From Boring to Bright and Beautiful

As you can see, our hallway was a bit on the boring side.  The walls, trim, ceiling, and doors were all the same color and everything just seemed pretty drab.  I decided to go for a lighter greyish blue color on the walls and then a lighter version of that color on the ceiling.  I ended up going with Stony Path by Valspar for walls and Possibility for the ceiling.  The trim is the same white that I’ve used throughout the house- Pale Bloom by Valspar.

Okay so here are a couple more before photos.

I had started to paint some of the trim and walls at this point.

Now for the finished result, which came out really well in my humble opinion.

Remember this shelf from the thrift store…  Here’s what it used to look like.

Now with a fresh coat of white paint, it looks fabulous and is great for holding scarves, bags, and coats.

View from the TV room.

There’s one more hallway that needs the same treatment, and it’s in progress as I type.  Hope you guys like the transformation!

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Another Paint Transformation

Last week I finally got around to painting the side of our neighbor’s shed that faces our backyard, and it made a huge difference in the look and feel of the yard.  I’m happy I got it done last week when it was in the 90s… this week the temperatures are around 105 degrees and I have been happy to stay indoors all day!  It’s nice to see the new green shed when I take Kitty outside and when I water the plants(some of which are having a tough time), though.

Sometimes I’m not as good at remembering to take “before” photos as I should be so I had to search around for some photos of the shed pre-painting.

This one was from when I was building the garden in the back, and you can see that the shed is in pretty bad shape.

It took me awhile to scrape and prime the surface but the old paint did come off really easily.

I was surprised that I was even able to paint the wood in some areas because there was so much rot.  At least the new coats of paint will help protect the wood from bad weather and prevent further rotting.

Here is the finished result.   I used the paint that I had leftover from painting our old house, which was great because it was FREE and I really like the color.   :)

I’d love to put some trellises up in front of the wall for vines to grow on, maybe clematis?  I think purple clematis would look great against the green shed, but that might have to wait for next spring.  I can dream for now…

It seems like the painting never ends at our house so tomorrow I’ll have the hallway finished and ready to post.  A little paint definitely makes a big difference!

Office Redesign

I took a long break from posting after our little trip and now I’m back with some updates on the house.  Last week I spent most of the week painting, and it seems that I’ll be doing a lot more of that in the next couple weeks.  It’s amazing what a little paint can do to a room (or hallway or shed, for that matter).   Last week I decided to re-paint the office and change things up because it seemed a little dark and gloomy in there.

The walls before were a nice tan color, but the color just didn’t seem quite right.  We also had mirrored closet doors covering most of one wall, which I didn’t like for several reasons.  First, there were too many mirrors on that side of the room, and second the mirrors had some distortion so I always had a fat head or weird proportions when I walked by.  Third, they were always getting stuck or coming off the track and causing me much (un-necessary) frustration.

So out went the mirrored doors.

And in went the new curtain doors.  So much easier to deal with!

I used a shower curtain rod to hold them up, and I used the same Ritva curtains that we have throughout the house.  Since I don’t have a sewing machine I used the iron-on hemming tape that Ikea provides to make the curtains the right length.

Here are some photos of the rest of the room, complete with new color and curtains on the window.  I took down the blinds because they were kind of a pain, and the curtains work just fine for this room.

What do you guys think?  Do you like the new color?

Hope you all had a great weekend!

Our $24 Kitchen Makeover

Last week I decided that I had had enough of the rotting cabinet and the horrible yellow color in the kitchen.  My mom was still in town, and we suddenly came to the conclusion that we could easily take a hammer to the cabinet and paint he whole room white.  So that’s exactly what we did, and the total cost came to $23.25.  It was something around $24 with tax so that’s what I’m going with.

Here is what our kitchen looked like when we moved in, and I had to throw this one in the post because it shows the horribleness (if that’s a word) of the previous wall color.   Not to mention it was on the ceiling, trim, and crown moulding, among other spots where it splattered while she was painting.

This is basically how it’s been looking since we moved the washer and dryer hookups.

They were right in the middle of the kitchen when we looked at the house- great for convenience I guess, but not so nice to look at.

My first job was to take apart the cabinet by the fridge which turned out to be pretty easy.

Here is what the base looked like when I got it apart.  Pretty disgusting!

Once the cabinet was on the curb, we got down to business and started painting.  All the while Jimmee was out getting his tires changed and had no idea that the kitchen would look totally different when he came home.

We used two half gallons of white paint that I had sitting in the garage, and then we went out and bought another gallon of white pain to finish the job (we only used half).   I also had some old blue paint hanging around so we used that for the backsplash.

Here are the finished results:

Oh, and now that I look at this photo, I have a confession to make.  I went out yesterday and bought these curtains for $7.99 each so that adds $32 to the kitchen total.   That brings the total to $56, but that’s still not bad for a whole new look.

We painted the backsplash (a faux wood laminate) a robin’s egg blue, along with a shelf that was built in to the kitchen.

Striper enjoying himself in the new kitchen, fitting in some bird watching out the window.

The canister set that I found at an antique store and then later found out that my Grandma has the exact same set from when she was first married (it was hidden in a cupboard so I had never seen it).  I love the silver with the blue.

My Grandma also gave me this beautiful stained glass piece that’s in the kitchen window now, but this photo was taken pre-curtains.

I think that sums up our one day kitchen makeover.  Everything feels so much cleaner and fresher in there, and maybe it will make me want to cook more.  You never know…