So, I kinda realized that the garden has officially exploded:
It’s huge. Way above the deer containment device. We even have had some veggies out of it! Mostly tomatoes, with a few squash, peppers and okra thrown in there for fun. We’re kind of busy to bother with the garden this year, but it’s doing well considering its state of somewhat-neglect. One great idea Oak came up with was to run a hose out there with a soaker hose attached to water everything. Luckily we’re still getting our produce box on a weekly basis, which definitely keeps us on the fresh produce train too.
What a far cry from what it looked like in April!
Crazy, huh? That’s quite the before and after picture, if I’ve ever seen one…. lol 
Continued from..
So, you’ve got your stairs all sanded. Think you’re ready to slap some stain on there? Not so fast….
1. Get rid of the dust particulates.. After you suck up all the big sawdust type stuff with your shop vac, it’s time to “de-bubble” the space, that is, remove all the crazy plastic you put up in an attempt to contain the dust. And oh, the dust isn’t only in the spots where you first think to look. It’ s likely stuck to your walls and on any teeny space you can imagine, like the stair spindles. So do a quick vaccum on those and then go over EVERYTHING with a tack cloth. A tack cloth is basically like a really sticky piece of cheesecloth, and it will get up all the fine dust particles.
2. More cleaning… My stain container recommended going over the entire surface with mineral spirits so I dampened a rag and did a quick swipe over everything. Probably helped pick up any remaining dust too.
3. OK, FUN TIME! The actual staining. The moment you’ve been patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for. We actually made our first purchase at Sherwin-Williams for this project. And let me tell you, it was great because the guy in the store just got everything we needed out for us instead of us standing there staring at all the products like, “d’oh” (our normal Home Depot/Lowes experience). I picked out a stain color. He recommended doing the staining with two old t-shirt pieces – one to apply and one to wipe. How economical! No stupid “lambswool pads” needed. 
I discovered a few awesome things doing the staining. One – staining is super fun and satisfying!! Two – stain actually stains your skin. Great if you’re going for a splotchy fake tan look (a la “Snookie”), not so great for everyone else. Three- Because of “two”, you need some gloves. I used cheap plastic gloves though, and they actually disintegrated on my hands and turned them brown anyway. Fun times.
4. Staining tips: Admittedly, there’s not much to staining. You spread it on. Spread it thick. Wait 10 minutes (or as directed on your stain) and then come back and wipe away the drips. Given this process, you can only stain a few stairs at a time. There’s a lot of waiting around with icky hands. Have a TV show or something ready. Oak took some uber flattering pictures of me staining… Can someone remind me to get some more stylish and slimming home improvement clothes? How do all these other home improvement bloggers look all cute doing their home improvement stuff? It’s like they actually take a shower and put makeup on, and THEN get all nasty doing home improvement stuff. Uuuuh, no thanks. That’s way too much trouble. I will only allow this cropped picture to capture the staining experience:
5. Wow, this stain looks great!! I think I’m done! I seriously thought I could be done after one coat of stain. It looked pretty darn good, a whole lot better than the un-stained stairs. Trust, me just put another coat on. It makes a HUGE difference in the overall even-ness of the finish. So, go through that whole process again. Yeah.
6. Stop: Poly time. Our Sherwin-Williams dude recommended this polyurethane for the stairs, which I got in a satin finish: 
Since we bought it, I’ve read some mixed reviews on Minwax floor polyurethane (apparently there are some pro versions that are better), but it’s seemed OK so far. The trick to polyurethane is to apply it EXTRA thin with a natural bristle brush.
Keep spreading until you don’t see any more coming off the brush. You’ll reload about half as often as you do with paint. This should minimize any drips, which you can definitely run into (pun semi-intended) on the vertical surfaces. Because it’s all oil-based, you have to clean the brush with mineral spirits. I apparently did not master this practice because my brush turned all hard and crusty after a few days. Luckily, I did all the poly in one day because the label says to recoat it in 4-6 hours, which I did. If you allow it to dry more than 12 hours, you have to sand again (NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!).
