Do You Know Why Wallpaper Is Called, Wallpaper? #DIY

Wallpaper is called wallpaper because, shit, was taken. It appears that, headache, ridiculous, stupid, unnecessary, horrible, frustrating, hateful, and complete crap was taken as well, so the evil genius who invented the shit had to settle on, Wallpaper. 

I think that looks like the hand of Satan.
It is the wallpaper from hell after all...
Fine... Wallpaper is not complete shit, but it sure is when you are trying to peel it off a wall. And well... I suppose it may have a place in homes with really screwed up walls, but for the purposes of this post, I will be referring to it as, 100% unnecessary, shit!  (If you are really interested in knowing the history on Wallpaper, there is a link at the bottom of this post. FYI: Wallpaper dates back to the 1500's!) 

When I first walked into our new house, the wallpaper didn't bother me. I thought, Eh, wallpaper, whatever, I can handle that junk! I'll just peel it off, no problem.  WRONG!  

The shit is EVERYWHERE!
The first day after closing, when FTD and I started renovations, I found a tiny little piece of wallpaper peeling off, so I grabbed it and ripped it off the wall. To my surprise and delight, it came off really well! So I found another piece and pulled it, but this time it barely came off. Uh, Oh...

It got ugly when I turned the corner...


I have gone through all kinds of methods to remove that awful shit! 

I have tried the following:

1. Peeling with just my bare hands and a paint scrapper-Day 1 FAIL! (See above photo)

2. Fabric Softener picked up at the dollar store mixed with water in a spray bottle- Day 2 EPIC FAIL! 
(See hand of Satan photo above, I created it with the cheap fabric softener.)

3. Expensive Downy fabric softener mixed with HOT water- Day 3 Fail (See photo below)

4. A Wallpaper remover steamer contraption- Day 4 SCORE!!!  Game-freaking-changer!!

Clearly, I am not messing around with that shit anymore. 
During my fails, I soaked my beautiful hardwood floors in fabric softener, I nearly glued my fingers together wiping glue off the paint scrapper with my bare hands, got a nasty blister from the constant scrapping with the paint scraper, and peeled the rouge pieces of wet wallpaper off the hardwood floors to find stains from it. See, it's SHIT! When I finally couldn't take it anymore, I broke down and bought a wallpaper steamer to get the damn shit off the walls. 

There should be a rule that, if you put up the shit, you have to take the shit down!

TIP:  When buying a large item from a hardware store, go to the website, find the item and see if you can buy it online then pick it up in the store, then search coupon sites for coupon codes and enter them in at checkout. I saved $10 on my Wallpaper steamer! 

As soon as I got home with the wallpaper steamer, I filled it full of water and let it sit for 15-20 minutes to heat up.  While I was waiting, I scored the crap out of the walls to help the steam get to the glue.  Then once the steamer was ready, I held it on the wall... OH. MY. Goodness! That steamer was an instant game changer.  INSTANT!  

I was so amazed. I held the little square thing in place on the wall for about 30 seconds, then EASILY peeled the wallpaper off.  But... only to the point where the square ended. After a little trial and error, I learned to hold it in place for 30 seconds, then slowly move it up the wall to keep the momentum going.  This steamer also gets the glue off too!  It's still a little messy in that water gets everywhere, BUT, it's only water, not fabric softener! You all, I may just survive this shit...

The expensive downy was used on the left side.
The right side is after only an hour with the fancy steamer contraption!
Can you tell how high I can reach without my ladder?
Tomorrow, I tackle the room with TWO layers of shit...
Follow on Instagram to see the progress.
Instagram: FirstTimeMomandDad
Don't worry... more to come once the room is completely stripped and painted...

For a history lesson on Shit, a.k.a Wallpaper, Click Here! 



Quirky Chrissy said...

Huzzah for the steam cleaner!!!

Christy Garrett Uplifting Families said...

If you don't want to buy the steamer, lowes and home depot allow you to rent equipment. In the case of wall paper its probably cheaper to buy your own.

If you have to pull up linoleum, go rent the floor scraper from lowes or home depot. It makes floor removal easier.

FirstTimeMomandDad.com said...

Home Depot rented it for $32 a day plus a deposit for the price of the steamer. I got mine for $47 thanks to the coupon code trick. If your house has more than one room, I say buy the steamer!

Unknown said...

YAY!! The machine works....what a relief! I've got to confess that I've never had to take off wallpaper but I'm sure if I did have to, you'd hear the foulest, bluest language bursting forth. Your new home is going to be BEAUTIFUL (without that shit on the wall) Congrats, SUPERMOM! xxxxx