On May 10, 4:16 pm, Jeff Dege wrote:

snip

Hiring a contractor is out of the question. The choice is between trying
to patch, trying to plaster myself, laminating, or leaving it as-is.

Taking the long term view, you have a cosmetic problem in a house that
you've lived in only 18 mounths. Might be prudent to ignore it for a
while, put away some $$ to go for professional restoration later and
during the interim get to know more about your local plastering firms.
Your friends and neighbors may have useful information about who is
priced right, who does quality work, and so on.
Old houses have a habit of developing more urgent non cosmetic
problems and working oin these ahead of the cosmetic matters makes
good sense. HTH

Joe