As is usual with my projects, I went a little further with this one than I originally intended. The thought was to paint the kitchen and do some plaster patching in the process. As I started looking at thigns, I realized that I had to change out the crown molding. Originally, I thought that I would just put new molding over the original. Well, that didn't work out.
After ripping down the old molding, I attacked the crown. I learned something: I suck at installing crown molding. I found nothing easy about this job. I've installed trim before but never anything with a cove to it. Cutting it was difficult and I mad so many wrong cuts, I can't believe I didn't go through more stock.
If it weren't for
Tom Silva's instructional videos, I would have been screwed. I won't even go through the process with you because I am sure it will confuse you more than I was. I suggest if you want to take something like this on that you watch the videos carefully.
The installation was not pretty but it wasn't a complete disaster either. I had the most trouble with the scarf joints. Because of the uneven ceiling (and walls and floor...), it was hard to align the joints and I think that the scarfs just added to the problem. I ended up using quite a bit of sealant to hide the gaps between the ceiling and the molding also.
I painted the ceiling a pale blue called "dawn's early light" and the walls were two shades of green. The trim was all a pale cream color. I am happy with how it all looks.
It is sometimes hard to enjoy a project like this because it seems like there wasn't much too it. When I look back at the "before" pics, it is easier to appreciate the lack of gaping holes, falling plaster and unaligned trim. I didn't go creazy and remove all of the cracks and unevenness. I figure that this is a temporary fix as we hope to re-do the entire kitchen at some point in the future.
My wife picked out a new window treatment, which looks very good.
Now it is just time to move everything back in. I also have some minor touch-ups to do. I'll tackle them next weekend. The final piece of the project is to re-think and paint in the blackboard wall again. My daughter is very pissed that I painted over it and insists that it goes back. I liked it also but just didn't want it taking up the entire wall.
