I love primer in the springtime

If you’re like me, the first sunshine-y semi-warm day puts me in a decorating/ cleaning mood. We had one of those recently here in South Dakota. That’s right, I said a warm day recently in South Dakota – it was 60s and sunny and delightful!

Of course, this week the temps hovered around zero – but the pretty snow on the ground was consolation.

Anyway, I have been saving up for Rob’s departure all my decorating projects and this one is the first tick on my list. I made the shelf off this simple design from Ana White’s website and modified it slightly to be a coat rack as well.

Primer

Then, my freshening up of the entry wall made it look so plain. Since I already knew what color I wanted to paint it (I tested it on the upstairs walls earlier) I went ahead and started painting the living room.

*Sigh* I do love fresh paint. It’s like cleaning with color. It makes the same old room suddenly seem polished and fresh and posh.

So, I painted the wall in the living room as I finished the new coat rack. The color is called “Sand Between Your Toes” and I love it. It wraps me in warmth and sunshine while still being a subtle touch of color. Plus, it contrasts nicely with the ultra white that we’re using for trim (and the coat rack).

I felt I needed to divide the space in the entryway. As much as I think I love a great room, one needs a little transition when one walks in the door. Opening the front door to a big one-room place is too overwhelming for me. BUT, Rob didn’t want to sacrifice his line of sight with the front door… SO…

I’ve always wanted to use old windows in my decorating and I finally can! What’s more, I checked out Habitat for Humanity’s ReStore and got these for $1 each!

Of course, I missed Rob severely! He’d have had them hung in an hour – but let’s just say it took me MUCH longer. Between joist direction, finding it, learning the spacing, realizing it wasn’t where I needed it to be, figuring out how to hang windows between the joists, and actually doing it… that was about all I accomplished that day.

Don’t my new walls look pretty??

My next step is living room curtains (we’ve been living with shears since we moved in). I’m working on other decorating (most are still in-progress as I learn the personality of this house and as we renovate), but here’s one other room.

Our bedroom. Still in progress, but mostly done.

Notice the rockin’ nightstands! I made those! Modeled out of the West Elm catalog and topped with our concrete sample pieces.

I haven’t figured out what I want in a headboard – I think a piece of architectural salvage would be really neat, but I haven’t found any in South Dakota. I’m thinking about making a headboard and bed frame… don’t know yet.

But I’m having a ton of fun decorating! I finally feel like I’m not living in a hotel. I can live in the happy green bedroom, the warm and shiny bathroom, the blue room (which is my yoga room – awesome!), and now I can live in the living room. Of course, we’re still planning on changing a whole lot in the great room (living/dining/ kitchen), but with Rob’s new deployment schedule, we won’t get to it for almost a year. Ergo… decorate then re-decorate. But such has been my military life anyway. This way, I get to try out TWO living rooms with the same floor plan.

Looking forward to more warm spring days! (but enjoying the snow outside my window for now).