean in a bathroom where there is regularly splashed water running down the wall) and the light shines across it perfectly to highlight every uneven brush stroke and roller fuzzy that was left behind. So five coats later, I'm still unsatisfied and I'm out of paint. so from now on, visitors will be directed to use the downstairs bathroom instead.