Linking up this post with White House Black Shutters.
My dilemma? What color to paint the ceiling?
If you are a follower you have maybe read about my living room here and here.
You might also remember that I'm totally disenchanted with it.
We have lived in our home for twelve years.
Before this home the longest we lived anywhere was four and a half years - not long enough to feel the need to redo what I had already done.
This house is rather large so it took me maybe eight years to really work through every thing the first time around.
So now, those areas I did first are in desperate need of a metamorphosis.
Meet my living room.
I know.
It doesn't look like me
but there was a time when I loved it.
Actually, I had just finished a book on The White House and I had devoured the pages of Jackie Kennedy's makeovers.
I guess I was a Jackie wanna be.
I had also fallen in love with the house at the end of the remake of Miracle On 34th Street.
Do you remember this house?
I spent the better part of an hour looking for images of this house on the internet and came up with a big fat goose egg.
These are off of my television.
Desperate blogger here.
I loved the reds and golds.
The foyer was yellow.
So happy and a look I wanted in our home.
I thought it was classic and I would never tire of it.
I did though.
So, unbeknownst to my big guy, I ordered new window treatments about a week and a half ago.
Actually, he does know now.
I told him Friday night after the three margaritas I had during our neighborly house crawl that for some reason never got beyond our house.
He took it well.
He usually does but I've learned
it is all in the timing. :)
So with new treatments on the way I will be taking these down.
I intend to hold onto them though.
I spent way too much for them.
As I explained to a neighbor, I ordered them a couple days after my ACL surgery.
So, I blame it on the drugs.
With these curtains down we will repaint the living room walls.
A neutral beige.
Confusing isn't it.
How can a woman who calls her blog BeColorful have a beige living room?
I don't know how to answer that but I think it is going to work for me.
Maybe because for me, it is a color I've never explored before.
I have also noticed a pattern in the images like these that I have squirreled away in a living room dreams folder on my desktop.
Most of them are neutral colors.
The new window treatments will look a lot like these but a bit lighter.
This light and airy space just had me nodding my head in agreement but I wonder if it would feel a bit cold during our long midwest winters?
Again, similar draperies but I was also drawn in by the rug and that stunning mirror.
I wish I could replicate that view. Wow.
This look is a bit more formal and I don't think it is really what I am going for but I was attracted to the sophisticated drama of this space and the simple drapery panels.
This image has been my desktop wallpaper this past month. I was intrigued by the all white, the furniture arrangement, the subway art, the pendant ceiling fixture and the window treatments. I can't say I like the Eric Roth piece above the fireplace. Well at least not in my living room. It just doesn't say welcome to me. :)
This is a familiar photo to many of us but again I liked the furniture arrangement, the light walls, the bright art work and the stripe rug.
This is more that a little over the top but one element of the zebra print would be fun to dial up the liveliness factor and I like the black and white against the creme walls. I also love those slip covers but I have just about given up on that. I can't seem to find any body in our area that will do these anymore.
Finally, how pretty is this space. I hadn't thought of using green but I am crazy for that wallpaper. I will never do wallpaper again but maybe I could cover a couple of canvases in paper to create an architectural element.
Just a thought.
That chair is fabulous and I do have that Ethan Allen love seat that I could recover.
I am fairly certain I will be going with a creme/beige wall and the woodwork with remain white but I am thinking I should maybe put a bit of color on the ceiling.
It would set off the woodwork nicely.
This room faces north and east and gets a bit dark in the afternoons so I need to consider that.
I am totally in the dark though as to what color I should do.
This room has the nine foot ceilings.
Suggestions please.
I know I am probably going at this all wrong but I went into Pier 1 yesterday to pick up some more margarita glasses for the house crawl and I found these two lamps.
I liked the shiny reflective surface of the bases and I can see them in my neutral space.
The shades offer a bit of pattern that should easily mix with whatever else I bring into the room but I could see these lamps with a plain linen shade too.
That's how I shop. I buy when I see something that excites me.
That is how I decorate too. I combine the things I love and although it may not be a decorator's dream it becomes a space that is uniquely me and the decorators be damned.
I feel like I have a lot of house projects going on right now.
There are a lot of needs here all of a sudden.
I have a couple of bathrooms crying for an update and
I still haven't really completed this bedroom that I started last winter.
I have made some more progress here though and hope to share with you soon.
I am also working on another bedroom in Galena.
The one with the grape merlot wall.
The wall is the only thing here that is staying.
Once I find my artwork for that wall I will be reposting my progress there as well.
So stay tuned. I am obviously A.D.D. Addicted to Decor and Design and I don't see a cure anywhere on the horizon.
Have a fabulous week.
I have to run
I have work to do.
XOXO,
P
