The first time I've ever been sorry we have no traffic on our street

And....

We're finished! Last weekend we, and I mean mostly Corey because I had the sore shoulder, did a trial run on the back door in preparation for The Big Job this weekend - the front door. It took almost the entire breezy, unplanned weekend to finish it, but it's amazing. Thom Filicia came to me in a dream and told me the color I first painted on the back door (Meridian Blue) was the wrong color, that it needed to be Pacific Palisades. No really. He was that specific, except he used numbers from the paint card. So we sanded the back door a little so that it would hold the paint, and Corey slapped a coat of Benjamin Moore's Pacific Palisades on there early Saturday afternoon. I also spray painted the hardware Carbon Mist.

By Saturday night we had removed the numbers and hardware, sanded, cleaned, taped off, primed and applied one coat to the front door, and I sent this teaser photo to my cheer squad.

This afternoon, after our trip to the Halloween store, we put the second coats on the trim and the door and painted the hardware. The trim for the door was formerly black, and unfortunately we did not get an exact match to the existing trim for the door trim, but here's hoping you did not notice until I told you!

We had to keep swapping where the baby gate goes to keep Murphy inside. The letters and door hardware are Rustoleum Carbon Mist. The paint is Behr Exterior Semi Gloss matched to Benjamin Moore's Pacific Palisades. 

It is exactly the dramatic effect I was going for!

Last night both boys said they did not really like it. Landen said he did not think turquoise went with brown, and asked who I was to say that it did. Corey left a little bit ago to take him to Cub Scouts, and apparently once Landen saw the full effect of the door with the numbers and the hardware on the house, he approved of my color selection and understands my vision.

I have vision, you know. I often do not have the funds or the motivation to do my vision any good.

Here's a side-by-side of what we bought, which was adequate and lovely, and how we improved it to fit us.

I love my house. I get excited when I turn down my street because I know I will get to see my house soon. I hope for the same for all of you.

The next project I am going to attempt to get Corey to agree to is painting the boys' bathroom. It looks like their bathroom in our former apartment. Extremely non-personal. Here are the swatches. I am thinking the darkest green - Fresh Parsley - for the cabinets and the Olive Martini or the Courtyard for the walls. The trick is figuring out what to do with the countertop, which is light and cream-colored.