Monday, July 30, 2007

Painting the nursery!

This weekend was filled with all things home improvement! Adam and I went to Lowes to pick out paint on Friday night. We were hoping and praying to get someone that was interested in helping direct us in the right way... do we need to prime?, what finish is good?, based on the square footage, how much paint do we need? These are all things that we are clueless about and we desperately wanted someone that had a clue... enter Lowes.... and the gum cracking woman behind the counter. Adam tells her how much space we are painting and what she thinks would be a good amount, gallon, half gallon, 10 gallons.... whatever, just give us an idea. I swear what I got back was the blankest stare and 'I don't know, you lost me'... if only lady, if only. We attempt a few more questions but she is literally just trying to hear how much we want and of what color... she has no interest in answering a single question we have. Then she informs us that some guys will be here at 6 if we want to wait for them. It's 5:15 and I can't think of anything I would rather be doing on a Friday night then hanging around Lowes in the hope that 'some guys' will be able to answer our questions better than miss 'givemeapaycheckandletmegohome'.... Adam looks and her and as politely as he can muster says 'thank you that would be great', then turns to me and says, lets try Home Depot. I have reservations because I fear that we will be met with the same incompetence but I don't have a better idea so off we go!

After an agonizing re-choosing of colors (note: Lowes and Home Depot do NOT sell the same paint brands which means a full fledged startover when you switch... FYI) we are ready to talk to someone. Enter the kind of curmudgeon-y, accent filled grandpa that you love. Yeah, he was pretty much the awesome. Answered all our questions, directed us to the brands that he swears by and even asking about Peabert! Thank the Lord! We actually felt like we had direction! So $120 later we head out with all we need to give Peabert a great nursery!

Oh and BTW - for anyone that I told we were painting the nursery sage on the bottom and white on the top, I lied. We couldn't find a sage to save our lives... this one is too gray, this one is too green, this one is too olive... ironically we found dark sage and light sage (of which both were awful) but never did find just sage... stupid naming of colors. Anyway, we went back to an original idea about a light blue on the top and a darker blue on the bottom (coincidentally similar to a certain neighbor of ours.... ;~)

So here are some pictures of our adventures!


This is the before picture... it's a little hard to see but the room was Christmas green... not pretty at all! Adam and I have hated it since day one.


We are awesome people to help paint, we taped the room the night before and got everything ready so we could just start Saturday morning.


Adam did the high stuff, we all know my un-coordination during pregnancy!


Even Riley got into the act...


Adam painting the top half... we were worried that it was too lavender as we were painting it on but when it dried it was a nice shade of light blue!


Heather, our awesome neighbor who gave up a Saturday to help us out and boy was she a help! Seriously, it went SO much faster since she was there!


I helped paint for a little while until the rolling started and then the smell was too much for me... I went out to the deck to do more power-washing... Adam got this nice artistic shot of Heather working inside and me working outside.


I did come back in and do a little more trim work...


Here is the finished product! This is actually probably the corner the crib will go in but until that comes in (yep, we ordered it!) it is the big bears space!


And the view from where the crib will be.... yeah, we ended up very happy with the colors (I was REALLY worried about the lavender affect we had going initially)

Oh and of course, paint ended up on the carpet... how is that not going to happen, right?? So our awesome neighbor jumps up and says 'aerosol hairspray'... k, what? apparently her mother taught her a trick about getting hard to remove stains out of fabric by using aerosol hairspray, maybe it will work here... she got the hairspray... worked on it for a few and what do you know, no more paint stain! Heather, you are the awesome! I am trying that trick on a couple 'unremovable stains' elsewhere in the house!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

K seriously? You needed paint advice? You know we've painted literally EVERY wall in our house, yes? Hellooooo!
The room looks great, guys. Your pics don't do it justice. :-)

kathi said...

It looks sooooo good! I love the colors, it's a great job. I can't wait to see the crib and all the bedding...it's so much fun. Good job everyone!

Carrie and Scott said...

Wow...I love the nursery. What an accomplishment. We haven't done anything! I did dream last night that I was helping you paint brick outside either green or yellow and I messed up and painted the mortar. You were not happy.

LoveLladro said...

danielle - thanks for the compliment... i actually took your advice to heart and didn't think about it until after it had dried, and by then, i LOVED it! so thanks!!!

kathi - thanks! we can't wait to see the crib all set up in there too! hopefully soon!!!

carrie - that comment had me laughing all morning long! 'you were not happy'... i still smile at that. i can't wait to see what you and scott do to your nursery... you still have time!

Michelle said...

I love the colors...y'all did a great job. We painted our room this weekend too, and just like you we painted it blue. A totally different hue of blue, but blue just the same.

What kind of bedding have y'all picked out to go in the crib?