Wednesday, March 5, 2014

Lightening Up Upstairs

So now comes the point in time when I write a post and have to deal with the embarrassing before pictures... but the before pictures are so worth it once you compare them to an after- or in this case a picture of progress. Here's just a few "Befores"....






Yes- this is what you call our  current "master" bedroom. However, it's quite the joke If you ask me! The only thing that makes me feel better is that I'm sure there are some other people that also have a room they're ashamed of in their own home??

Just to catch you up... I noted in my last ridiculously simple post that we have some major projects going on- one of which is the master bedroom redo. I know the nursery is probably the first thing I should be thinking about, but this room needs some major attention right now... (No worries- nursery planning is in full force and I'm getting very excited about it!)

Our bedroom is tucked away on the second floor of our house- it's so 'tucked away' in fact that some people who visit don't even realize there is a second floor and only a few have actually made the trek up the stairs. I've mainly focused on the first floor while living here and have put off doing ANYTHING to our bedroom other than a good cleaning.  I know this is crazy, but I've even held off on using our nice sheets and comforter we got for wedding gifts because I refuse to break them out until our room is in decent condition. (Nathan seriously deserves an award for having to deal with my quirks). I thought it would motivate me to get it done sooner, but alas those high thread-count Egyptian Cotton sheets are still in their original packaging just begging to be broken into (Yes I know that is kind of insane). So....  we've been using the comforter I've had since college and the closest we have gotten to lighter walls and new furniture has just been dreaming about them.  

You'll notice my pregnancy pillow- gotta love The Snoogle!


The lonely room has sat with its scuffed walls (which are painted a very bad muted teal by the way... it was that way when I moved in- not my choice), wood trim that has more of an orange tone than anything, and some decent but not that fresh of carpet. We also have some crazy mis-matched furntiure going on. I seriously am using a dresser that I had growing up as a little girl… that my mom bought at a yard sale. Not knocking yard sales (love em), but folks I am 27 years old and I think it's time my husband and I have a grown up room with AT LEAST decent, coordinating furniture.





But the MAIN reason we are doing the master bedroom is because the nursery is actually located directly off of our room on the second floor. If we're going to be creating a beautiful little room for the babe, we may as well do the whole upstairs. Mom and Dad's space needs some sprucing up just as much as Baby W! So....  I'm insisting the grown up room becomes a reality before baby. I'm afraid if we don't do it now, baby land will take over and I'll continue putting this room off.





And by looking at these pictures again... I really can't fathom doing it any longer.

So of course the first and most altering step for any room is a paint job. We both want the room to look bigger and brighter... so we decided to paint all of that orange trim a fresh white, recoat the ceiling, and give the walls a refreshing light gray paint.

We started off by patching the ceiling and walls along with taping around the baseboards so we could slap the paint on without getting anything on the carpet.


The priming probably took the longest, but after we applied it (all on a wonderfully long Saturday) it gave us hope that this room was becoming a reality...


We realized when we were priming that the baseboards were kind of in bad shape. Had we paid a bit more attention, we would have caulked before priming- but we still caught it in time so we applied some caulk where the boards met the wall and the trim paint covered it. It made a huge difference!

 

Sunday was paint day! I chose "Bay Waves" from Valspar (We are lovers of Lowe's), and it ended up being the perfect shade and tone. I didn't want the gray to go too blue and I also didn't want it to be too dark so this color was perfect. 



We finished everything up late Monday night. These pictures are from Sunday afternoon- so I don't have any images of how it looks right now- but just imagine the trim has another coat and the gray is all touched up where the walls meet the ceiling.








That air conditioning unit cover pops off- 
so we'll be spraying that to get rid of the 70s color and wood.


Oh and for those who are wondering or worried- We used low VOC paint and I used a gas mask that Nathan picked up from work... Yes a gas mask. I sounded like Darth Vader the majority of the weekend... Safety first!  


If I'm going all out by showing you embarrassing pictures of our room, 
I may as well stack it on and post these.

So we've gotten half of the upstairs painted... next up is our closet area and the stairwell.... I'm thinking some dark gray doors to add a little interest! We're starting it this week and hoping to be done by this weekend!



And then it will be onto priming and painting the nursery! God be with us- I'm getting really sick of the paintbrush...

-Tricia

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