goodbye wasabi…hello urban putty!

We’d had a green kitchen (technically called wasabi green) since we moved into our house.  It was the color I wanted.  At first.  It loved it for a while.  It was bright.  It was cheerful.  It was kitcheny!  But it wasn’t very flexible.  There aren’t too many colors that go well with this certain green.  And anything red made it look Christmasy.  It was time for a change.  I learned that choosing the right color of beige is super ANNOYING.  I thought I’d picked the right color and spent an entire naptime painting the kitchen and dining room…only to discover that it looked purple when on the walls.  Not what I had in mind.  Then I went the smart route and got samples of beiges and for a couple of days my walls looked like this:

After looking at the colors in all different lights, I chose Urban Putty from Sherwin Williams.  After getting it on the walls and redecorating a bit, I love it!  I love having more color in the room through accessories.  I found this fun table runner at World Market and love the colors it introduces in the room.

In my kitchen I’d always had a chalkboard/corkboard combo that helped me organize my life.  Well…it never looked organized.  It always looked chaotic and made my kitchen feel cluttery.  That corkboard is still an essential part of my life, but it now has a new home in the stairwell leading down to the basement.  And the wall in my kitchen (the only wall in my kitchen that has any room for hanging things) now looks like this:

I discovered through this decorating adventure that hanging plates is NOT easy.  All those plate hanging hooks that you can buy are tricky!  I couldn’t get them to work with my plates.  I ended up buying some super strong glue and sawtooth hangers and gluing them on the backs of the plates.  I haven’t heard any shattering glass in the middle of the night…so far so good.  I also thought this was a fun idea that my friend, Abbey, gave me.  I found a fun piece of scrapbook paper, framed it, and then used a dry erase marker to write a verse on it.  It only cost me 50 cents for the paper so I can change it out with the season…or whenever I get tired of it.

Moving on to the part that I love the most…the kids now have an art corner!  Our house is small without a whole lot of storage space (upstairs).  All the kids’ art supplies used to be stored in the top of Owen’s closet.  Not very convenient.  And, to be completely honest, I often didn’t suggest doing art activities with the kids because it was such a pain to get everything down.  I have this shelf in my dining room that has always been home to decorative cake plates and the like.  I had a vision of turning that into an accessible art corner for the kids…and now the dream is a reality!

I love the see through containers so the kids can choose what they want to play with without having to be able to read.  A little chalkboard paint and a white paint pen made my little organized-obsessed self very happy.  Everything has a label.  Bliss.

I can’t even begin to tell you how much I love this.  Ever since I put this together, the kids are obsessed with doing projects.  They can easily find their own supplies and get started without as much reliance on me.  The little table is now right next to the art shelf so they can get right to work.  It’s working out so great.  I wish I’d done it years ago!

 

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