A Little Facelift

Before we moved in all of our worldly goods into our new humble abode we decided to freshen things up a bit with a little bit of a facelift: a fresh coat of paint.

We didn't paint everything, but the vast majority of the upstairs was done in two days. It was a lot of painting. Thankful to our parents and family members for grabbing brushes and helping us to move. We couldn't have completed this without all of their help.

However, before we could move any paintbrushes we had to pick a paint. This was much easier said than done. We thought we knew the color we wanted. The little square looked great. It was called "winter wheat". We thought it was a match made in heaven.

Then we put it on the wall and reconsidered that crush we had on that paint sample.

It was back to the drawing board, and with family waiting to help out, we had to act fast. We grabbed three different samples in the same earthy tone family. We put those on the wall too. Better... but still not "it". Finally, we opted to go to the dump for paint in the closets so that something productive could be done and try to figure out what we wanted on our walls.

The local dump takes old/unused paint and mixes it generally into white, off-white, black, and blue. Our realtor told us about it. You can purchase it for a dollar a gallon! The day my husband headed out there, they did not have any white left, but they had just mixed a 55 gal drum with a tan/light brown color. My husband bought a gallon, put it on the wall and waited for the me to arrive for the final yay/nay.  Surprisingly it was perfect. The hubby went back to retrieve more paint and the rolling and trimming began.

The following are pictures of the before/during stage. Hopefully around Christmas, when the house is a little more put together, when pictures are maybe hung, I will post pictures of the semi-after pictures. (Sorry about some of the picture quality... I used my phone mostly).

View of the dining room looking towards the kitchen. Gotta love the shag!

Another look at the dining room from the living room. The paneling is staying for now. May paint it after awhile.

The living room. Love the window!

Front entry way that nobody uses. The door cut off in the picture is a big closet. Thankful for family to help paint.

The hubby... Master of the paint roller. The first door to the left goes to the laundry, the door behind him is to the "blue" room. The pink bathroom is the second door on the left, and the master and second spare bedroom round out the rest of the rooms down the hall.

Here is the blue room that's no longer blue.

Front view of the blue bedroom. Double closets that have shelves running behind the built in.

Pink bathroom.

Everything... tub, toilet, sink are all pink!

Master bedroom looking toward walk-in closet

Looking towards the master bath

Cozy little space for now.. hopeful to demo someday

Sure is nice to have a master bath though!

Through the closet is a "bonus" room. No heat/air, and leads out to the garage.

Washroom.. was all yellow, but received the same brown treatment.

Pantry shelves on the left, storage closet on the right

Another look at laundry room, the open door goes to the kitchen.

View of kitchen from the sink, to the right of the fridge is a door to the hall/entryway

View from the door by the laundry

View from the entry way.

That's most of the house. We didn't paint the spare room/office, the half bath (still currently orange), and the backroom. The original owners used it as an office, I'd like to make it a mudroom as it leads off of the back porch and down to the garage and basement as well.

For now the basement is completely unfinished. Which is leaving us with a ton of possibilities. Just need to gather a few funds and add a few pieces of our own style and personality in the mean time!

--The Whitehairs