A good sign

One of our teachers, Mike Kingcaid, made us a couple of signs with our with our logo, and they turned out fantastic!  He made a large aluminum one for the outside of the front of the building, and a smaller one for the inside.  He hung the smaller one the other day and it was a pretty cool moment when we saw it up on our wall for the first time.  It made everything we've done and are doing seem more real.

A panel of experts (or not)

Tom's been working on putting up some bead board paneling.  It's been a bit of a challenge because, with the vertical lines of the paneling, it has to be perfectly straight, yet the floor is uneven, turning it into a somewhat frustrating process.  Nothing that a little molding can't fix, though!  He finished around the stairwell and is working on the outside of the classroom.  Here are some before and afters of the stairwell.

Allow us to vent for a moment...

I've been working on my pet project, which is the duct work.  Tom says that it's a good thing the guy from the gas company pissed me off when he told me how ugly our duct work was, and that we should really invest $50,000 in some new spiral duct work, because he unknowingly threw down the gauntlet and challenged me to make the existing duct work look as cool as possible.  It's getting there.  Last summer I scrubbed years of dirt and nicotine stains off of the galvanized steel, and now I've been taking off the filthy vents and making them look new again.  Here are some before and afters:

How it looked when I removed it.

Just in case you really didn't know just how dirty it was.  Ewww!

After soaking in ammonia and water and getting a good scrub.

I've learned through this project that there's really nothing a little paint
can't make better.

The finished product!

The other neat thing I discovered is that the duct work was made by a division of Bethlehem Steel called Bethcon, which I had never heard of.  Ours was made 42 years and 16 days ago.  I found this out because I saw this when I removed one of the vents:

Tread on me

The upstairs floor is done!  Tom spent a couple of very late nights (we're talking 3:30 in the morning) working on it, but it was all worth it!  Some before and afters:

We even love all the scratches!

A Floor Show with Stripping and Bad Language

We’re finally moving on to refinishing the other half of the upstairs floor!  Once again, Tom rented a sander from Home Depot to do the job.  This one looked like it was almost brand new, unlike the ones we used previously which looked like Abe Lincoln might have used them to refinish his entire log cabin.  The power cord on this one was pristine; not a hint of electrical tape on it from someone running it over with the sander…until Tom got a hold of it.  Now there are two, that’s right, two pieces of electrical tape on the cord.  I won’t repeat some of the language he used when he ran over it (twice) since this is a family-friendly blog, but it was not pretty.  I was shocked and highly offended.

Goodbye to a century of dirt!

There were some floorboards rotted from water damage, which Tom ingeniously patched with wood paneling he ripped out from the bathroom.

Tom's sign to keep people off the naked wood (insert joke here). Someone's been watching too much
Monty Python and the Holy Grail/Game of Thrones

Shhhhh...maybe Home Depot won't even notice!

Stripped and un-stripped wood side by side.  

Just watching the paint dry

Finally, the painting is winding down!  It was a Herculean task, one which took so much longer than we expected.  The ceiling is done, the walls are done, and now we've started putting the finishing touches on. Our theme is black and white...

Loading dock door painted black

Trim on top of walls and shelf on wall painted black

Door to private lesson room painted black

Meet our newest teacher...Cecily Mowad!

We first met Cecily in September at the Riverside Arts Festival in Easton, where we were immediately drawn to her work.  She went on to win 1st place, so obviously the judges felt the same way!  Cecily is a 2013 graduate of Kutztown University, graduating cum laude with a BFA concentrating in painting.  We are VERY excited to have Cecily as part of the team!

To check out more of Cecily's incredible work, please visit her website:

http://www.cecilymowadart.com/