shades of blue

Technically the living room was completed a few days after the upstairs rooms but it seemed like a more natural progression to talk about next. This is the first room we touched on the night we took possession by taking down the tobacco smoke stained lace curtains revealing the original wood molding. What a difference such a small change made; how did their realtor not make the suggestion?

We started off by tearing out the carpeting, scraping up as much of the thick carpet glue we could and got to painting. We applied many coats of stain and odor blocking primer then painted the room Behr 'Tuscan Beige'. We wanted a simple beige for this room since all other rooms were turning out quite colorful. Tuscan Beige didn't do it for us though and in certain times of the day looked baby pink. We ended up repainting it Ralph Lauren 'Canvas Natural'.

These side by side photos are of the first vs second color.

In the second photo you also see the new light fixture that replaced the ceiling fan. The ceiling also has tiles directly glued to it that we simply painted over. Not knowing what condition the plaster was in under them and with our time constraints we didn't want to bite off more than we could chew.

Another 'paint it and forget it' item was the already once painted over wood paneling. Again we had no idea what condition the plaster underneath was in and decided to paint over it for the time being. This actually turned out to be a nice detail to help break up the larger expanses of wall but isn't distracting.


We had a Liz Claiborne carpet installed with a gridded texture to it. I think it was a great choice because there is such a large expanse of open flooring. The tiny sample we used to choose the color definitely didn't seem as white as the carpet turned out to be. I still really like the color but it requires frequent professional cleanings and no shoes allowed. This is a sneak peak into a later project but here you can see the texture.


And now some before and afters

Bryce, after already tackling the lace curtains, ready to tear out some carpet.


I was amazed how much brighter and bigger the room felt after the blue/grey shag and blue walls were replaced.


Here you see the door into the kitchen to the left and the doorway into the entry to the right. This is after the carpet has been taken up and we're ready to paint.


and of course, after


Here I'd like to point out that I didn't mean for this blog to dip into decorating but since we were in such a rush to move in we don't have many 'after' photos without furniture in them. I'm no expert but maybe I'll delve into decorating when I run out of remodel work to talk about. This is more like how the house looked right after moving in, with a few of the only pieces of furniture we owned.

I'll never forget just lying on the floor the day the carpet was installed before any furniture was in the room.