It's terrible to be a home wrecker....especially when you're wrecking your own home! Nevetheless, that's what wound up happening Saturday when my brother came down to help me take the the wall paper border off of the kitchen.

This was supposed to be a very simple project. Aren't they all?....

We were simply going to remove the wall paper border, take down the curtains and possibly get started priming the trim around the windows and doors. Our realtor wants to start our listing over with a new number and advertise a "freshly painted kitchen". I admit that the colors in the kitchen are a little strong. I was going to re-do them, but they kind of grew on me. And The Hub and I have to be aware that, though we bought the house in it's current condition we're probably not going to sell it to a couple with interior design experience(me) and remodeling experience(him). Things have to be made as easy as possible for people.

But, nobody made it easy on us! Not only were there not less than 4 layers of wallpaper border up, but some idiot had painted, with high gloss paint, over at least two different kinds of wall paper. The result of THAT was that as we began the border excavations tearing the border away pulled away the top part of ALL of the layers of wallpaper, paint and all.

Well, at least the mystery of what was under there was solved. After practically going an an archeological dig with a putty knives and Dif wallpaper remover, we found out we have plaster walls.

As easily as the whole mess fell away from the wall at the slightest touch near the border we thought maybe it would be easy to get the whole wall done. But nooooo! Without the "sticky factor" of the ancient wallpaper to pull it away, the glossy paint acted as a kind of exoskeleton, an impervious shield making progress with anything duller than a razor blade impossible.

We worked for hours and got about 3 feet of total wall space done. And this is really impressive, when you consider that my brother will firmly state, "my tool of choice is a sledgehammer". He was very cool and patient about it....of course, he went home at 5:30.

Luckily, when The Hub got home he could see exactly what the problem was, and confirmed that there was no other way for us to have handled it besides how we did. But I still don't think that the poor man, who was kind of expecting a hot meal and a nice chat with my brother enjoyed coming home and find the kitchen in a state of disaster, the dog in a state of panic, and the outdoor trash can stationed right outside the back door.

At this point, I have two words for prospective home buyers: decorating allowence!