TheBanyanTree: The Porch Story

[Pam North]

Shortly after we bought this house, we noticed that the ceiling of our
porch was 'molting'.  Evidently, whoever had put it up had done a
crappy job with the joint compound and tape.  Pieces would fall down
and lay on the deck.  If they were picked up - great.  If not, the
kids and dogs trampled them and they became a whole bunch of little
white pieces that were hard to sweep and got everywhere.

And it's been almost five years of this.  The porch was built with big
screened 'windows' and two doors, and a ceiling fan!  Supposedly, the
couple before us used it for a daycare and it was painted a bold blue
and bright yellow!  YUCK!  We repainted a pleasanter light green
before we moved in.

One of the screen doors we kept propped open so our dog could be put
out on the porch, and then go through the door and outside on his own,
and then come back and stand at the door (all glass panes) and stare
until he was let in.  Occasionally he'd let out one bark.  Good dog! 
Hannah of course has her own rules.  She has always just jumped up on
the door to scratch and whine to be let back in!  Brat!

Last summer, realizing that the porch was all mine to do as I pleased
with, I removed all the screening because it was getting pretty hole-y
and I didn't want to mess with rescreening.  I also put down
indoor/outdoor carpeting with big plans to make it over into a place
to hang out.  I was going to hang plants and dress it up.  Okay.  I
hung two huge baskets that I bought in Raleigh with Maria and Carla,
but then I forgot to keep watering them and they turned into hanging
dead things.  Ugly.  And I replaced the door with one not glass on the
bottom, and had a piece of plexi-glass screwed in so that when Hannah
jumps, she's not damaging the door itself.

And I also moved the small portion of chain length fence (you've seen
it in photos with the morning glories) back, and then had Randy make a
gate to keep the dog from getting off the deck.  (There's a porch,
then one door leads down steps to outside, and the other door to the
open deck with stairs to the side yard.)

Anyway!  My molting ceiling.  The man who used to live here wasn't
concerned about the ceiling, and I certainly didn't know anything
about it, so we just lived with it.  Hardly even thought about it
anymore.  The porch was just there.  A place to pass through.

Until Diane came to visit and started hanging out.  She absolutely
could *not* stand it!  Said she wanted to meet the guy who'd done it! 
There was a reason my ceiling was falling down, and the reason was
shoddy workmanship!

So while our plan for this weekend was to paint my porch, the plan
changed and Diane started showing her talents!  We did power wash it
Saturday to clean the walls first.  Okay... we mostly watched Charlie
do the power washing!  Once again, he struck upon a 'chore' that he
saw as fun, and we couldn't get the hose away from him!  We pulled out
the carpet and moved it to the driveway and Diane washed it.  Don't
worry!  I was right there pulling weeds and sweating too!!!!

And yesterday morning when I woke up at 0923, Diane was already on a
ladder pulling all the old stuff off and scraping what need scraped. 
Mostly I morally supported her all day  - and she worked on it for
about seven hours!!!!  She got all the old stuff off, I swept up the
mess, and then she started smearing on more joint compound, cutting
strips of tape, and covering all of that with more compound!

Alright, geez!  I can't get away with ANYthing around here!  Ya'll
*always* make me tell!!  Actually, she said we needed the compound and
I said not to worry!  I had a big bucket of it in the garage, and I
even pointed it out to her and she agreed that I already had exactly
what we needed!  Until I picked the bucket up  yesterday morning.

Firstly, I knew right off it was awfully light.  Secondly, the top was
moving around which meant it obviously wasn't secured!  Okay.  So I
ended up having an almost empty bucket of dried up compound!!! 
Aurghghghgh!!!  So we had to make a run to Lowe's before she could
even get started!

But!  We did and she did, and right now it's just over halfway joint
compounded!  We she gets the time, she's gonna finish (which will
probably be next weekend since her son has baseball this week and I'll
be gone for a couple of days to Duke), then after it's all 'cured' and
dried, we can start sanding.  And *I* can even do that too!!! 
Ohh-hoo!!!  Something home-improvement-ish I can take part in!!!!!

After that her plan is to bring over her bucket of texturing stuff and
then paint the ceiling.  Because she was in the middle of her own home
improvement projects when Miller died, she already has the stuff we
need, including paint for the ceiling and she's not going to use it
'cause her ceiling in her bedroom will be yellow.

So!  And then, after all *that* is done, we can finally paint the porch!!!!

And this time I *am* going to dress the place up with plants and seats
and 'stuff'... make it a pleasant place to hang out in the evenings,
or whenever!

Ya'll feel free to come by and visit anytime!

Pam

p.s... and right now I have *three* sunflowers blooming over the side
of the deck!!!!