Coming Together

When we bought our house new in 2003, every wall was painted "builder's white."  Over the years we've slowly been painting room by room.  One of the early rooms to get paint was our dining room.  But only an accent wall.  The terra cotta color resulted from a conversation Trent & I had sitting in a Starbucks one day (he liked the color on their walls) and the luck of discovering a $2 oops gallon at Lowes not too long after.  For $2, we might as well give it a shot.  Although at first a shocking contrast to the white walls, we loved it.

Now, when searching my photo files for an older shot of the room, I had to laugh when I discovered the above photo taken in March 2005.  A lot has changed in the last 5 years ... new table & chairs, new light fixture, the peace plant is still alive and much larger, the curtains have a new top panel, etc.  But what remained were the small cabinet for the aquarium (which I just replaced - details tomorrow on that project) and the stark, "builder's white" walls. 

In the last few weeks with the goal of moving in a new cabinet and the effort involved in moving the aquarium, I became determined to paint the remaining walls.  It took a couple of tries to get the right shade.  I ended up with a 55% tint of Valspar 348-2 Offshore Mist (mixed in Olympic no VOC base).

Our kitchen and dining room connect as one big space.  The official walls of the dining room are complete.  I'm still working my way through the kitchen (lots of cabinets & counter to tape off and outlet covers to remove).  Here's an early in progress glimpse that gives a good feel of the new color versus the old white  [forgive the mess, this is real life :) and, yes, those paint trays are still there!  LOL]:

And a view of our dining room with the new cabinet and paint (and I did not intend the focus to be on the light fixture - still learning how to use my new dslr):

Two subtle changes (the paint and green cabinet) and yet a big impact on the room.  Loving it.  Only 7 years and it's finally coming together.