7. Admire your hard work so far. Soooo pretty!
This might look “done” , but, you might notice some tape still on there. If you’re like me, you likely got some stain on the skirting, a.k.a. the “white part on the sides of the stairs.” Ours also needed some dings sanded out and a fresh coat of paint, so stay tuned for the “final reveal” in the next installment! Thanks for tuning in!
Yeah, it’s not a baby. (Sorry to our patiently waiting mothers…). We now have a “house rabbit”: 
His name is Radar. You might be able to deduce the reasoning on that one from his obvious ear situation, but it’s also kind a nerdy Oak reference to a character on one of his favorite classic TV shows. Luckily I’ve come to appreciate that show over the years (despite changing the channel to Full House when it came on after The Cosby Show in the school afternoon TV lineup all those years). And no, we have not attempted to feed the rabbit Nehi Grape soda, though we have learned rabbits have a strict diet of hay and greens:
His love of collards and disdain for kale have us believing he is a true Southern Rabbit. He hops around the kitchen a few hours a day (as that’s all where he’s allowed for now… the rest of the 1st floor is “under construction”), kinda/sorta uses his litter box like a cat (minus the “pebbles” which we are told.. are pretty much a given, oh joy), begs for love, and tries to chew on our cheapo ikea chairs. That could be because the first weekend we had him, we had no choice but to take him with us INTO ikea in a cat carrier . Leaving him in the car would have been deadly, having the outside temperature around 90 degrees. Can you take a rabbit to “SMALAND”? He is small… anyway, I wanted my new desk darn it! He survived but I don’t think he was very happy about that entire situation. We made it through the entire store without anyone noticing until these ladies behind us in the checkout line noticed the bag and were like, “IS THERE AN ANIMAL IN THERE ??? HOW CUTE!” I was like, yo ladies shut up because we’re going to get in trouble! Geez louise! We made it out unscathed and undiscovered and he’s had his teeth set on devouring our chairs ever since.
There’s more to tell but I will let you revel in these first pictures of the cuteness, which, I am discovering is extremely difficult to capture with a quickly moving object that also is subject to red eye. I’m willing to accept the challenge.
OK so the crazy thing with our house is that we have not one, not two, but THREE freaking sets of stairs! One set in the entrance that goes from the main floor to the second floor, a set that goes down to the basement, and a third set that goes through the back of the house from the kitchen to the bonus room (which is over the garage). The bonus room stairs are probably in the middle as far as condition of the stairs go – the basement stairs being the best and the front, most visible stairs being the worst (can we say disgusting dust and grime-half-coddled-togetherness? Yes. but that’s for another post..). So, I figured, not being all that visible, that these bonus room stairs were the first to try my hand at refinishing. Here’s what we are working with:
Lovely eh? They’re really not the quality of stair you’d normally refinish, but they are workable, especially being in the back of the house and not all that visible. Oak thinks they are combination of himself (oak wood.. haha) on the treads, with pine risers.
As much fun as we have working together on projects, this confined space isn’t exactly comfy for two people. So while Oak has actively contributed to the stairs, I feel that I can call them “my project.” At least for the really annoying and getting dirty parts.
Here we go…
- Spend many evenings pulling staples out from the stairs. Apparently they were carpeted at one point or another. You might be asking, if they WERE carpeted, why not just carpet again? Well, besides how gross and dirty carpeted stairs can get, it costs something ridiculous like $50/stair to get done because of all the extra work involved. Yeah. I think we paid that just for the little part where it wraps over the top of the top stairs. Best tool to use for removing staples, I discovered, is needlenose pliers. Especially for those icky really small and strong staples. Find even more staples when you improve the lighting situation with a giant work light. Almost fall down the stairs trying to use entire body to get stubborn staples out.
- Pleadingly ask husband to pull out supper bugger icky staples. OK, so I almost developed carpal tunnel pulling out all these staples. By the end, my hand was blistered and swollen, and I JUST COULD NOT PULL ONE MORE STAPLE! (dramatic collapse at like 11pm one night). Mark these staples with blue tape so he can find all of them. Miss several … only to be discovered later on..
