Fresh paint

 There is nothing like a fresh coat of paint to refresh a room.  And the bathroom Syd had been using needed a refresh really bad.  The paint was chipped and the paper was peeling in a couple spots.  The faucet was out of date and and the towel bars too.  She'd pulled a towel bar out of the sheetrock and then glued it back to the wall.  The wallpaper is original to the house from 1978.  Not Sure who hung it, but after removing the paper in the master bath and having to basically plaster over the walls to cover the mess left behind (we tried every idea I could find on the internet and none was effective), we are not planning to remove this paper until we hire someone to remodel, which I don't think we'll ever do.  

Just after Syd moved in, we replaced the counter and sink and tiled them in blue to pull the small amount of blue in the wallpaper and it works still, but Syd wasn't a fan of olive green, so that's really the only thing that coordinated with the paper.  I've been able to go wild on olive and forest green and the paint is almost exactly the shade of the wallpaper background.  

Honestly, the hole in the wall was the hardest thing to deal with.  Because she'd glued the towel bar over it, I didn't know how big it was.  It was a place where the original towel bar had been pulled out of the wall, a new bar installed over it and that one pulled out of the wall.  The backer boards for the towel bars were the only way we could think to deal with it.  I screwed a small piece of wood behind it and then screwed the backer board into that.  The rest are in some very secure anchors.  Unless someone comes along and tries to hang from those towel rods, they're not coming down again. 

Rob was out of town this weekend.  This project kept me busy and out of trouble...not that I could have gotten in much trouble.  It's drippy rainy here.  Not raining, not drizzling, more like occasional rain drops.  The good thing is there's no runoff and all that water is staying here on the property.  If we have another round of sunny days, the whole garden should really perk up.  I have several plants I'd like to move before winter sets in to make the garden even better next year.  I got to spend a little bit of time in the greenhouse, but that was really about it.  I bought a Wardian case in goodwill a couple weeks ago.  We thought it was really rusty and I planned to clean and paint it, but that turned out to be the finish...except I didn't know that til I started to paint it.  Anyway, it's lovely and I have the plants to go in it.  Soon as I get them planted, I'll share.  

For some reason, there's always a theme to food when Rob isn't here.  This weekend, it's been Italian.  Friday evening, I made baked ziti.  I ate it until I was tired of it and there's still plenty to have for dinner tomorrow night when Rob gets home.  Last night, I made tortellini with 'chicken sausage with feta and spinachs', fresh basil, and Kalamata olivrd.  That was delicious.  I love how well Italian food pairs with a good fresh salad.  

That's it for me today.  Have a great week!  After I finished in the bathroom, I did all of Rob's weekend chores so I feel qualified to say 'find something you enjoy doing to break up the routine of all the things you have to do.'

Lane