Hello! Last week over at LMB, she shared our Dining Room Makeover. It is taking us much longer than expected. I’ll key you in to some of the areas I found to be a DIY pain when hanging shiplap, but we figured it out. We are excited to announce that is officially ready for painting. We are enjoying the ride on our first bigger project in this forever home.
Enjoying The Ride
If your like me, you put everything on the clock. Years back, a road trip from NC to Grand Rapids comes to mind. It would start off with me stressing to get to GR in the quickest amount of time possible. I had LMB prepared miles ahead of the next rest area, to shoot into the bathroom and get back in the car so we can get back on the road. And food consisted of fast food and granola bars. Any lost time would have to be made back up. While in the car, we enjoyed a good tune and laughed, but I was not truly enjoying the ride as an experience to be remembered.
Slow down and Make Mistakes
There is a ride to be enjoyed when doing a DIY project too. Many will attest that the best lessons or experiences comes from mistakes and this applies to to the entire DIY world; but ego and confidence can easily get in the way of that. My lack of confidence in woodworking or construction, would take over my attitude and ruin my experience; a bad measurement, or a mis-cut piece of wood would seem like the end of the world. I wanted to be done with the project before I even started. When everything is done, you boast yourself up and are proud of what you have accomplished, but what about the experience that you just missed out on?
Enjoying the ride is something that LMB has preached to me for years. Have fun with your experience, have fun with your mistakes, because if you do not make one single mistake in a DIY project, how are you suppose to tell others what to look out for. Essentially, what she was telling me was that I needed to make mistakes, rather than fight for the image of imperfection. I have looked at our journey, our time spent together, and I realized time is going too fast. Why would I want to speed that up?
Shiplap Dining Room Makeover
The Easy Part
With as long as this dining room makeover has taken, believe me, I enjoyed every tricky cut, and every routed board. We used pre-cut tongue and grooved style shiplap boards that were 6 inches wide. With preexisting chair rail, the first board was very easy to level out. Using a nail gun with 2″ nails, nail down the board in a downward angle at the top of the board. Continue to add the shiplap and softly tap the boards into place. Make sure each board is level, and nail your way across. Fill any exposed nails or indents from the nail gun with wood filler, and follow the lines that run into the trim with paintable caulk, I used DAP White Painters Caulk.
Oh…The Curve
For the fun part, the curved arch, dom-dom-dommmm. The good news is that 6 boards of this curved arch are straight cuts and four boards need some… love and special attention. All of the trim was 3/4 inch thick, matching the thickness of the shiplap. When the shiplap would run into the trim, it was flush.
The curved trim area however, not only presented a challenge with matching the curve, but also the thickness of the trim was only 1/4 in thick. I used a 1/2 inch radius cove router bit by Ryobi in order to blend the shiplap into the trim, and where they butted against one another would be flush. The curved portions took a little time and patience and I have to admit, when it comes to details, this wasn’t easy. We knew the easiest way would be to remove the preexisting trim, but we appreciate it so much we wanted it to stay.
I will be sharing a tip and technique for matching curves or obstacles when hanging shiplap soon. The building portion of this project is done and it is ready for paint. We will share when it is all painted, but until next time find me on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. Thanks.
Tools and Materials Used For this Project.
Miter Saw
Router
Tape Measure
Scroll Saw or Jigsaw
Nail Gun
Air Compressor
Level
Hammer
Plastic Putty Knife
2 inch Nails
Paintable Caulk
Wood Filler
Here you will follow Mr. and Mrs. LMB on their journey with redoing their 1800's farmhouse, taking on new hobbies, and sharing their day to day adventures.
Thank you for stopping by and we hope you come back very soon. 
I stumbled upon your blog yesterday and I’ve fallen in love with all of your projects! May I ask what white you used to paint your dining room?
Hey how did you keep the dark lines in the bead board when you painted it? Did you go back through and paint them dark or did you do a glaze over the board? Thanks! We are in the middle or painting ours and I’m trying to figure it out while we don’t have furniture in the house. Thanks again!
That bead board here when we moved in. The wonderful lady the lived here before us had high dollar taste. That was some higher, individual bead board, that comes with the deep groves. We even used a airless paint sprayer for that room. Id recommend a lot of layers with light paint on the roller if your painting by hand. Great questions, thanks for the comment.