Color.

About 6 months ago I started looking for a house to rent. I knew I wanted an older home, preferably a bungalow. Well, bungalows are everywhere in this city, the trick was finding a nice one that wasn't trashed by college students. I found it! The only problem was that it was very expensive and it looked as though someone had gotten white paint and pumped it through a hose while covering the entire interior of the house. The owner doesn't live in the state so he didn't realize how bad it was. With a little bargaining I was able to get the rent knocked down with the understanding that we would paint the house and make it look beautiful. Boy, what did I get myself into for a rental house? Oh well, its history now. We've lived here for about 5 months now and couldn't be happier!

Here are some before and after pictures. Be prepared to be outraged if you love details in old homes.

Our cute little house! The exterior was in excellent condition!

The living room... before.

The living room. Beautiful mantle. Before.

This house has excellent original panelling and built in book shelves with scalloped edges. Someone decided to make holes in the back of the shelves. I'm assuming it's not the same person who drown this beautiful detail in white paint. Before.

Along the back of the living room and into the little hall connecting the two bedrooms and the bathroom. Before.

 Living room after. We added a medium chocolate brown color to the wall and then repainted the panelling in a warm glowy color.

 After.

After, going into the dining room. That was a mess as well.

 Close up of the panelling in the dining room. Poor house. Before.

Dining room after. I added a chocolate brown that's a shade darker than the living room and continued the same glowy color on the panelling. Excuse the mess, it had JUST gotten finished.

 This is the kitchen before. My dad was sanding down the shelving because it had such a thick coat of paint on the edges that it wouldn't shut. Overall, the kitchen wasn't terrible.

 Kitchen after. It's an okay kitchen. I left the cabinets that dirty streaky white because it looks more shabby chic in person than it does in these pictures. I hate how there is NO counter space!

 I chose a really lovely dark red. I knew I wanted something in the house to be painted dark red. I just didn't know it'd be the kitchen.

 The door to the backyard and Dieter (the cat). The wood floor is beat up really bad but I kind of like it. Goes back to that shabby chic thing I'm trying to do.

There are the cabinets that my dad sanded down. They still don't shut all of the way but it's the best we could do.

 This is the bathroom, before. I didn't get a great picture of it before I painted it. Just so you get the point, it was all white. ALL WHITE. Dripping in white. So much white paint that the electrical socket was not useable because it was caked into it.

 I took a bit of a risk and used a very dark purple paint. I wanted something different from what was in the rest of the house. I love it with the white accents.

I didn't do a good job of painting in here. I don't think you can tell by the picture. Originally I painted it the same color as the living room but decided that was weird.

 I didn't get any before pictures of the bedrooms. This is the master bedroom after. The color on the walls is a very soft sage color with an almost grey accent in it. I adore this color.

LOVE this color!

So, that is my home. I'll be posting more pictures when I do something different with the rooms. I never did paint the second bedroom. I'm considering making it into a cave type thing for the boy. I may have to decorate it in Army stuff. I think he might like that and he really needs his own space to relax. Now to find time to accomplish that.

It was kind of cool when we were painting. We would peel back the tape on the trim and reveal the original colors of the home. The panelling was all this really weird green color that I can only describe as being similar to split pea soup. I also found some interesting gold/yellow color. I really hope those colors weren't used together. I won't hold my breath.