Making a house a home

Almost three years ago, we moved into the house where we now live. During that time we have lived with almost everything as the previous owners had left it. The only redecorating we did was to replace the washer and dryer. While the appliances were gone, we painted.

I chose a 'sunshine yellow' to brighten up that windowless room. The paint was actually named 'Van Gogh' yellow and that should have been my clue that it would be bright, bright, bright. At first I winced, but now I can't imagine it any other color.

We make changes slowly, very slowly, since neither of us want to redo something, especially because it was a bad choice. Maybe that was the motivation to embrace Van Gogh's yellow.

When I recently used a favorite piece of cloth to recover a valance in our bedroom, I pulled a green from that print and painted the window wall. Just that wall. The remainder of the bedroom desperately needs painted, but I can't decide if I want a whole green room. Please understand that the remainder of the house is green. The previous owners really liked that color.

Since I can't imagine the walls inside our house as any other color. We decided to work on the outside.

We hired Billy Price and love his work ethic and devotion to perfection. It took a few tries to come up with the colors we wanted him to paint our house.

At first I embraced a golden yellow -- it is that Van Gogh influence. But when we drove down the street and saw several houses being painted that color, we decided to try something else. So now we have a chocolate brown house with tan trim -- love it. LOVE IT!

Most houses reflect the inhabitant's personality by the door color. Seems that alot of people in our neighborhood like white, green or red doors. Our neighbor painted theirs black. Not sure what that says about them....

I wanted something different and chose blue. I thought 'Sapphire' blue, but sadly the color I chose was much more turquoise than that.

Now, like with the Van Gogh yellow, I'm wincing and not sure I can handle this bright, bright blue door. It looks Hispanic. But maybe if I get a Pennsylvania Dutch hex sign to hang on the door or near it on a wall, maybe the door will look more at home and also reflect my heritage. Right now it looks out of place. I swear, it glows.

Yet, Heidi, our mail delivery person, shouted out while delivering the mail this morning, "I love it! It looks great!"

The painter just shook his head and said, "I don't discuss color choices. I just paint what you tell me."

The neighbor man diplomatically said, "Well, it certainly is blue."

My husband's coworker added, "Blue's good -- maybe navy blue...."

But I'm pinning my hopes on Heidi. Maybe she saw what I was hoping to create. A cheerful, welcoming entrance that would make you smile -- not because it was so ugly, but because it is a happy color.

OK, I'm probably going to repaint the door. But I'm sticking with blue. Just not this one.

The exciting part of this whole painting project is now when I drive up to this chocolate colored house -- it feels like it belongs to me. Who knew paint could make a house into a home.

Now we just need to pick out the new lighting fixtures, house numbers, and paint to decorate the green bench on our front porch....it never ends. But that's OK, at least now we feel like we are in our own home. And I could paint the foyer to match the door -- just not this door.