Wow, I had no idea going into this project how much would be involved! We have painted the trim 3 different times in the last 7 years and I have painted the bathroom and kitchen floor and other things in the house, furniture and what-not. But I have never taken on the house itself.
We have needed to repaint a couple of years now, there are chips in the paint here and there from things hitting the house or where the wood has been damaged by rain and we have gone over those places, repairing wood and sealing off around windows and doors and so on. Without the exact color to cover chinks in the paint, we have covered them with white...which protected the siding just fine but did nothing for the house's self-esteem.
We have needed to repaint a couple of years now, there are chips in the paint here and there from things hitting the house or where the wood has been damaged by rain and we have gone over those places, repairing wood and sealing off around windows and doors and so on. Without the exact color to cover chinks in the paint, we have covered them with white...which protected the siding just fine but did nothing for the house's self-esteem.
I had the color in mind-a faded blue, like denim. I even had the paint chips-stacks of them in fact-and I looked at them and envisioned the house that color and really wanted to have a nice, subtle clean/fresh coat of color on there. I even did the color swap thing on the camera and took pictures with the 'new' color on the house to see how it looked.
Then we went yesterday to get more spray paint to finish a project I had going and I decided to get a couple gallons and start on the porch. As I picked up the chip that had the chosen light blue color on it, I saw the one next to it. oooo. Blue Phlox, same color as the flowers, as lilacs and irises and snowball bushes. That bright purple-blue that we all love. We decided to go for the much more bold color and if we did not like it, we were out $50 and a few hours of time.
I had just pressure-washed the porch and the house walls and eaves, so it was ready to start on. The kids got going with the rollers and Matt and I worked on the cracks and details. Then we decided to do the ceiling the same color-we paint it light blue every year and it keeps away the wasps. The last 2 years we painted it, it looked white 3 months later and we had all kids of trouble with dirt daubers and wasps. It won't fade this time around! Not in a year anyway.
As the color dried to a lighter hue, we all stood back and looked at it. It's not trimmed out or even filled in all the way yet, but we LOVE it.
We were back out this morning to finish up the gallon we opened yesterday before the rain hit and Matt was painting the wall and saying how he thought it was a great color. Ben said he thought it was beautiful. Even Chan and Jake commented on how happy the color was, how blue is calming and now we have a serene house. The most I got out of everyone about the other, lighter colors was 'it's fine'. I am glad we went with the brighter shade, it certainly is a big difference over the faded grey green. It feels happy.
We went and got the price for replacing the fascia boards-which we can paint before we put them up, which will be nice! That's next, after we finish the porch and the front of the house. 2 gallons will barely make a dent in the whole of the house, at the rate we are using it, we will need 8 or even 10 more gallons, plus several gallons of white for the trim. We are going to do the porch first, then the remainder of the front of the house. The bathroom floor in the hall needs to be replaced, so that will be next in order of necessity.
Then Chan's surgery, then we can start on the rest of the painting once that's paid for. So it won't be done all in one go, but it's underway at least!
