Post 16: Dining Room Part 4 -- Crown Molding

Today's post is a short one.  After installing beadboard on the ceiling in the dining room, we had to add the remaining molding in the room, fill the nail holes and seams, and sand to get ready to paint.  Below is a reminder of our starting point with the room and where we left off:

Alan and I started by installing crown molding to cover the edges of the beadboard.  

When we priced the molding, we saw how this could quickly become a HUGE expense, so we used a trick we learned on Pinterest to make our molding look a little bigger -- we took a piece of half round molding and installed it a few inches below the crown molding.

Once the molding was nailed into place, we filled the seams and nail holes with caulk and then got to sanding everything.

To see more on crown molding, check out our master bedroom project!

Sanding above your head is NOT fun...

...and it takes FOREVER!!!

But I'm glad we did it.  This step was going to make painting look so much better!

Our next step was to texture the top half of the walls where the molding was so that we could move on to painting.

Here are a few more views of the room before we textured:

Getting closer -- read more on texturing and painting here!

Post 15: Dining Room Part 3 -- Beadboard Ceiling

Here we are, still working on the dining room.  Need a refresher?  Here's where we started:

And here's where we last left off:

So far, we've replaced the fan with a chandelier, taken down wallpaper, and framed in the window. 

Today is all about putting bead board on the ceiling.What you'll need for this project:

• Bead board (we used bead board planks)
• Liquid Nails
• Nail Gun
• Saw (we used a radial arm saw)

Here's my handsome fellow getting ready to work:

We started off with your basic, textured ceiling.

We used liquid nails on the back of the bead board planks (so that they won't come away from the wall or shift when the weather changes).

After the liquid nails, we held the plank in place against the ceiling and nailed it into place.

A few nails later, (okay, a lot of nails later,) and we were rolling!  One piece up, 800 to go!  (It wasn't really 800, but it did feel like it!)

Here's a closer look at the first piece.  Notice we didn't put nail holes too close to the edges.  That's because there is a lip on the edge that the next piece will fit into.

We took a few measurements to finish out the length of the wall...

...measured and cut...

...and started back at step one.  We did the best we could to line up the bead board lines, but you can see there is a small gap where it just didn't fit perfectly -- that's okay!  We fixed this later with some caulk.

Onto the next few rows!  The next piece "snaps" into the first.  It isn't a perfect fit and nothing is completely square, but with two sets of hands and a nail gun, we got it pretty close.

Here's a look at the first few rows.  We'll caulk the seams and the nail holes later -- fun!!

Along the way, we did our best to stagger the seams so that they wouldn't be as noticeable after we caulked them.

We measured and cut some more...

...and fit each piece into place.

We repeated the process about 800 times (now I'm thinking it really was 800) until we got close enough to the other wall that a plank was too wide to fit.

This time, we measured the remaining width on the ceiling and cut the boards longways (I believe that's the scientific term) to fit.

A little maneuvering...

...and MAYBE a few extra cuts...

...and voila!

The ceiling was covered!  Time to rest.  That project was a little over our heads... (anyone?)  

Here's a look at where we first started and where we are now:

Read our next post here where we'll show you how we finished off the edges!

Post 14: Dining Room Part 2 -- Window Frame

I've decided that I'm not the best at posting on the blog regularly, but when we get into projects like our dining room that take so much time, I figure blog posts are better late than never!  So here's where we left off -- wallpaper in the dining room was off the walls, which meant we had started a project we couldn't back out of.

The next thing on our list was to frame in the window.  Here's what it looked like before we got started:

First off, I want to give full credit to to Remodelando la Casa and her window-framing tutorial you can find here.  She has great instructions that we followed pretty closely.  Here's what we did:

First, we took down the apron (see below for window terminology).  We did this because the width of the window would be bigger once we framed it in, so we would need a wider base.

We used a crowbar and a hammer to pry the old apron away from the window.

Next, we scored the stool to get ready to pull it away from the window.

Alan used the crowbar to pull the stool up and off of the window frame.

Using the old stool as a stencil, we cut a new stool that was a little wider on each side to provide a base for the new side casings.  We cut this out with the jigsaw.  Alan used the miter saw to cut a new apron and then installed both pieces with his nail gun.  We had to take down the chair rail molding on either side of the window to make room for the new side casing.  We did this the same way that we took down the apron.

Next, we cut the two side casings and nailed them on the right and left sides of the window.  When we did this, we left about a quarter inch from the drywall edge of the window so that it would be a little smoother transition.  We used the same size wood that we used for the side casing for the head casing and then used half round molding to hide the seam between both pieces.

Finally, we cut crown molding and nailed it at the top of the frame for a finished look.

Voila!  What do you think?

We still had a long way to go, but we were very excited about the difference the trim made on the window!

Here, we'll show you how we add our special touch with a beadboard ceiling!