We worked through the weekend on the house with a couple of small breaks for fun. We had dinner last night with friends. As the sun went down Karen was talking about how much fun it would be to watch a movie out by the pool. At last, my projector can be used for more than work! We had a better-than-drive-in experience watching Star Wars, A New Hope while paddling around in the water!

I spent a day and half doing prep work for painting. I had thought I would use the spray gun for a lot of it until I figured out that I'm faster with a brush and roller on the walls and ceilings. But I did prepare this bathroom vanity for spray painting.

Steve has been slaving away on the kitchen cabinets. It's taking a very long time to take off the doors because the screws have been painted over so bad that he can hardly turn them.

He's using chemical stripper and the belt sander on these. It's going to take days.

This morning I washed the louvered closet doors. They need a new finish coat of paint. I knew they were dirty but I hadn't realized how bad they smelled until they were in the garage overnight.

Dave, who has been outside a lot so as to avoid the baby cat, sat out by me. I think he was enjoying the water splashing around as long as it didn't hit him.

The bad news is that just after I finished cleaning these doors I got a frantic call from mom. Christy had a seizure – fell flat on her face. So in addition to having to deal with the fallout from the seizure, she has a very bruised face, her nose is possibly broken, and she broke a bone in her hand. Amazingly enough, after being taken to the hospital in an ambulance, they sent her home after a few hours. She was much better, all things considered, and she hates being in the hospital. She had dialysis this afternoon and I really hope she's feeling better tonight.

After taking Christy home, Steve and I went back to work. I've begun painting! I love seeing ne paint go up.

Today's task was washing the walls to get ready to paint. I thought I would breeze through that by noon and begin painting today. Boy, did I miscalulate! It's going to take as long to clean the walls as it did to scrape off the popcorns. If I'm lucky I'll begin painting tomorrow. But all is not lost – we have made a lot of progress.

This is my sister's room, before.

And later:

Wallpaper gone. The stuff on the walls came off easily. The border that you can still see here took 4 hours to remove – with stripper!!! I was not happy. Notice that the carpet, pad and tack strip are gone. As is the light fixture and all the switch plates – everywhere in the house. Steve will replace all the plugs and switches with white ones.

Below is the dining room, before.

There's oh-so-much going on color-wise in this room, before. Below you can see that the carpet (and the vinyl tile below it) is also gone, along with the curtains and the (bad) ceiling fan. The wallpaper border is gone as well but you can't see that.

All the ceiling fans are out, all the carpet, pad and tack strip are out. The vinyl flooring is out. Most of the walls are washed. I seriously hope to be painting on Monday.

I also spent 1.5 hours at Lowe's this morning with Mom and Christy ordering the countertops for the kitchen and bathrooms. They're getting the LG version of corian. It'll be lovely – and no seams. I want the same thing for our kitchen one of these days. Mom and Christy are pretty excited – this house is going to be so cute and fresh and new.

I should mention that the previous owner smoked in the house. I've been really surprised at the grit and black residue on the walls. The stench is about gone now that the carpets and curtains are gone, the ceilings are scraped and many walls have been washed. I'm so glad I quit smoking back in the day. If the walls look this bad goodness knows how her lungs look.

…on the ceilings! It took 1.5 days but I got 1500 square feet of popcorns off of the ceillings at mom's new house. And I got all but one wallpaper boarder off at the same time. Luckily the wallpaper mostly came off easily. Steve was busy doing all sorts of things in the same time-frame:

• taking the fan blades off of all the way-too-many ceiling fans
• taking off all the outlet covers and switch plates
• removing all curtains and curtain hardware
• taking out carpet, pads, and tack strip (there's more of that to do)
• beginning to strip cabinet doors
• and more that I can't remember

We have both been pretty tired at the end of the day but floating in the pool helps a lot. Mom wants to help but can't so I asked her to bake us a cake and she did! We are having cake at every meal and that helps my attitude a lot. Christy is on for soup. My initial estimate was 6 weeks to get the house in shape. That time frame is getting shorter by the day.

Here's my tip for taking popcorn off ceilings: buy a canister sprayer. I got a $15 Hudson sprayer in the garden section at Lowe's and I wish I had had it yesterday. Yesterday I used a squirt bottle and my hands are not happy. The cheap canister sprayer worked like a charm. Soak the area in front of you, wait just few minutes and scrape. My other tip is that it works best if you are in shape. The pilates and weight-lifting are paying off big time!

I've taken a lot of before photos that I'll share as we work on the house. This is the living room, looking out the front window, which is the only window in this room. It is orange and gray with a questionable floral wallpaper border.

The previous owner smoked in the house so every surface has to be dealt with. The ceilings are scraped (yeah!). Tomorrow I'll be washing the walls and then I begin painting. Everything – trim, doors, ceilings, walls – gets painted. The curtains are gone. The blinds are goings to be replaced by slightly better ones. The carpets and flooring are going out the door and then we'll lay Pergo.

The living room was almost the last room for popcorn removal and I thought to stop and take a photo. I hope it shows the popcorn/no-popcorn areas.

What popcorns do is cast shadows. The contrast between light and dark catch your eye. The bigger the popcorns, the worse it is. A smooth ceiling is quiter which is good because mostly you don't want the ceiling to be what you see when you look at a room. When you look at the photo above, do your eyes go to the swath of popcorn in the middle? That's why the popcorns are gone now.The rooms feel higher, lighter, calmer. I just wish I had the time and energy to take the remaining popcorn off the ceilings at MY house!

I always say it's good to be busy but I admit that I'll be very happy when this project is over and I'm back to regular busy. That said, it was kind of fun today. I enjoy occasional days of hard work where you can really see what you have accomplished. And mom and Christy are going to love this place once it's done.