- After the last marathon staple pulling session, cover all the holes and imperfections with wood putty. Read online the next day that you should NEVER use wood putty when you’re going to stain something. BUGGER!
- Create a sand bubble in which you will be spending several hours. This was accomplished by attaching plastic on the top banister of the stairs, and taping to the wall. Apparently spreading plastic is a talent I am COMPLETELY lacking in…. thanks to the hubby again for this one..
- Let the sanding begin. 80 grit paper,cause that’s what the internet told me. Start out with mouse sander. Remember that heavier dutier (read MANLY) DeWalt Orbital sander is also available. Orbital sander kicks mouse sander’s ass. Quickly become covered in a thin layer of fine dust. Not quite as annoying as drywall dust, but enough to call yourself “Dusty”, which is also the name of our neighbor’s cat. Feel very fashionable with the glasses/headphones/dustmask combo. Stupid “safety” and “not losing your hearing” interfering with looking awesome while being holed up alone in a stairway.
- Get about halfway through the stairs, and realize that, hmm.. how am I going to get this pesky paint off the edges of the stairs? The orbital sander obviously doesn’t get in corners. So I try the mouse, which is suppose to get into corners. Fail. Consider spending the next 35 years holed up in this stairway with a sanding block. Consider painting stairs instead. Husband thinks of the multi-tool that is currently being loaned to us, which, coincidentally, ALSO IS A mini SANDER!
- Try mini sander multi-tool. Works well. Finally there might be an end to the edge sanding conundrum! However, the tool runs on a battery and said battery has about 10 minutes of battery life + 30 minutes of battery charging time. Go through this process about 3 times for 3 stairs.
- Realize, that for the first time ever, you want to purchase a power tool of your own. Yeah… I know, buying power tools is for boys. What I realized is tools were invented to make your life easier. I could spend the next 5 months sanding these stairs, or I could get it done in a few weekends. Sorry ladies who oppose man tool purchases… I actually kind of get it. (However… the jury is still out on the biscuit joiner… sorry darling.)
- Go to Big blue. No, not your place of employment, the blue home improvement store. Marvel at the very FEW choices in mini sanding tools. Finally Oak asks some employees and they take us to a new SHINY SPECIAL display where this beauty is displayed. It’s everything I could want in a detail sanding tool. And, it’s a multi-TASKER! It can cut, it can grind, and who knows what else. Alton Brown would approve.
Feel a little comforted by the fact that it’s called the soniCRAFTER. Surely this means that it can also be used in scrapbooking and other crafty pursuits. This isn’t a pure man-tool now is it? It even comes in a cute little purse. How fashionable! - After picking up the sonicrafter and being satisfied with the help received, it’s time to go home and get back to work. Oh BUT WAIT! It’s time to hear the LIFE STORY of the guy that helped you find the multitool! Well, actually the entire story of this family heirloom antique armoire he restored for his daughter, who lives up in Washington DC. Apparently she’s finally getting it a year after he promised it to her because it’s been such a pain to work on. Actually he was helpful and had some good ideas, but we swear, Oak has “the face” where people just want to talk to him. This from a blue store guy on a SATURDAY. He must have spent at least a half hour with us. haha
- Continued fun with the 80-grit sandpaper. 80 grit definitely helps with the paint removal. Develop a large pile of worn sandpaper pads. Marvel over the wonderful functionality of your newly purchased tool. Get covered in dust again.
- Unexpected improvements made by hubaroo. Early Sunday morning, he decides to eliminate the creaks in the stairs with some screws and wood plugs. How fancy. I wake up to realize that these plugs need to dry because they’re glued in and need to dry before I can sand them down to be even with the rest of the wood surface. Oh bummer, I don’t get to sand more?
- OK, now you can sand more. Oh, you thought the sanding was over? Do the entire thing over again with 100 grit paper! WOOHOO! Find some more staples. Whoops.
- Time to semi-dedust. Hopefully you hooked your big sander to your shop-vac to eliminate some dust, as I actually did because Oak told me to. Go over EVERYTHING with the shop-vac again and then tack cloth to pick up the pesky super dusty pieces that even the vaccuum can’t get.
Next time:Let the staining begin! Stay tuned…
