A day off . . . sort of!

When you live in an area where most of the weekends are cloudy, rainy and cold, one must tackle the long list of "things to do".  So that's what we did.  Last weekend, my sweet hubs donned his coveralls and painted the upstairs hallway.  We live in a 1928 farmhouse and the upper floor of our home is clapboard.  So in the hallway, we've always kept it white.  BORING . . . after 23 years, this girl that loves color settled on a new color, Edgecomb Gray from Benjamin Moore.  It's the lightest version of paint on my chip that includes the dark gray that we have in our familyroom.  Love it, love it. 

Anywho, years ago when I was in my "red" state, I painted a pretty white shelf a beautiful cherry red.  It was gorgeous then, but seemingly a little dated now.  As I've gotten older, I'm finding that I love soothing colors.  A friend of mine who owns a darling store in Kirkland, WA called Haley's Cottage sells a paint from Annie Sloan.  It's called Chalk Paint.  I had used it before and thought, what the heck, it's gotta cover this deep red.  So I took Wednesday off from work :) and began the task of painting out this shelf.  It has some decorative bits to it; a couple of little medallians and a decorative rope moulding on each side.  I painted those pieces along with the face of the drawer front in Old White.  Then the rest of the cabinet/shelf got a coat of Paris Gray.  OMGosh . . . it just needed a bit of touch up, but didn't even need a second coat.  I was done with most of the painting by noon.  To give the decorative bits a bit of zing, I rubbed in some of the dark wax into the crevices and then wiped that off with a soft cloth.  OH, one thing I missed, I rubbed down the entire cabinet/shelf with the opaque soft wax first.  Gives it a bit of shine and dimension. 

I am now in love with my hallway.  A new lamp, a small side table, and gorgeous rug and I seriously want to put up a cot and live there.  I will post photos of the hallway after my hubs finishes up some detail work today. 

But just so you can see how lovely the cabinet/shelf turned out, here's a collage of the before and after shot of the piece.  How fun!

Now on to the next project . . .