Living Room Novella, and Some Cheap Art

Okay, so I had grand plans to paint the living room yellow.  The living room project included about one bajillion small little jobs, most of which were kind of grueling and miserable (spackling and painting a ceiling is a job for masochists), so even though I'd been planning on painting the room since the moment I finished painting the kitchen (in SEPTEMBER!), it took a long while for me to muster up the energy to tackle the project, and to finally select a yellow color for the room.

This is going to sound weird and George W. Bushian, but when I'm looking for something, whether it's a pair of shoes or a new camera or a husband, when I find the one I want I just know.  It's this weird inner assurance, kind of like a little click inside of me that is like, "Oh, there it is."  For example, I hunted and read reviews and stressed about which new camera to select, and then when Hugh showed me the white Pentax Kx, I was all, "Oh, that's my camera."  And there was no more looking. Once I have that realization, I don't go back.

And the problem with the painting living room yellow plan for me, and probably part of why I put the whole thing off for so long, was that I just didn't have that "There you are, Peter" feeling with it.  Once school was out I soldiered on, though, started painting my trim, and selected my yellow color, Custard by my friend Martha.

I painted a little swatch of it on the wall, decided that it was good, and kept painting trim.  I was trying to envision a more grown-up looking room, since there's no place in our house that looks like grown-ups live here.  I was going to do yellow accented with gray and black--you know, something more subtle, more sophisticated.

But the problem with that plan, and the reason I didn't have that inner click about it, was probably that I am neither subtle nor sophisticated.  And Matt doesn't care because he's colorblind and even if he wasn't he wouldn't care.

So when Cassie was here last week, she threw out a suggestion that I should paint the walls ultra white with lots of brightly-colored accents.

Oh, there it was.  The click.  Bangarang!

Now, this plan was kind of terrifying to me.  All that work just to paint walls white?  Shoot.  Plus, the room was white to begin with.  Well, not really white so much as an off-white-smoker's-paradise-dingy-used-to-be-white grossness.

Painting walls white was actually about the most bold thing for me to do in a room.

So, anyway, that's the inspiration for the living room.  And if you're reading this (still!? not so much into the brevity today, huh?) and you're asking yourself if I just do everything that Hugh and Cassie suggest, well, I would say, "Not everything."  Just like 90%.  What can I say?  They make good suggestions.

Now, I'm not showing you everything just yet because the finishing touches are not yet complete.  BUT!  You get a fun preview.  I just couldn't do everything white, so I painted our little entryway/alcove/foyer the same blue color that I painted the kitchen.  (Because I totes had leftover paint and I am more obsessed with this color than I was with hunter green in 1995.)

And then the space totally needed some art.

Well, about four years ago I bought these pictures at Target because I got all four for $15, and although I didn't love the pictures, I figured I could use the frames.  Four years ago.

Cris, post-wrist-surgery, posing with ugly cheap Target art.

Then I had an idea.  I really want to point out that this was actually my very own idea and that I didn't steal it from anybody.  I steal like 99% of stuff I do from other people, so I'm really proud to have come up with something on my own.  

And it was quite simple.  Cheap frames.  Free downloaded fonts.  Some M's.  An exacto knife.  Yep.  That's about it.

Look how fun!

But is it as fun as our mail slot?

Kind of in love with this room now.  More to come.