Weekend of White - Fireplace Remix Part 2!

Hey all!  

This weekend was full of fun as I conquered my To Do list (seen here) from Friday and got the lead white out.  I managed to finish both doors for the hallway, update the hardware on said doors, as well as the fireplace priming.  Since I did the priming last night I needed to wait and make sure it was fully cured before moving on to paint.  Brick, even veneer brick, has a habit of soaking up paint due to its porous nature so I wanted to make sure it was nice and dry before proceeding.  Even with just primer it looks WAY better than what it was before...lets review!

Before Tuck Pointing

After Tuck Pointing

Things were looking up!  Then yesterday they were looking upper...more up...uppity?  Whateve...

POW!

Granted this is just the primer but she is lookin' MUCH better already.  I used an oil based primer and super nappy 6 inch roller.  I don't like to use large rollers on smaller areas so I have more control.  I also took this chance to prime the last bit of paneling that for some reason was missed during Operation Tear Out the Paneling NOW!  In all our haste to get it out ASAP nobody saw the strip of paneling left under the fireplace until the molding was going in.  Attention to detail during demo is not always the first priority!!  Anywho - it is primed now and you can barely tell the difference.  Now it is time to start thinking about a mantle to tie this baby all together...let the planning begin!!

In the living room - the weekend began like this:

And Ended like this:

SWEET!  I have 2 more doors done and 6 to go!  Not exactly putting a dent in it but success is in my future - I can feel it...then again, that may be the paint fumes?  How 'bout a before and after side by side?  I don't have a pic of the closet door before with the tacky brass hardware but I have a horrible one of the during process..check it out:

Obviously we need to work on organizing the closets...

Pretty in Pink White!

And thus ends my Weekend of White.  For more how to on painting the doors and updating your hardware check out the posts here and here.  If you missed how to Tuck Point your fireplace in preps for painting check out the post here. 

I am so happy to have half of the fireplace done!  Did anyone else get a project accomplished this weekend?  Feel free to share down below.  If anyone has mantle suggestions please pass them on.  This fireplace is looking pretty week without one!

See you tomorrow!  :)

Bianca

PS - this post is on a DIY parade hosted by a couple of other blogs. If you have some projects you need to get done or are just looking for some decorating/design inspiration join the party here and here and here! 

Funky Fireplace Keeping You in the Cold?

A fireplace in a room is usually the first place an eye will fall upon when grazing a room.  It is a focal point that stands out and is usually the pride of the room, the king of the thrown, the warmth to any house.  Unfortunately for us, our fireplace is ugly...really ugly.  Eyes wander the room and don't just fall upon it, they crash upon it.  It is a hideous site of  veneered brick and missing mortar...I mean, completely missing mortar.  As if the previous owners decided to glue brick veneer to the wall and forgot to finish the project.  A truly dreadful site...until this week!  This project is not complete (big surprise, I know) but it is in the stages of getting there so I now bring you Part 1 of the Fireplace Remix.

Here is what we started with:

My Uncle Greg (UG from here on out) came to do give me a tutorial on how to Tuck Point the joints.  As you can see from above it had never been done and it would look awful once I painted everything.  Our first job was to replace the missing brick veneer with one I had found in the garage - thank goodness the previous owners had left that behind.  With a nice blob of Liquid nails on the back UG held it in place for a few minutes to set up.

We had a few other loose bricks to fix up and then we were on to mixing the mortar.   Mix mortar as directed on the bag/bucket.  When it is mixed it should look a little something like this:

Mortar should be able to stick to the spatula thingy-not too dry not too runny

Once your mortar is mixed you move on to filling the gap between the bricks like so:

Go slow but not too slow - you don't want your mortar to dry up!  Also, because bricks are porous and like to soak in water you should keep a spray bottle of water handy and spray them down to keep them moist - not wet but moist.  That will keep the bricks from soaking up the water in the mortar which would leave the mortar dry and crumbly.  This is a slow process and will require some patience! 

As the mortar starts to dry - about 15 - 20 minutes after packing it into the joints - you can go back and strike it with like so:

Striking the mortar leaves those nice indented gaps in the mortar.  It makes it look more uniform but is really for water to have a path down a brick wall instead of soaking i through the bricks...remember bricks are porous!  Since the fireplace is inside the weather report calls for little chance of rain however we kept with the striking...it looks more polished this way. 

So thats it - fill the gaps, fill the gaps, fill the gaps, go back and strike the mortar.  Fill the gaps, fill the gaps, fill the gaps, go back and strike the mortar.  You'll get the hang of it!  UG did the majority of the work and then at the last minute I came to finish it up:

After the last line was struck UG told me to wait until the morning and then take a brush, like in the above pic, and run it over the fireplace in the morning to get all the crumbly extra bits of mortar off.  If you do it too soon chunks will fall out and you will have to re-mortar so don't bother skipping this step.  You can, however, improvise in the morning like I did:

That flimsy brush wasn't doing wonders for me so I set it aside in favor of my handy painting tool that I use for almost anything.  If I was MacGyver this would be my duct tape.  I just scrape scraped away.  What we have now resembles a little something like this:

How bout a little Before and After?

It truly makes a world of difference!  Though it is not complete it is much further along than 3 days ago!  Our next step is to prime and paint...I cant wait!!!  Anyone else beautifying their fireplace??  Drop me a line and let me know how it goes!

Bianca

Update - You can check out the Fireplace Remix Part 2 by clicking here.  Part 3 will have paint and hopefully a mantle to balance things out-I'll keep you posted!