A few odd jobs

We've managed to get a few things done over the weekend. I started stripping the paint off the Dining room mantle. Here is what it looked like when I started:

And here it is after over 2 hours with a heat gun and a scraper:


Once I'm finished scraping I'll remove all the old shellac the put 2 coats of amber shellac on it then a coat of poly to seal it.

We also started on the stairs. They were too dark completely stained so we decided to paint the risers and baulisters white. First I sanded the risers to give the paint a good surface to adhere to, then I painted the risers.

Here it is with half the risers done, you can really see what a difference it makes:

And here it is with the risers finished:

Next we'll paint the baulisters.

We also went outside and started decorating the house:


You can see the Christmas tree in our Parlor window. I was going to post pics of it but I forgot to upload them to my server so it will have to wait for the next post.

There are a few other things I have in the works for the house, one is what to do with the floors that need refinishing. Another will drastically change the exterior appearance of the house if I decide to do it. I'll be posting more about these things later.