Grey Really Does Matter

With the Chandelier looking new it was time to get this front entrance way into shape.  The first thing people see when coming over.

When pulling off a full house facelift, knowing your budget is the most important thing.

Once the budget is figured out the facelift can be planned out.

• Will this be a working with "the bones" of the house operation? 
• OR maybe a little extra pulls and tucks here and there?  
• OR is this a complete and total make over.

Unfortunately for us, this facelift is a on a tight budget a.k.a working with "the bones."

The first thing we HAD to give up on our wish list was new flooring.

Our house has (ugly) tile from entry way, to kitchen through the hallway, half bath and laundry room.  We do have beautiful hardwood in our family room, dinning room and a boarder of hardwood surrounding carpet in our front living room.  The stairs going up are carpeted with carpeting through out the entire upstairs with exception of bathrooms which are tiled.

Plan (with budget in mind)...Keep Tile and save money.  Let me just say, I hate this tile!
I did not want the tile to stick out, I wanted it to blend and work with the tile. Colour choice was extremely important for this. I literally took my colour wheel and sat in the middle of the entry way pulling colours and pairing it with the tile.

I wanted something soft and calming, however that made a big impacted. I was planning a focal wall that will be seen from the front door so I did not want to compete against or clash with that.

But most importantly I wanted something clean, fresh and new.

WE WENT WITH Grey Matters Sherwin-Williams  

But before we started painting, a plan for the gritty/dingy/smoker yellow wallpaper wrapped around the lower half of the front entry walls encased in gold trim was needed.

First thought...take it all down.  It was just so so hard to look at.  

 However once some of the trim (that was glued onto the wall paper) was taken down the wallpaper wasn't looking so bad. 

Before the paint but with extra trim removed

I did think about the possibility of installing all new wainscoting, more modern, a lot nicer but then...of course the budget came into play.  

And I thought to myself...maybe I can just paint the wallpaper, save some dough and time?  

Painted

Painted

 And it turned out GREAT!! I LOVED THE LOOK!!

Now time to add a little Grey Matters

Done! Well, kinda...

 Walls painted, Chandler rope in need of a little more black spray paint, and that door...it still needed an action plan.  But the wall colour, the white painted wallpaper and trim...I loved the way it turned out!

 

Shut The Front Door

Well, if you have been following along on our little journey you will know that we are trying to finish up the front yard's face lift...BEFORE THE WINTER. 

Who knew it was going to take this long?

Our next project was to paint the front door. 

Colour was chosen   We went with Sherwin Williams Outer space.

I started painting the window frames around the door first, then cutting in with a brush painting all the  squares and areas that a roller would have trouble getting into and covering well.  Once that was done I used a little foam rolling brush to complete the job. 

 After the door was painted and a few days past it was time for some new hardware.  As you may know we are de-golding this house so the old door hardware HAD to go.  FYI door hardware is not cheap however it makes such a huge difference.

 It may look and sound easy ("Oh, lets just pop out the old hardware and put in the new stuff") but it really took some time and just a little frustration.

 But it was so worth the time and work.

 I love the new colour and hardware.  It makes the entrance feel a lot more welcoming and calming and trust me with a house full of screaming kids you need that little bit of serenity before you walk in the door of this house.

 Only a few more to-do's (new chairs for the porch, our surprise for a rock and a new door knocker) and the Front Yard Face Lift will be complete. 

De-Golding, A Light Upgrade From A Friend

A little upgrade at a wonderful price makes me happy. 

Living in our new house we are surrounded by shinny brass, gold painted everything and golden accents.  Connor says he loves all the gold because it makes us look rich.  Silly kid! 

One of my goals is to de-gold this house and when I can de-gold at a great price that makes me feel so happy.  I have been looking for new outside lights for a while now to replace the old black & brass ones.  I have not really found any that I loved...for the RIGHT price.  It is so hard to spend money on outside little things when there is so much inside big things to do.

However thankfully for us, our friends had a set of great lights with NO BRASS for a great price, we could not resist.

Our old lights

New lights

Next on the TO DO list:
Finish painting font door, this has been a loooong project
Find the perfect chairs for the front porch at a great price
Install a new door knocker, we just ordered one online :)
De-gold the address sign
Finish our front landscaping with our surprise rock that we are waiting to be finished