Getting the giggles

I'm back with another update on the green walls: they're done!  I spent a lovely day off work recently finishing off the green (hereafter referred to as The Giggle) that goes on the whole long wall facing the alley, all the way through the kitchen.  During my last painting sesh I left off here, after finishing off the long wall - you can see it stops right above the right window.

So this weekend I Giggled the whole kitchen!  Woot! 

It wasn't easy going.  Unfortunately, this paint (Dutch Boy Platinum, if you're curious), had a hard time getting good coverage in The Giggle, so I had to do three coats.  I used the same paint for the brown and didn't have that problem, so it must just be something to do with the makeup of this green. 

Here's a few shots to reminisce about what the kitchen looked like before The Giggle Makeover.  Before:

And after!

And just for fun, let's go waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay back, when the only thing I had done was to buy my gas range:

Isn't that crazy?  I hadn't looked at that old picture for months, but it feels really good to have it up there to see just how much progress has been made.

If I was a more honest blogger, I'd show you where all my little painting or taping-off mishaps occurred...but I'm not.  So rest assured that there are a few tiny mistakes here and there, but I don't think you'd notice unless you were looking for them.  I've come to be quite comfortable with the idea that it's not perfect, but it's satisfying to do it myself.

In lieu of doing something more flashy (and expensive) like a new countertop, or painted cabinets, or backsplash, I think The Giggle does a nice job of perking up the kitchen.  Eventually I will want some of those things, because the countertop (which was always ugly) is still ugly, and neither the countertop or the backsplash tile really matches the green.  But oh well - those are problems for another day...or year :)

Under pressure

So I got a little sassiness from my family tonight about promising to put up the pictures of the green walls and then failing to do so.  So here you go, clutter and all :)  No styling was done in the making of these pictures.

This first one was taken right after the actual painting was done, before I had moved any of the furniture back into place.  Also, I used the flash in this one so it's a little brighter than the others.  It's kind of a janky picture but I included it because the color in this one is a truer representation of the green than the other pics.

This next one is basically from the same angle, except it was taken after I put all the furniture and wall art back up and then took it without the flash, so it's a little darker.   What I like about this color is how much it makes all the wall art and the white trim pop.  It's just such a fun color, it makes me smile every time I walk in.  Which is something, right?

Then here's the angle from the kitchen, so you can see what the green and brown look like side by side.  I think they go well together, and it makes for a nice way of dividing up the space.

And then just for posterity, a picture of the living room with all the brown walls up and the furniture put back and everything.  (Again, a little dark because it was taken without the flash.)  I'm so excited about how this looks!

Remember how it was before?

Pre-tty bland.  This is a big improvement, I think.

This upcoming weekend I'll be hoping to finish off the green, which still has to be painted around all the walls in the kitchen.  I predict it'll be tough because of all the weird angles and the extreme amount of taping off I'll have to do - not to mention dealing with painting behind and around the appliances.  Wish me luck!  If that goes well, I might even get around to painting the opposite facing long wall in the brown, to finish off the living room, dining "room" and kitchen areas of the main floor.

That would leave just the hallway connecting my bedroom and bathroom to the rest of the main floor, but I still haven't yet decided what I want to do with the color there.

 
Ideas range from leaving it the light neutral color it already is to painting it Boothill Brown, to finding some third accent color to use.  Not sure which one is the way to go yet, so I'm putting off that decision until I get to that part of the wall.  Procrastination is my friend in this project, I think.  Any opinions on the color from out there in the blogosophere?

Boothill Brown, meet Green Giggle

I've been at it again this weekend - painting, that is.  In my last big effort I had painted the wall facing the street with my new brown color.

This past week I worked on the area behind the bookcase and continued on down the long side wall between the living room and the kitchen.  It didn't go quite as planned, but more on that later.  Here's what the bookcase area looked like after it got The Treatment.

Looking pretty good, right?  I was happy, so I continued on down the long wall. 

Now, as you can imagine, I had spent quite a long time staring around the room over the past several months in preparation for this project, trying to decide how exactly I wanted to do the painting - would I break up the walls into different colors, or keep it continuous?  If I did break it up, what would my accent color be?  I had decided that I was going to make about 3 sides of the main floor all this brown color, and do an accent on the opposite wall with the piano (though that color was still unknown).  So my strategy was basically to keep painting brown until I got to the point where I really wasn't sure what to do next.

I should have known it wouldn't be quite that easy.  When I got up this morning, a totally new plan suddenly occurred to me that seemed a lot better.  Because the original plan had the kitchen being painted brown, it also involved doing something to brighten up the kitchen (which is already a little dark).  So I had planned to do that by painting the cabinets white.  But the more I looked at the kitchen with the idea of painting it this brown, the more I didn't like adding more dark colors to the wall in that space. 

Instead, I thought, what if I painted the kitchen the accent color (a certain green I've had my eye on) to lighten it up?  Because there's no obvious place to break it up, though, the green would have to continue on down the long wall to the big column to the right of the bookcase.  I pondered it, but decided that since I had already bought all the brown paint, I'd go ahead and paint the first coat as originally planned and then see how I felt after that - which is what you see above.

After getting it up there, I just couldn't shake this new idea, so I went to Menard's to get a sample of the green I had in mind (awesomely titled "Green Giggle"), and on the way home called my very own personal color consultant, Erin Jude.  Erin came over tout de suite to check it out, and endorsed my new idea.  Hooray for instant decision-making!

So I'm making kind of a left turn from the original plan, but am feeling excited about it.  I love this color - it's a really FUN green, if that makes any sense.  So I'm really thrilled about the idea of having a fun color in the kitchen, the room I generally have the most fun in.  Tomorrow I'll go buy the paint and start painting the big green wall, and possibly the kitchen.  Here's a little sample of what the Green Giggle will look like.

In this picture, it's a little hard to see, but it's the green square to the left of the stove.  (Trust me, it's cute!)

I'm excited to see (and post) the results tomorrow!

Painting party

Dear readers, sorry for going AWOL.  Life got crazy there for a while, but I'm easing myself back into the swing of house projects again.  I took a random day off of work today and finally got started on the thing I've been waiting to do for months: paint the walls!  The experiment has begun.

With the time I had today I've just been able to tackle 1/4 of the walls, the ones facing the street.  Remember the bland old yellowy beige color on the walls?

Gone!  Out with the beige, in with the brown.

I can't say the brown looks exactly like what I thought it would - it's a little redder than I was picturing.  But even so, I'm enjoying the change.  It's too soon to tell what the whole room is going to look like, but I like the contrast with the white trim.  It definitely crisps things up a bit. 

I've still got some decisions to make about the rest of the room - how far to go with the brown, when (or if) to switch it over to another color in the hallway or the opposite wall, etc.  I'll keep painting along the bookcase wall over the next few weeks and we'll see how things go!