We moved into my dream home \u2014 a beautiful 1834 farmhouse \u2014 in March. My mom was away the first week after our move, and I decided to surprise her by painting the front entryway, hallway and stairwell before she returned. This seemed like a good idea at the time. The previous owner had painted the walls a bright, blood red color \u2014 it looked like someone had stabbed a vampire to death. Not. Mellow.<\/p>\n
What I did not consider, as I drove to the paint store, is that I\u2019ve never actually picked out a paint color on my own \u2014 my mom has always helped me. What I did not realize, is that I actually have terrible judgement when it comes to paint colors.<\/p>\n
I wanted something that would look \u201cright\u201d in an old house \u2014 a heritage color, if possible. And after agonizing over several hundred paint chips, I found it \u2014 a mellow, dusty rose that would look beautiful with the old wood floors and deep, white baseboards and trim. <\/p>\n
The man at the store had recommended an oil-based primer, but had warned me that it might \u201csplatter a bit.\u201d I don\u2019t want to criticize, but that\u2019s like saying a blender might \u201csplatter a bit\u201d if you forget to put on the lid. Even when I moved at a snail\u2019s pace, an aerosol-like spray of white dots shot off the roller. I was coated with white paint by the time I finished priming, and the only reason the floors weren\u2019t completely ruined was because one of my kids followed behind me as I painted, frantically washing up the mess. <\/p>\n
I plunged ahead, slapping on the first coat of dusty rose as the sun set. It seemed a bit pinkish, but I wasn\u2019t worried. After all, I was covering up Vampire Blood Red \u2014 a color that is not easily tamed. I was squinting a bit as I put on the second coat of dusty rose, since there aren\u2019t any lights in the stairwell, and no outlets to plug in lamps, there, either. <\/p>\n
When the sun rose the next morning, the full horror of what I\u2019d done was revealed. I had painted my beautiful old farmhouse Pepto Bismol Pink. It was such a hideous color that just looking at it made me irritable. As my kids fired off text messages, inviting their friends to come see what I\u2019d done, I raced to the store to get a replacement color \u2014 this time, a deep, no-nonsense clay that matched the old can of paint I\u2019d found in the basement. Two more thick coats, and the hallway was saved. In less than 30 hours, I\u2019d added six layers of paint to walls that already had several coats of Vampire Blood Red slathered over four layers of old wallpaper. If the house ever collapses, I\u2019m fairly certain those walls will still be standing. And the clay color? Since I didn\u2019t pick it, it\u2019s perfect.<\/p>\n
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We moved into my dream home \u2014 a beautiful 1834 farmhouse \u2014 in March. My mom was away the first week after our move, and I decided to surprise her by painting the front entryway, hallway and stairwell before she returned. This seemed like a good idea at the time. The previous owner had painted […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-funny-bits"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":120,"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114\/revisions\/120"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}