Dining Room Progress: Our Plank Wall

This is the post that has taken since early January to finish. No reason. I’m just lazy like that. The last thing I shared about my dining room was the before pictures and a mood board. Oh yeah, and this sneak peek:

 

And here that wall is now:

 

Overall, we’ve painted the walls, added the horizontal plank accent wall, bought a rug and put up window treatments. But today I’m just gonna talk about the wall (simply because the rest of my dining room is covered in, you know, general day to day stuff.) That plank wall was a must, due to some horrible drywall work by the previous owners. I always knew we’d either have to completely redo the drywall or cover it somehow. Pinterest to the rescue! I found some great inspiration here, here, and here.

I couldn’t use regular boards like I've seen other people use, because my window trim isn’t deep enough. We found these thin 8’ tongue and grove planks at Lowe’s:

 

My wonderful hubby did all the handy work (on his vacation, no less.) I just did the painting. It’s a pretty self explanatory process. The planks came in 8’ lengths so we knew there would be seams and planned accordingly. The wall is 11’ wide so we did one whole length plus a 3’ section, swapping those lengths on the next row up so we had a nice zig-zag of seams (as opposed to one long seam running up one side of the wall.) I really liked these planks because they were easy to install and had the look we were going for. I wanted it a little rustic with a slight gap between each board, so the tongue and groove feature is perfect. It was just a matter of snapping them together and securing them to the wall with a few nails (6-10 depending on the length). Here’s the wall au naturale:

 

After Sam got the wall covered, it was my turn and time for spackle, primer, and paint. Here are my weapons of choice:

 

There were quite a few knots in the pine - remember I wanted rustic ;) ;) - no problem because I knew I was painting them. The spackling took patience – fill holes, wipe with damp cloth, let dry, fill again (because it shrinks), wipe with damp cloth, let dry, and finally, lightly sand. I used a sanding block because it’s easier to keep it nice and flat. After letting the dust settle (and promptly wiping it off) it was time for paint. Two coats of primer and two coats of paint later, we have a beautiful plank wall!

As a reminder, here's the before:

And after:

 

(You have to please excuse my photography. The afters were taken with my phone when I was between cameras. Hopefully I can get some decent shots soon. Maybe when I do a full reveal.)

We left a slight gap, about 2”, at the top because we plan on adding crown moulding to this entire room. Not to mention the sides need trimmed out, but one thing at a time, right? We’ll get there. :)

This simple wall was the best solution we could come up with to cover that awful botched drywall. It wasn’t too big of a mess to do and the total cost was around $70 - $11.00 for 6 planks in a package and we used 6 packages. That doesn’t include the spackle, paint and supplies because we already had all that.

We really love how much it brightens up the dining room AND the living room since they’re connected. If you’re on the fence about installing something like this in your own home, go for it! It’s a fairly easy project (we made all the cuts with a hand saw and a miter box), and the best thing is the character it adds to our otherwise plain 1970s ranch.

 

 

 

Yard Sale Score!

I have a love/hate relationship with Saturdays. I look forward to the day off all week, so I can get this or that done, or have a fun day with the family. But it never fails that I end up sleeping in, finally dragging myself out of bed at 8:30, and then taking an hour to drink my coffee (lovely, lovely coffee) before I even acknowledge to anyone else that I actually AM awake. Of course by then half the morning is gone, and I don’t even see the point of putting makeup on. By the afternoon I’m cursing myself that I didn’t get anything done, and what’s the point, I’ll just take a nap now! Boooooo!

But a couple of Saturdays ago I actually did something productive and fun! My Mom called me wanting to find some yard sales, and despite having a hard time finding a decent sale in our small town, we hit the jackpot. I knew it was gonna be awesome as soon as I spotted all the furniture peeking through the trees! The lady selling everything had closed her insurance office, so there were desks, armoires, chairs (you get the idea.) She had all kinds of office junk stacked on this old desk, but I knew right away it was AMAZING! Check it out!

It’s almost the size of my dining table with some really fun features and I actually love how its beat up a little bit. I never look for perfection in the pieces that I buy. A little character always does a piece of furniture good. And I don’t solely look for antique or used furniture when I’m in need of something. I’ll buy new if I think the quality is good and the price is right. I have a good mix of both old and new in my home. But I will say that I rarely find new furniture that is as well built and solid as older furniture. (At least anything that I can afford.)

I’ll be opening it up to show off the awesome features and give a short tutorial on cleaning up old furniture (namely getting that musty smell out) next week. Right now, I’m just glad the hubs has somewhere else to work besides the breakfast bar or dining table. I’m sure he’s glad, too. J