5 Projects In 5 Hours

Back in February we gave ourselves a push and decided to try and tackle 10 projects in 10 hours.

Whilst it was a great way of motivating ourselves to finish a load of projects that we just didn’t get around to completing, it was tough and pretty hard going trying to get everything done in time, so this time we’ve set ourselves the more realistic goal of finishing off 5 projects in 5 hours.

Hopefully if we do this at regular intervals and try to finish off project in the first place, we’ll have a completely finished house with completely finished projects. (Yeah, right…)

5:00 – Project 1 – Paint Porch

Painting is always a really quick and easy way to achieve an instant transformation. Although we already painted the front door and most of the interior of the porch (the actual PVC porch desperately needs knocking down and completely rebuilding) about 3 years ago, it has in parts become a bit grimy over time – especially the windowsills.

I’d tried cleaning, but a quick fresh coat of paint seemed quicker and easier.

4:45 – Project 2 – Wax Bathroom Door

We already had the door stripped and filled the holes before we went on holiday, but hadn’t quite got round to finishing it off. Needless to say it’s probably not ideal, having an unfinished unsealed door in an area where there’s a lot of moisture.

It’s amazing to think that this is the same door. I can’t believe that someone would hide the beautiful period moulding under horrible fibre boards and layers of yellowish gloss paint!

4:00 – Project 3 – Brighten Up The Inside Of Our Cupboards

One of the very first things that we had done in our house was having the built-in cupboards on either side of our chimney breast in the living room installed.

They’re great for storage and whilst they look fine on the outside, they are really very basic on the inside – especially as we didn’t do anything to finish them off. The amount of junk in them doesn’t help make them look any better! Although no one really ever sees the inside of the cupboards, we still decided to give it them a little freshen up.

For us, it was a free project, as we used some paint that we had left over from our front door. Whilst it’s nothing amazing, it certainly gives them a more finished feel. Admittedly a sort and tidy probably already went a long way on improving the look.

3:15 – Project 4 – Strip Skirting Boards in Hallway

Yep, we’ve still not finished removing all of the old paint from our skirting boards and doorframes, but we’re almost there now. We’d actually already stripped and repainted most of the hallway when doing other projects like restoring the staircase, so it’s well overdue that we finished off the last few meters.

We still have some dado rails, a bit skirting on the upstairs landing to strip and one doorframe to strip, but amazingly that’ll be the last of it! I can’t believe that we’re almost finished! The thought of finally being free of the old paint makes me want to get out the heat gun right now!

0:05 – Clean Paint Off Garage

Something that we’ve barely touched since moving in to our home is our garage. With so many projects around the house to do, it’s really not been much of a priority. We’re still not further with our plans to replace the roof, but there are a few little things that need sorting, too. For one, the outside of the garage must have some point been sprayed with paint.

I was really worried about damaging the bricks, so applied the stripper to a little test area first. Luckily the paint came of quickly and easily, so that we didn’t have to leave the stripper on for too long.

-0:25 – Done.

We didn’t quite manage to finish all projects within the timeframe we’d set ourselves, but it is really good way of giving ourselves the push need to tackle jobs that we’ve been putting off. .

How do you motivate yourself to finish DIY jobs that you’ve been avoiding?