*Editor's Note: This editor has been too lazy to take photos, so that'll be a different post.*

Our continued efforts in the Transformation of Chateau Travolta rise and fall seasonally. In the summer, we become obsessed with the yard and flowers and the roof and the paint and the blah blah blah. In the chill of winter, when we're stuck inside all weekend long? OMG, the ceiling in the living room is so depressing. It's like hobbits live here or something.

(The ceiling has rough-hewn beams every six feet or so. They are were a chocolate color. Which is totally cool if you are a hobbit or live in a Tudor. Neither of those are we.)

Beloved installed the arch in the door between the kitchen and the living room a few months ago after my nagging incessantly about the unfinished doorframe for just a week or two, seriously. The arch is beautiful. And white. Which made those hobbit beams look even darker and goth-like in contrast. Also, the trim around the living room ceiling, which somehow in a paint-matching miscalculation is even darker brown than the beams, reminds me of wearing courdoroy with silk.

We've talked about painting those beams white or boxing them in since we moved in. But of course, every other project got in the way. It was finally the beautiousness of the arch that pushed Beloved over the edge. He really wanted to paint the ceiling. Ever since I painted the kitchen ceiling and dripped all over the lineoleum (thank goodness that's not staying, because people, I am telling you -- you do NOT want me to paint your ceiling), I swore never again. Not me. I'm not allowed to paint ceilings. Or remove tile. Not that I've ever accidentally punched a hole in a wall doing that. Um. 

So Beloved said if I left the house with the little angel, he would paint the ceiling and the beams. And this weekend, he did. It only took twelve hours.

The effect is pretty amazing. The trim still needs to be replaced, so it's not complete yet, but it's like the ceiling just rose by six inches. I no longer feel quite so hobbit-like.

We just keep hacking at this house, and with each measure, it feels more like ours.