Back in Black

Er, well, more like black for the first time.  And staying that way.  But typing the other, more appropriate to the situation black reference makes me feel a bit uncomfortable.  And now I'm wondering why I've used the word "black" so many times.  Let's start over.

We painted our shutters!  I'll bet you can't guess which color. 

Here they are before:

 They were a dirty, faded brown.  First, Patrick took them all down so we could clean them up and get them painted.  He kept all the extra long screws in a cup and numbered all the shutters on the back so we would know which ones went where.  I'm SO glad he thought to do that; the screws holding them up were attached at slightly different places in each shutter.  If we didn't put them up in the right order, they wouldn't be level! 

I was shocked at how naked our house looked without shutters.  Unfortunately, it stayed this way for over a month while we put off the next phase of the project.  Sorry, neighbors.

Once we got our bottoms back in gear (says the mom of a sixteen-month-old), we pulled the shutters out of the garage and scrubbed them down with some dish soap and an old bristle brush.  Well, Patrick scrubbed them down.  I supervised/splashed him the shutters with the water hose. 

 Look how dirty they were!  Here they are before (left) and after (right) cleaning.

 After they dried, we set them up to be painted in what little shade our backyard had to offer:

 We used seven (!!!) cans of Black Semi-Gloss Rustoleum.  It only took one very thin base coat and a second slightly heavier (but not thick) coat to finish.  We also painted the screws.  We just poked them into a diaper box so we could spray them all at once.

 Unfortunately, I can't share a very good after picture with you yet.  The day after we reinstalled the shutters, we got a new roof!  I rushed outside once the roofing crew got here to take these, because I don't want to show you the house with the new roof until I write that post.

 Here's another "before" so you can compare.  I like to think that the black helps the house look more current, and "current" is a pretty good adjective for a circa 1945 house. 

Happy Monday!
-Kelli