GROUND FARCE - Pastures new: MUSH

The beauty of snow is short lived and in the Southerly coastal regions we live in, it’s not long before the diamond white quilt of snowflakes covering our neighbourhood has dissolved into a dirty, slush puppy-like grey mush. Three days on and the beast from the East has been transformed into the pussy from the past. Snow? Been there, thawed out, moved on.

Snow today, gone tomorrow

Daughter has gone off on a skiing holiday. I told her it would be cheaper to take a tea tray to the local golf course which had as much snow on its hills as France but she wasn’t having any of it. So whilst she’s off on the piste with her mates, we used our snow enforced weekend curfew to tick off a few more items from our DIY snag list.

First up - sanding down the banisters. If you have the cash and the inclination you can arrange for your staircase to be completely dismantled and sent off for dipping and stripping which is probably the quickest, most hassle-free way to get the everything back down to bare wood ready for staining. However, as we are just freshening up the existing paintwork then a bit of sanding down should be fine.

Sanding old fashioned wooden spindles is a fiddly, messy and time consuming process so we’ve split this into a 2 section job; the upper banisters and the staircase run. Don’t tackle your spindles all at once as you’ll soon get bored or go barmy. Divide and conquer is the best way forward. Whilst old fashioned spindles give a staircase character, getting into all those nooks and crannies is almost impossible with a conventional sander and even the small mousey ones struggle to get into all the grooves.

Lovely but fiddly to sand

To get round this issue, we’re using packs of sanding sponges from In-Excess (£1 for 8 pads). About the size of an average scourer, these sanding pads come in different grades/grits ranging from course to fine and fit snuggly into a small girlie hand like mine giving flexibility and control over the surface being rubbed down. Handy to use and definitely less of a faff than folding up bits of sanding paper.

Sanding pads/sponges - InExcess

Flexible so you can get into all those grooves

After a good rubbing, the other half looked like Buddha in a sandstorm. Keep bedroom doors closed as everything gets caked in powdery dust and will need a wash down afterwards.

Has it snowed indoors?

Sanding completed, time to fit the second chandelier to the upstairs hallway. At this point, I’d decided to go and spring clean the bathroom to save my ears from the barrage of blasphemy pouring forth from the other half who unlike Buddha was not on the road to electrical enlightenment.