Popcorn No More

Popcorn ceilings. I loathe them. They create horrendous dark shadows and make rooms feel so dark and dingy and old! I made it my personal mission to hand scrape, sand, and paint our popcorn ceilings. So how’s it going you may wonder? Take a look!

So far I under took the hallway that leads to the girls bedrooms and the area in front of the coat closet. I also did the hallway in front of the laundry room and most recently tackled my biggest room yet, the kitchen!

Was it worth it? 100% yes. Is this labor intensive? 100% yes. I will not sugar coat the process. It is messy and it was not fun. However, the end result made it worth every painful second.

What you’ll need to do your ceilings:

• Spray Bottle With Water
• Plastic Putty Knife
• Disposable pans
• Plastic Drop Cloth
• Spackle
• Joint Compound
• Fine Grit Sanding Block
• White Ceiling Paint

Girls Hallway

The very first step should be floor protection. When the popcorn gets wet it can create a nasty mess. I reccomend laying a plastic drop cloth down over the floors, especially if you have carpet. Once the floors are protected, you can begin. First, you need to wet the ceiling. I used a dollar store spray bottle with some tap water and gave it a good spritz. You want saturate the popcorn pretty well. Then, wait a few minutes to let the water really penetrate the layers but not long enough so that it drys. I found that the best method of doing this is using a large disposable tin oven pan and a plastic putty knife. Scrape along the ceiling, catching the droppings in the pan as you go. The popcorn should come off relatively easily but you will need to apply some pressure. Be sure that you apply even pressure at ALL times or you will end up with gouges in your ceiling and that doubles your work load.

This is what the girls hallway looked like after I scrapped all of the popcorn off using the putty knife. Notice the spots where I applied too much uneven pressure and gouged the ceiling slightly? Also take note of the spots where I didn’t apply enough pressure and ended up with a lot of sanding that would need to be done. Take a fine grit sanding block, some goggles, and a mask and sand your heart out. This step is SUPER messy. You will be left with a thin layer of dust on everything you own. (You’ve been warned!)

This is the result! Clean smooth ceilings.  The next step is to assess any damage and fix accordingly. For any large holes I used spackle and for the superficial surface scuffs that didnt sand out I used joint compound. I also used joint compound around the perimeter of the room where the joint tape was started to get a bit fuzzy from sanding. Not sure if this is a common occurance but the joint compound worked like a charm. I did a 2nd light sanding. This time I was careful not to undo the repair work I just did by sanding all of the compound off but just enough so I was left with a flat surface. Take your time with this process. You will be glad you took the time when you paint a clean flat space.

Then we were ready for paint. Heres the first coat of white.

My apologies for the dark photo, typically I keep the bedroom door open with the windows for some natural light but this was taken at nap time!

Here is the final result after I painted 3 of the 4 walls and went back and edged the fourth. I do plan on painting the last wall grey but I have to cut new vinyl for the wall so stay tuned for the tutorial on that!

Coat Closet Hall

The process was the same for all spaces, both small and large. Heres the work progression for the hallway in front of the coat closet.

Laundry Hallway

And heres the work progression for the hallway in front of the laundry room.

Kitchen

This is the room that has seen the biggest change since we moved in. We changed the knobs on the cabinets, the light fixture, and made the island beautiful. Scrapeing the ceiling just seemed like the natural next step. Heres what we started with.

And so I began scraping.

And scraping.

And scraping. And this is what it looked like when I was finally done scraping a day later!

The next task on the list was sanding. Sanding a ceiling of this size was no joke compared to the small hallways I was used to.

When I was finished sanding I assessed the damage. There were some small holes and gouges that needed my attention. I fixed any imperfections and lightly sanded one last time. This is the mess I was left with when I was finished sanding.

But I persevered. After cleaning up to the mess to the best of my ability, I was ready to paint. Heres the ceiling after the first coat of white.

All in all it needed 3 coats of white ceiling paint to get a solid color. I then finished the kitchen off with a coat of grey paint to brighten up the space.

And here is the space post renovation. All tidied up and ready for daily use again!

At the end of the day, this was not a quick, easy process. The smaller rooms took 2-3 days each and the kitchen took me 5 days start to finish including painting the wall. I did this alone during nap time and after my girls had gone to bed. I am so proud of the results and feel confident it was worth all the mess and late nights it took!