It's time that I come clean about a sickness that I've dealt with for a long time now. I like to refer to it as, "Decorating A.D.D." I don't know what's wrong with me, but I'm constantly wanting to update, rearrange, paint, or completely change rooms in my house. I know you have to take ownership of your own problems, but I have to partially blame my mother. She would change our comforter sets in our bedrooms at least once a year. We always had new bath towels. She loves to change the "style" of her living room furniture often. And, given that she was a seamstress, it was nothing to whip up some new curtains or pillow covers when we were sick of the old ones. I'm assuming that's part of the reason why I don't usually stick with my current decorations for too long- also a pretty good reason to not buy things that are too expensive!
With that being said, we decided to give our living room an update. You may remember that this living room was just painted a pretty aqua color on the night we found out we were pregnant with Nolan. Buuuuut, new living room furniture prompted a big change. For about 7 years we had a light tan microfiber sectional couch. The light, somewhat safe couch color demanded a bold, bright wall color in my opinion. Here's what we were working with...
But alas, the microfiber couch had taken a beating. Our cat, sensitive stomach dog, and two kids had put their mark on these couches- not to mention the many parties we've hosted and years of eating dinner on them (pre-kids.) After referring to this blog that I found on Pinterest (
http://chrisandrobinsnest.blogspot.com/2010/09/how-to-clean-microfiber-furniture.html) about cleaning microfiber one too many times, I finally caved into the never ending "spill proof" sippy cups and decided we needed to buy leather couches. We sold the old sectional on Craigslist (someone actually paid money for it and picked it up from our house!!!) Here's what we're working with now...
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| A brown leather couch and love seat. Notice the sippy cup on the new fabulously wipe-able couches! Also, Brady is, um, yea... |
The couches are awesome, but very big and dark. This of course prompted me to get the itch to re-paint the living room a brighter, lighter color. We were off to Home Depot and Chris was back on his ladder re-doing the paint job that he had finished less than a year ago. Here's the paint we chose...
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| Martha Stewart- Nimbus Cloud |
Seeing as how there was nothing wrong with our previous color, and I actually really liked it, I questioned our decision to re-paint several times throughout the process. Thank you, Chris, for being so patient with my Decorating A.D.D. (in sickness and in health, and all that fun stuff.) But, in the end, I really, reeeeally like how it turned out. It feels airy and bright and I think it compliments the brown couches much better than the aqua would have. Here's some before and after pics. (Turns out the only "before" pictures I could find were from Christmas.)
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| Before |
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| After |
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| After |
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| After |
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| Dining Room Before |
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| Dining Room After |
In addition to paint color and furniture, I was on the lookout for new throw pillows. Throw pillows are my weakness. My mom had recently made us some fun pastel pillow slipcovers to brighten up the microfiber sectional, but I didn't think they would look right on the leather couches, so they have found a new home on the boys' playroom couch.
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| The playroom- A perfect new home for my fun pastel pillows! |
I had my eye on some awesome Pottery Barn pillows for the new couches, but I didn't have a Pottery Barn budget (Remember my Decorating A.D.D.- I can't afford to spend too much on something that may or may not stay for a long time.) So, I went to Homegoods and found some almost identical pillows, but at a much cheaper price!
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| Pottery Barn Pillows |
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| Pottery Barn Pillows |
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| Homegoods pillow! |
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My Homegoods pillows- so similar!
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I'm sure I'll keep tweaking the living room here and there, but for now, I'm loving the new look. The couches are comfy (Chris can't wait to recline them for football games!) and the walls feel fresh and clean. I love the change and hopefully it will satisfy my Decorating A.D.D.... for now!
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| Ready for college football, and pony rides, apparently. |
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