Painting update!

So much painting fun!  Well, okay, that's slightly sarcastic.  I mean, seeing the results of the painting has been fun, but it's been a long, sometimes tedious process.  I kind of decided - without quite realizing I was deciding - to do the whole thing myself, instead of rounding up some friends to help.  It's been really satisfying in many ways, because it's been ALL my work, and I can do it on my own schedule, and make my own mistakes.  But the flip side is that it's taken probably a couple months when it might have taken a weekend.  (And truly, I'm not even 100% done yet.)

Anyway, I've finally finished off the brown on the long wall where the piano is, so that officially completes the parts of the main floor that I really wanted to deal with - the kitchen, dining area, and living room.  As usual, I shot a few before pics, because I know how much you want to dwell on that meh-colored beige.

Yeah.  Just as awesome as I remembered it (not).  And after:

So here's what the living room looks like with all the brown up.  It really makes it kind of nice and warm-feeling without being too dark. 

And the lovely green kitchen, all Giggled up:

Still really loving that crazy color.  So now the question is...what to do about that pesky hallway.  You know, this one?

Bland as bland can be.  So now that I've got the two sides of it painted, I'm debating what to do about the old beige that's still the original color.

I think there are a few different ways to go with this, so I've been soliciting ideas from various people I've talked to this week.  I don't think I can continue with either the green or the brown because it's such a small, window-less space, and I think either of those might be too overwhelming.  So I think it has to be a third color, which could be one of these options:

• Leave it the way it is - it's not absolutely horrible, after all - just kind of blah
• Find a different neutral beige, but one with a little bit more warmth
• Paint it white - but maybe that's too much white with all that trim?
• Find a neutral that's a super-light version of the orange or red in my color scheme (below)

• Paint it with a burnt orange kind of color - not quite as bright as the one in the color scheme, but bold
• I saw a post on my favorite blog today about stenciling on walls, and I must say that kind of caught my attention...maybe there's a way to do a nice bright color, but soften it with a light stencil?  Kind of create a modern wallpaper effect without the hassle of actually putting up wallpaper?

Lots of exciting possibilities to think about!  So I think I'll be mulling that over for a while, and just trying to live with it, assuming that eventually a good idea will reveal itself.   I'll keep you posted when it does.