It’s time to break out the bubbly! No, it’s not New Year’s yet, but at long last, I can move into the house again. The last job, installing and painting the quarter-rounds is done. This is a big day for me, something I’ve waited for for a long time. I have much, much more to do, mind you, but at this point, at least, I can breathe a bit easier; the hardest, toughest job is done and I can move back in and tackle the rest of the house while I’m living there.

Let’s see what I have so far…

This is the living room extension, I had just started and had this corner done; you can see the small pieces I cut off on the floor.

Above is the back bedroom, and below is the living room at the front door and coat closet.

Like every job in this house, it has had a few difficulties. One of them is a perplexing filing job some worker did to mate the baseboards to the door frames. The baseboards were apparently wider than the boards used in the door frames, so they were filed down at the ends so they wouldn’t protrude. In some cases this was more pronounced than others, but it meant laying the shoe molding (quarter-rounds) was a headache. Here’s how I dealt with it:

This shows how the baseboard was filed down just before it ends in contact with the door frame, and making a straight line to the door is impossible. So, I cut a slight angle on the end piece of quarter round and nailed it in place.

These pics were taken before I put the paint on, so it looks “unfinished” but my phone was dead when I did the painting, and now the paint has been applied and the lines and nail holes are mostly filled in. You can also see a lot of sawdust on the top of the baseboard; I had to go around with a vacuum and damp rag prior to painting the quarter-rounds. I also had a lot of gouges from the hammer and the sander to deal with, plus some stain which splashed up when applying that to the floor, so I basically gave the baseboards another coat of paint while I was at it.

I will go back and take my expensive Nikon camera to shoot the house in more detail as soon as I do some final cleaning and touch-ups.

I’m still looking for those missing receipts; I will have to guesstimate if I can’t find them!