I’m done refinishing the baseboards for the living room.  It was a really big job.  To get the right color took about 10 coats of garnet shellac with a lot of sanding back to get the grain right.  But that’s done now.  I have boards laying on the floor, on top of furniture, boards everywhere!  Now that they have had about a minimum of 2 weeks to dry, I am rubbing them out with black wax.  I bought some Satin Waterlox that I was going to use but it looked streaky no matter how much I stirred it. There were subtle dull streaks from brush marks even after it leveled out and dried.  It’s clear but the stuff in the product to make it satin (silica, I believe) doesn’t stay mixed. It would probably be fine for chairs and floors but a wide, long expanse of the baseboard shows everything. Instead, I’m putting on black wax with 0000 steel wool. The black wax looks really good and cuts the shine to a pretty satin finish because of the fine scratch pattern of the really, really fine steel wool.  Lots of elbow grease, though, but this should be the last time in my lifetime that I’ll have to do anything to them other than touch up wax. I don’t know what ingredient in the black wax smells really good but it is wonderful.

I’ll be insulating the areas where the outlets come through the walls with fiberglass insulation stuffed back in there and I’ll be sealing any gaps in the boards where the floor and wall meet.  That’s going to take some time. 

*UPDATE (see photo below)
The baseboards are back up on the walls in the living room. I just tacked them in place for now because I’ll be painting this room a neutral beige color when I finish the dining room and it would be easier to take them off to paint rather than tape it all off and then permanently put them back up. The outlets got well insulated. Before, a lot of air was coming through and now I don’t feel any. I also added the latex white foam (DAP) around the edges where the floor boards meet the wall. There were some gaps there. When it was dried, I trimmed the foam level with the floor and wall where the foam expanded too much. With the help of my husband we got the baseboards back up and the outlets installed and the room looks so much more finished with the baseboards installed. It’s great to have the furniture back in the places they belong.

NEXT:
I have to cut the nails off and refinish the quarter-round moldings that go on the floor up against the baseboards to complete the finished look. I’m also going to be working on adding another couple of coats of garnet shellac to the inside sideboards of the stairs to darken them to match the baseboards and then scrape off the finish on the treads. I want the treads the same clear finish as I have on the floor. I think it will be just enough contrast to look good and the lighter color will show the dust less. The dark color on the treads now really shows even the smallest of dust. The photo looks the same as the other ones I have posted? No! Look! The baseboards are up!