Revisiting our Dining Room

You might remember how blah our dining room looked before I painted it.  If not, the following is a picture to jog your memory of the "before".

Pictured below is the wall the mirror is placed on pre-mirror.  As you can see, it looks sort of blah.

Here is the first after.  This is the view from our foyer area.  I am not thrilled with how the table is decorated, but wanted to share the progress with the newly installed light, mirror, and drapes.

This view is from the corner near the window.

This view is from the corner closest to the kitchen looking into the room.

This view is similar to the view above, but it is from the entryway in the kitchen rather than the corner.

This view is from the corner by the window closer to the entry door.

This below view is from the center of the window.

Closeup of the pendant light.

One more view of the mirror and the buffet.  I think this turned out divine.  I love how the pendant is centered in the mirror in the picture.  :)

All and all, I am very pleased with how the dining room is shaping up.  I still need to figure out a few more wall accessories.  I am thinking of hanging some white plates on the wall just to the left of the entryway that leads into the kitchen (see first pic on the left hand side where the wall is blank).  Outside of that, I am not sure if I really need to have items flanking the china cabinet.  I am generally of the thinking "less is more", but am open to suggestions.

Also, let me know how you decorate your table top.  I like having a table cloth on the table most of the time because I like how it protects the table top from dust.  Although, I am thinking of getting ambitious, and doing something else.  Suggestions are always welcomed.

Sidetable Gets Its Groove Back

This is a classic story of giving a good piece of furniture another life with a little bit of elbow grease.  Below you will find a traditional sidetable that has seen better days.  It has great bones, but has been loved a little too hard.  However, it has major potential.  All it needs is a bit of sanding, primer, paint, and poly.

Before:

Mid-procress: Half-Sanded

After:

The sidetable is back to its regal self.  I gave it two coats of primer, three coats of paint, and three very thin coats of poly.  It now has a wonderful home in our guest bedroom.  Perfection!

Making Heirlooms Work for You

My husband and I received an old family picture of his Great-Great Grandparents from Hungary.  It is a wonderful pic, but the gold frame was not working for our home decor.  We struggled with finding a place to hang the picture for months.  Initially, I wanted to preserve everything about this picture.  However, the frame was the frame's golden tone wasn't working, so we just did not have anywhere to display it.  Then, one day I decided to grab a can of silver spray paint, and spray the frame. 

Before:

After:

I am just tickled with our result.  The frame looks great, and now hangs proudly in our dining room for everyone to see.  It is a great conversation starter, and I am so happy we were able to make this heirloom work for our home decor.

Color Me Beautiful.....

As you can see, I didn't take a “before” pic of the dining room (I got ahead of myself a bit with this project). Below, you will find pics of the blank slate before the paint was applied. This presented me with a great opportunity to make the room my own.

The room had never been painted (just builders paint on the wall which is crazy since the house was built in 1997), but had major potential with the crown molding and the molding boxes on the bottom of the walls.

                            

You may notice that the white color inside of the molding boxes looks a shade different from the surrounding moldings. I had recently painted the inside of the boxes white (they had been a dark khaki color). I used the same color white the molding had been painted, but since it had been painted a few years ago, they read a bit different for a few months. Now, they blend in just fine.

     

The color I selected was Woodlawn Blue by Benjamin Moore in an eggshell finish. I just love a Robin's egg color with dark wood. The china cabinet, table and chairs have an expresso finish.

 

I absolutely love how it turned out!

Now all I need to do is replace that fugly brass chandelier. I have the below oversized equator pendant ready to install from CB2. It is quite a steal at only $199 compared to other pendant lights I found.

                                          

So what do you think?