Three Season Room Part 2

I really love our three season room. I would love it a lot more if it were a proper sunroom but it is not in our budget anytime soon to make that happen. In the meantime I will continue to enjoy this room for 9 months a year and for 3 months a year fill it to the brim with crap.

We were given an escrow with the house to supply floors so we found the cheapest floors we could and got to work. That was actually a lot of fun. I remember listening to music out there, laying on the portion of the completed floor on my large stuffed giraffe and watching Chris work late into the night cutting and placing the tile. I have always loved watching him work. Something really attractive about a man who can work with his hands, amirite! We laughed and joked and just made the best of it.

He was concerned that the direct sun could loosen the tiles on the floor so that's where the curtains came in. They transformed the room. Even though they are technically ugly, they actually have added a lot of personality to the room. Thank God for this website and their instructions on DIY curtain rods out of conduit. Otherwise this would have potentially cost hundreds of dollars. Patience not being a virtue I own, I didn't spray paint them or add fancy decorative ends though. Just cut them, hung them all while Chris was asleep so I could really surprise him.

After being in this room a few years, I started to get really tired of the yellow. It was fun and different but after growing up a bit I really just wanted something classy and timeless. I found blog after blog that had done plank walls. I knew exactly what I wanted to do!

This also provided a cover up to one of the biggest issues in the room. When we moved in, before we took pictures :( the largest wall had a big patch job from where French doors were removed from our bedroom, to the 3 season room. No paint, just drywall. Well the rest of the wall had texture so I was at a loss of what to do.

I tried to add texture but that was just a ridiculous amount of work, so I just painted the whole room the deep yellow color instead to 'mask' it. If I had known about chalkboard paint that would have been an ideal cover up!

Fast forward to coming across the plank wall. PERRRRFECT.

I only chose one (smaller) wall to start with. 1. because I like to really drag out projects so we don't spend a ton of money and time in one room 2. this way I can gauge if it's going to work and turn out how I want before going in whole-ass.



So here she is, see those seems? That sagging corner round at the top? Oh man, she's a beaut.

Step One: Paint

I followed this tutorial from Jenna Sue Design Blog as a guide (one of many) and they all said to paint the wall the same color as your boards so my white planked wall didn't end up having this mustard yellow peeking out.



I went ahead and decided while using this primer on the wall to paint our gross yellow door too. The frame was a mess after one of our cats (I'm guessing Piper, it's always Piper) used the frame as a scratching post. And I don't think it had more than one coat of paint around the frame!

Step Two: Cut

I went to both Lowes and Home Depot for the 1/4" plywood to create the planks. Lowes was able to cut them down to the 6" strips I wanted but the plywood available cost a few dollars more. I ran out of wood mid wall so I ended up at Home Depot since they are usually a bit cheaper but they wouldn't cut them smaller than 12". The stores are less than a mile from each other but at this point I just wanted the wood. I hate when a project is stalled. I should probably use that as a lesson to improve my project planning and measuring but meh.

I bought more than enough wood and came home to rip the 12" to 6" to complete the wall.

Step Three: Attach

My dad had generously gifted me his nail compressor gun that had been sitting in his barn for years and years. I was visiting my sister Miranda and was in the car with my dad and just randomly asked, do you happen to own a nail gun I could borrow? To my surprise he said "Yes, I do actually. Don't borrow it - just keep it." SWEET. I love my dad.



Bye Bye you stupid texture

Chris again was unaware of this project and I wanted to surprise him and keep him from trying to stop me... so when he was out mowing the grass I set up my nail gun and tackles attaching these boards one handed.  They run about 4 feet wide so not impossible to hold and they are light. I drew a line using a level to get started and went from the top down. the top is angled so I didn't start at the very top, just the first straight board I could hang.



This is where I ran out of wood...



Primed door & old yellow wall



Lowes on the right
Home Depot on the left

Chris fixing our party lights



So I just worked my way through the wall with a nickel in between to keep the equal spacing. Up and down on the chair. I was really proud of my cut around the outlet since I've never had any obstacles before to work around! And my angle. I can't remember now how I worked that out but I believe I measured and traced with butcher paper to get it as close to perfect as possible.

Step Four: Wood Filler on all those holes

After your wall is attached with a billion nails. Seriously, some of these kept popping off because of the way the board may curve and not lie as flat as you would like. I fixed this by adding a shit ton of nails. I didn't adhere these boards to the wall because I didn't want something that permanent on a wall that may or may not have moisture issues in the future. This room is pretty much a hot mess under the seams I fear.

I then went back over every single nail hole with wood filler to be sanded later so my paint looked as good as possible. I didn't want a bunch a holes to show.



Holes holes holes, so many holes



After the sanding

Step Five: Paint

At this point it was pretty simple. Paint it white & we decided to replace the corner round molding rather than just paint it. I say we, I mean me. I have a habit of naturally including others with we. I'm just such a naturally inclusive person I guess. ;)



1 Coat



With the new corner round that I left natural to break up the wall. It's so pretty.

For comparison sake, the new plank wall vs. yellow wall & my newly gray door! That I never did go back and finish those bottom sections that just have one coat. whoops.

Step Five: Hide Them Seams!

As you can tell in the pics, my cutting & nailing was far from perfect. I have no time for perfect. That's just not my style. Much to my husbands annoyance. He is the perfectionist, I'm the completer. The get-shit-doner. I was pretty tired of this wall at this point so I went to Lowes or Home Depot I can't remember now and bought pre-painted, sanded, plastic? wood strips to hide my seams where the wood met. I brought three home and cut to size. A few nails and she was good to go.

This whole plank wall took me maybe two weekends if I remember correctly. We finished this in the spring of 2015 and plan on tackling the much bigger wall this spring! I'm insanely in love with this wall.  You've come along way baby!

Update: I have since built a farmhouse table for this room. Here's a snap from a few days ago. I have since planked a wall in our living room instead of finishing that bright yellow wall.