Playing with Paint

When John and I first married, he told me that there was not much he wouldn't or couldn't do when it came to fixing things around the house with one giant exception--he hates to paint. He'd happily unclog a drain (gag! when it comes to wet hair clumps), replace plumbing, install lights, clean carpet and perform any number of yard work duties, but keep the paint and the brushes as far away as possible.

This seems fair enough, right? Except that I, too, hate to paint.

Certainly there are a lot of folks out there who would gladly come and slap some paint on our walls for a fee, but the miser in me hates to do that. I'm perfectly CAPABLE of painting but I'm not great at it and the perfectionist in me hates to have squiggly lines where there should be a straight edge.

It's a conundrum.

But I have learned that when it comes to painting in a style that doesn't require precision, I'm all over it. So recently, after extending the invite to my Florida family to join us for Thanksgiving, we began a list of tasks and upgrades that we wanted to knock out prior to having guests. I do love having a reason to be motivated. And on that list was painting. I wanted to redo my kitchen in a faux painting style which is easy to do but it was involved, simply because my kitchen/breakfast area are one big room with lots of corners and edges and funky spaces around my cabinets to have to cover. Luckily, my mother was up to the task of helping and together, we knocked it out in a day. It looks awesome:

Before:

 After:

I was very pleased with how this turned out. We refaced our kitchen cabinets not long ago from white to chocolate maple with a black glaze, and I felt like lighter walls would complement them better. 

After this success, I was feeling bold in my painting abilities. The next project I fixed my attention on were the two built-ins and fireplace mantle in my living room that were a pristine and way-out-of-style WHITE. They had to go!

 

How to tackle these? They were daunting with their size and finish that I felt sure would repel paint and any attempt to improve them. But I had recently discovered a decorating secret weapon who was going to change all this: a little lady named Annie Sloan. Stay tuned for my next remake!