Floor painted white

Ayumi went to Japan recently for a 12-day visit with her mom (Hi, Seiko!). While she was away – and after I was bored of working, drinking alone, and watching sports – I decided to paint our bedroom floors white. Some sample pictures of white floors look pretty sharp at this website. Plus the article was entitled, "Are You Gutsy Enough to Paint Your Floors White?" so then I basically had no choice but to do it. (Umm.. this might have actually all been Ayumi's idea.)  

Our future master bedroom is on the 2nd floor at the front of the house. It has beat-up, splotchy pine floors. Pine is a soft-wood and looks a little cabin-y in its yellow coloring, in my opinion.

Bedroom floor after a little sanding

Closet floor after sanding and brush painting the edge with primer

My initial plan was to simply spill a bucket of white paint on the floor and then squeegee it around but I guess that's not how you do it. Over a series of nights after work I went around on my hands and knees and sanded the the pine down, wiped and cleaned it. Then I rolled on a coat of oil-based primer. Oil primer is a little more durable than latex, but its also very stinky. Which led to my first mistake. 

Sexy knee pads

No turning back now

Primer down, windows open

 You need to "paint yourself out of the room" which of course means start in the corner far from the door and then make sure you finish as you're stepping out the door. No I didn't have to jump out of the window, but I did accidentally leave the windows open. I had them open to air-out the stinky fumes from the oil primer while I was painting. It seems like a small thing except our windows sills had a lot of stuff on them and the overnight breeze blew grit, dust, and plaster crumbs onto my primer. The next day, I walked in in my socks and they were catching on all kinds of little stuff that was stuck in the primer. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

So.... then I went a little OCD overboard and went over literally every square inch of the room with my finger-nail and a super-fine 220-grit sand paper. It took 3 hours and I needed to band-aid 4 fingers. I picked every speck and sanded every little thing. When I was done you could slide around in your socks without feeling a thing, which was very fulfilling. I think painted floors are cool because they are really cozy and comfortable on your feet so it would have been a bummer to have it not be perfectly smooth.

After a few sock pirouettes, I cleaned the floor again and started rolling down super durable "Porch and floor" paint from home depot. I think I did a new layer for each of 3 days.

Gleaming, smooth, homey floors

 

Blood, sweat, and tears all forgotten

Walk-in closet got the white floor treatment too.

 I think it looks pretty cool. Maybe Ayumi should listen to my design ideas more often.