It’s been almost 4 months, but the updates to our dining room are finally done!  Thought we’d share some “Before & After” pictures of the changes we’ve made:

The "Before" Picture

The "After" Picture

We started work in the dining room back in July by removing the old wallpaper.  Once the wallpaper was down, we ran new wiring for the wall sconces to replace the old knob-and-tube.  We then had the walls skim-coated with a fresh layer of plaster to fill in some holes and cracks and smooth everything out.  With the plaster work complete, we installed picture frame molding below the chair rail and then painted the upper portion of the walls gray and the bottom the same shade of white as the rest of the trim in the house.

We still think the room needs some work from a decorating perspective, but we’re so happy to finally be done with the other updates.

A few weeks ago, we started giving our main floor powder room a face lift by removing the old ivy-patterned wallpaper.  Although it’s taken a lot longer than we expected, we’re finally getting close to calling it finished.  I’d still like to replace the faucet with something a little less gold, but, so far, we think it’s a pretty good transformation considering we’ve only spent about $175 on paint, light fixtures, and accessories.  Here are some “before and after” pictures:

Before

After

This morning I spent about an hour replacing about 30 outlet and light switch covers in our master bedroom, master bathroom, and sun room. It sounds like a silly thing to think about replacing, but it made such a difference – in the bedroom especially.

The master bedroom and bathroom (and also the kitchen, hallway, and third floor) had oak outlet covers when we moved in. I’m not a big fan of the wood finish since it’s such a contrast to the paint, but I’ve felt kind of guilty about replacing them with the standard $.39 variety since I know the oak ones are probably about $7 a piece new. Since we’ve painted the bedroom, though, I keep thinking how much more I’d like it without the wood outlet covers, so I finally broke down and spent a whopping $13.00 at Lowe’s last night to buy plain cream ones, which I installed this morning. Here are before and after photos:

Before

After

I’m happy with the way the standard covers look, but I’m not sure what to do with the nice wood ones we took off. So, if anyone happens to be in the market for some oak light switch and outlet covers, I can make you a great deal! We’ve got about a dozen outlet covers, 3 switch covers, and another 3 with the rectangular cut-out for GFCI outlets, etc.

In the sun room, the outlet covers had been wallpapered and still had a bunch of glue on them, so I figured they could stand an update while I was at it. There’s really not much of a difference in how they look until you get up close and notice that the new ones aren’t sticky, but I’m still glad to have that crossed off my list of things to do. Here’s the “after” photo:

I’ve been a little delinquent in posting, but the project to paint our master bedroom is finally done! It took the painter nearly a week and a half to finish, with most of the time being spent in the master bedroom suite. Here are some before and after photos.

Before

After

All in all, we’re pleased with the way it turned out. The new color is a Sherwin Williams color called Sand Dune, with the trim being painted Modest White. We debated about whether or not it was worth the extra effort and money to paint the trim in the room, but I’m so glad we decided to do it. This was the only room in the house with a different trim color, so painting it makes everything consistent … and I’m really happy with the contrast between the walls and trim. It seems like they would have blended together a lot more had we not painted the trim a brighter white than it was before.

The wall color looks a lot pinker to me in this room than it does in the other rooms we have painted the same color. I’m blaming it on the green carpet, thinking it’ll probably read more tan when we replace the carpet with something a little more neutral. Either way, though, I like the way it looks a lot better than the previous color.

Wallpaper – when is it ever a good idea? It doesn’t matter what the pattern is – it’s going to go out of style and, even when in style, it’s such a matter of personal taste. What I dislike about it most is that removal is no small task. Best case, it’s hours of tedious mind-numbing work. Worst case, it’s hours of tedious mind-numbing work followed by the dilemma of what to do with permanently scarred walls. I just hate it. And yet, we just purchased a house with several rooms of floor to ceiling wallpaper that coordinates beautifully, but still wouldn’t be my pick.

So, last week, we decided to start wallpaper removal efforts with the floral border in the master bedroom and bathroom. The plan is to start in a less visible area so we can figure out how difficult it’s going to be to remove wall paper from a plastered wall before we tackle the much more public areas on the main floor. Besides this, the wallpaper in the master bedroom was probably the most dated in the house … the perfect place to start.

Here are some before and after photos:

Before:

After:

Fortunately for us, the wallpaper in the bedroom turned out to be strippable (infinitely easier to remove than the alternative) and the wall surface underneath was not horribly damaged, so we think we’ll be able to get away with just a coat of paint. I hope the same is true for the floor-to-ceiling wallpaper in the dining room and sunroom! Now we just need to pick out a paint color … and maybe some new flooring … and a new bedspread …