Wall Painting Virgin

Confession: I am a wall painting virgin.

I've never painted a single wall in our whole marriage, never picked out a color pallet for a house, and never had to consider how many color options there are. 

Obviously I've chosen paint for furniture, but that's different.

When we bought the house, we hired a painting crew to help us paint the downstairs of the house, mostly because the main living room has 19 foot ceilings and we didn't have the equipment to do that.

We chose 2 colors, Sand Beach by Sherwin Williams and Crisp Linen, also by Sherwin Williams. 

Sand beach was used in the kitchen (we love it) and in the downstairs bathroom (also love it) and Crisp Linen in the 2 living areas. 

Then I decided I wanted a little bolder color in the laundry room, so we painted it in Sherwin Williams Peppercorn. (Again, love it.)

What I don't love so much is the Crisp Linen in the front room.

It looks great in the main living room with the tall ceilings and big windows letting light in all day, but it doesn't get as much natural light in the front room so it looks really yellow and kind of dingy. 

So all of this has lead to...well this.

We are repainting the room we just painted. 

Bahaha!

The fact we're doing this makes me seriously laugh out loud at the extra work we are putting on ourselves.

But...we still don't have furniture in the room, the baseboards are being installed next week so it seems like the perfect time to get it done.

After living with the samples on the wall for a few days, we've picked the one in the top row middle, Cityscape by Sherwin Williams.

It's a great gray with just enough blue in it to keep it warm and even a little brown to keep it in the neutral family. 

We're installing 7in baseboards next week and in about a month, 6in crown molding, so we think with the white of the baseboards/molding it will look warm, inviting and elegant. 

And if it doesn't we'll just repaint! 

Just kidding. ;)

PS: A few quick tips about picking paint for a room.

1. When you get your samples up on the wall, LABEL them. 

2. Label the brush you use for each sample so you don't end up with a different color mixed in with what you're putting on the walls.

3. Paint the samples on more than one wall. Each wall gets different light durning the day which effects the color etc.

4. Don't be afraid to buy several samples that are in the same family. Even if the colors look similar on the swatch they can look really different once they're on the walls. 

5. Give yourself time to live with the samples for a few days. When we first put the paint up we thought we would go with the first one on the second row, Sherwin Williams Software, but the more we lived with it and watched the color change with the light, we realized there was actually too much purple in it for us.   

Time to go paint!