Painting the Living Room

Once I got the vinyl off (see my last post), we moved on to taping and painting. But before I show you that...let's take a look at what the living room was :)

I don't have too many recent pictures of the living room, so I will give you a Halloween throwback. Here is myself and my friend, Emily in front of our off-white walls, with our less than fabulous wall grouping behind us.

 And to give you another angle, here are our minions husbands. I know the lighting is weird, sorry! The days are shorter now!

 And here is a photo from the last post, showing you the mantle wall before the new paint.

 Here are the clean walls, with some of the taping done.

 Now once we started to paint the new color on the walls, we noticed that the top of the mantle was looking a little dirty. So we dug out our white trim paint to paint just the top. Well as you can see in the photo below, the paint that they used was wither a different shade or it was just that dingy from whatever they did with the fireplace that made our walls so funky.

 We ended up totally repainting the mantle. Honestly thought, I am glad that we did because it makes the mantle really pop off of the new tan walls!

 See how crisp and clean it looks? I love it!

Here is the wall color. The lighting is a little weird because I had to take these photos at night. The color is not as peachy as it looks in the pictures. I will try to get some day time pictures to add on here soon!

 I can't get over how much I love the mantle now! It really stands out!

 Here is one daylight photo that I took of the paint down the hallway. I was worried that the darker color would make the hallway feel smaller, but it really doesn't at all. The entire room is so cozy now!

I can't wait to show you all of the other updates that we have made to the room! It really does feel like a different space. Isn't it just such a good feeling when you walk into a room and feel compelled to pause and enjoy it? And you can't help but smile. That is my favorite. I want every room in our home to make me feel that way. Now it is ours. :)

Let's just compare before and after really quickly, shall we?

True Life: I have a Chalkboard Addiction

I know that there are probably SO many people out there that struggle with this just like I do. In fact, I know my friend Amanda Carver (Amanda Carver Designs) does! She recently chalkboarded a refrigerator!  If you leave something that I think is ugly in color...or maybe just boring...around me long enough, it most likely will get covered with chalkboard paint. Its just a fact that I have come to accept.

A friend at work gave me this brown, glazed clay flower pot a while back because she did not have a use for it. While I did not hate it brown, I thought it was boring. I also wanted to use it in my girl room, which is primarily blacks and teals and greens and the brown just looked all wrong in there.

So the other night I took it out back and shot it. With a can of chalkboard paint! You felt bad for a minute...I know! I did not do my fanciest spraypainting, because it was dark out and I kept hearing noises. I got a few drips, but you cant really even tell. Big deal, right?! I kind of liked the way it looked just painted with the chalkboard paint.

 Once you let the paint dry for 24 hours (this step is really important!), You rub chalk all over the newly chalkboarded surface, to prepare it for writing. It should look something like this, which I also don't hate!

 After doing that, you have to take a cloth, paper towel, something and wipe the chalk off. You don't want to get it all off, just kinda smear it around some.

 Once you have done this...it is ready to be written on! I have found that you should not press too hard the first few times that you write on a chalkboarded surface. It still tends to be a little soft and can scratch.

 I took the flower pot and filled it with ribbons, my glue gun, glue sticks and a few other craft items that are usually strewn about my desk.

 Once I had filled it as full as I could without over-filling it, I tucked it onto the open bottom shelf of the little cabinet that sits on my desk. It is the perfect size for the opening!

This was part of my campaign to organize and clean the girl room. I have a whole separate post about that! And several other little projects to share! :) The long-neglected and poorly organized craft room now looks amazing and neatly organized!