Painting Question

[Cudedog]

I know a lot of you do home improvement projects in the winter. Sue, I know you talk a lot about this.

I am loving my new looks-like-a-woodstove electric heater with the fake (but real-looking) "flames". I have it sitting in my masonry fireplace, and I want to build a "surround" for it partly because it would look nice, and partly to better block off warm air from going up my chimney (although I do have the chimney blocked off already).

I have run the heater on high for several hours (as a test), the sides and top barely get warm, so I know it would be safe to build this surround out of wood (it just gets hot in the front, where the heater blows out the hot air).

Problem being, I would need to paint this new surround (would paint it black) inside my house.

Question (finally!) How do those of you that do indoor house painting when it is cold outside deal with the paint smell?

I am sensitive to chemical smells of all kinds, paint smell included.

Thanks to all!

Anne

[snowball]

[quote="Cudedog"]

I am sensitive to chemical smells of all kinds, paint smell included.

Thanks to all!

I think wait until warm enough you can open the windows at the very least some paints though aren't as smelly as other's
sheila

[Redetotry]

They have no VOC and low VOC paint now unless you were planning to use enamel which for you would not be a good idea. I was chemically poisoned in the Art Dept when I worked at the university and worked from home a few years. In 1998 when the no VOC paint was first coming out we had the inside of the house we bought painted before we moved in and it still looks great. I probably would still wait until you can open a window though even with the no VOC since you are sensitive.

[gypsyrose1126]

The newer paints don't have much smell to them anymore. I painted my kitchen last winter and no problem with the smell. Just ask at the paint store about the smell.

[Cudedog]

Sheila, BJ and Rosemary:

Thank you all for your responses, very helpful!

I think what I might try is putting some plastic drop cloths on the floor in my spare bedroom, and do the painting in there. It's kind of "cool-ish" here right now (with rain) but once the storms pass through daytime temps will probably go back up to mid-60's to low 70's on a sunny day - normal winter temps for my area of California.

I can just close the door on the spare room, and open a window while I am painting.

That should do the trick, I hope.

BJ, being poisoned like that must have been - and still is, I'm sure - absolutely dreadful. It must be a very difficult thing to live with. You have my sincere sympathies.

I don't think anything like that has ever happened to me - I have just always had a very intense sense of smell.

One time, years ago, when I was working at the office counter (where there was public access) a woman came in that was positively saturated with "cookie smell". As I was filling her request, I think I said something like "Mmmm. . . cookies!"

The poor woman took a step back, looked at me in confusion, and was totally freaked out.

She said she had been baking cookies and demanded to know how I knew this. I guess maybe she thought I had been standing outside her kitchen window or something, peeking in. I told her she smelled like cookies (she actually did smell very nice, because I do like cookies) but she was still visibly upset - she told me she didn't believe that anyone could be able to smell that well!



Anne