Pick a Color, Any Color

While on Pinterest I discovered (here) that Martha Stewart Living's paint colors at Home Depot are designed to help you create a cohesive color pallet for your ENTIRE house.

You had me at "Hello."

I am obsessed with color.

I can't get enough of them, and their nuances.

When I was pregnant with Jasmine and getting her room ready, I literally went to every paint place in town to get every single swatch of blue there was, because I had to fine the right one.

(The paint guy in one place was baffled that I'd pick blue for a girl. But It made sense to me. It was what I called Cinderella blue, and the room was decked in vintage flowers.)

That may have been slightly hormonally driven, but honestly that's basically just me and color on a normal basis.

So given that we are trying to get a lot of this new house done before we move in (well not done-done, but livable-done) I knew we'd be painting right away.

You see the carpets have all been utterly ruined by gross renter's dogs. So we have to pull all the carpets and start fresh. (Except the family room which was replaced after the dogs left.)

I figure we might as well use those carpets as a paint drop cloths before they go!

So because of the time crunch I was leaning towards just painting everything upstairs white. So it would be clean and fresh and I wouldn't have to think. (Because get me thinking and my brain goes wild and doesn't stop until I think its perfect. Which I wasn't sure I had time for.)

And while I still am leaning towards a lot of white up there, this concept of whole house color pallet is opening up new things to me on my time crunch.

Forgive the ipad for ruining these paint chips -- they look much better in person.

They have it figured out where there are 4 different symbols at the top. If you grab any color with a matching symbol, your house won't feel like it has fighting colors.

See that matching asterisk in the upper right hand corner? These all flow well together.

The home depot by us is 30 mins away -- everything seems to be. 

So I had to ask Blake to watch the girls and I ran down today.

I wasn't sure what I was gonna do, take one of everything?

But I got there and just started in the grays.

I (like everyone else) am really feeling the grays.

Call me a lemming. But I just really do think grays are a wonderful neutral. I'm soo done with cream. Our rental here is ALL cream. And I've never liked cream. I'd much rather do white.

So grey feels so decadent when my eyes rest on it.

Martha's stuff in the grays all seems to have either the star symbol or the asterisk symbol.

Since I've only been in our soon to be house like 10mins combined I don't know for sure what will work. So I grabbed one of each of the colors with those two symbols.

It was a fatty pile, but I was excited about it.

After I got home, I started holding up the swatches in front of photos I have of the house, while sitting by bright windows.

I started with the trickiest room. The family room with the red/brown brick fireplace.

For now we are gonna leave the fireplace as is.

I have no idea what I want to do with it long term, and the house has a painted white fireplace in the living room -- so I'm not going straight for the paint here. (Plus Blake is a guy and they always wanna try and keep brick and wood original....we'll see.) (But I WILL be fixing that brass fireplace cover. Brass is back, but not like that. And I'm still figuring out that mantel.)

So I'm looking for a color that makes me happy next to brick.

I went through both piles and found the ones that work for me.

Next I moved on to the entry way/ upstairs hallway. Because I feel like that is the most fundamental color of them all. I picked out the good ones for that spot out of both symbols.

After looking around for a few more rooms it became clear I was leaning towards the asterisks.

The stars have more of a blue dominance, and the asterisks have more of a green. Its hard to really explain because they both have each color -- and all colors. But the stars are more of a real blue, and the asterisks are more of a soft blue often with hints of green.

I wasn't sure I wanted to commit,

but eventually I basically did.

I did rescue out the grays from the stars, because a grey is a neutral. And I get that they have under tones, but I just had to save them just in case I need them.

I can't really share with you all the stuff I'm leaning towards, because its still vague.

But here's some I'm thinking of for the Family Room.

Once again, they look MUCH better in real life.

I'm just being lazy with the ipad tonight.

Sorry.

I have a bunch of best guesses written out. But tons of back ups for each space because you have to be in the spot to know what works.

I might be deviating big time and choosing a star for the entry/upstairs hall way.

GASP!

But I think I can do it.

(Heck, this is the first time I'm even attempting to have a whole house cohesiveness. I've not cared before.)

 

Crappy photo verbal massage: Its kinda a fleshy, ever so slightly purple, brown-gray called Cavern.

Strangely enough, it sorta looks like the wallpaper there already.

Hmm.

Now I'm second guessing it. I may have to rethink. lol.

Who knows.

I gotta see it all in person.

When I have a color palette figured out I'll show ya. (With nicer photos.)

We are set to close Thursday at 3pm!

I am so excited.

I plan to get in there and take photos of EVERYTHING, in case I need them for before photos.

And then we plan to paint, paint, paint.

Then rip up that carpet!

Can't wait!!