Den Update

Well, it's been way too long. Prepping the den for painting took us weeks. It could probably easily be prepped and painted in a weeks time if you worked on it 5-8 hours a day, but we worked on it in the evenings. You can only get so far on a weeknight.

 The last picture of the den without any modifications (besides the carpet, of course.)

I'll break down our process for you so it's clear why it took so long.

1. Stripped the gloss of the paneling to make the primer stick better. Used a deglosser to do this. Horrible fumes (even though it is apparently all-natural) and I'm not entirely sure it made any difference.

2. Covered all the knots with shellac-based primer. Since this smells way worse than normal primer, we just did on the knots since those are the most prone to leak through. Just used the spray paint version and it seemed to go ok.

sorry it's so blurry.

3. Caulked all the spaces where the paneling was not flush with the molding. I only ended up doing this in the floor molding because the gaps in the ceiling ones were sooo high up and scary to do on the second step of the ladder.

4. Filled all the knots in with patch n' paint. Sanded as needed.

5. Taped the WHOLE room. This took a while.

6. AC went out and all painting/prep was put on hold since it was too hot to function.

7a. Finally started priming. Started by priming all the groves. This took.....a while. 7-10 days before I got them all done in hour-long spurts after work.

7b. Didn't prime around the lights because we weren't sure what our plan was. Decided to take them down....which took some time. Had to order tools which caused a slight delay. Finally got lights down. There was an obvious line where the sun hadn't been able to bleach the wood so all that had to be primed thoroughly.

8. Finished all the grooves so Phil rolled the walls with primer while I followed behind with a brush making sure it got evenly in the grooves.

9. WALLS FINALLY COVERED WITH PRIMER.

10. I waited to choose a paint color until this point because I figured I need to see the room in a different light to know what shade I wanted. We chose a creamy-grayish-white.

11. Hand brushed a first coat of the paint on every single wall. It was tedious, but I think it was worth it to make sure all the nooks and crannies get covered first.

12. Rolled the walls with the "first" roller coat which is I guess technically the second coat.

13. Did a third coat, painted the trim.

14. Called a painter to come do ceiling. We knew that was above our pay grade

And with that, the den has been painted! I've prepped and painted a lot of rooms in my short life, but this is 100% the hardest one I've ever done. There have been so many steps to take care of. I think it's worth it to make sure it looks the best it can, but at the end of the day, it's still painted paneling. Despite that, I really like the color and it already makes the space feel so much bigger, fresher, more relaxing and more like our home instead of someone's 1970 time capsule.

Now we have to make it pretty, but it feels soooo much lighter and brighter in here without those dark walls.

Next update is the front room (living & dining area). After our 5 weeks of painting, we just decided to have the painter do that. Coming soon!