I want color!

We have lived in our current house for over 2 years now. It was a new construction home when we bought it and we are the first people to live in it. The only two rooms we have really painted and decorated are Julia's room and our room (master bedroom); every other room in the house including stairways, foyers and hallways is the same light-yellow-beige color(see "before" master bedroom picture color) that the builder applied. It is certainly difficult to get any house projects done when you have a toddler running around; even more difficult when you have an open floor plan between your kitchen, living room and dining room with high, high ceilings in the stairways and foyers and little to no time to do anything.

(this isn't our living area-just an idea of color flow I found)

I told Mike I am sick of looking at all the same colors and want to get all the bathrooms (total of 3), the rest of the bedrooms (2) and all the other parts of the house painted and done once and for all. I really, really want a prettier kitchen with some kind of bold color with a cafe style theme (yup, that is my coffee addiction coming out in my decorating). I want a tranquil, calming master bathroom where I can soak in our big tub after the little gal goes to bed; right now the master bath just reminds me of boring hotel bathroom.

I am kind of clueless as to where to start with the paint selection since it is a very open floor plan and each room flows into one another. I am doing a lot of researching on-line about color choices, utilizing the color wheel and making sure to maintain the flow of an open floor plan without sacrificing style and having to paint everything all one color (something I want to stay away from).

Doesn't this look tranquil and relaxing, yet simple?

Are we going to do all this painting ourselves? Nope. I told Mike I am going to research lots of painters and get recommendations from friends and have someone do it for us. I personally don't mind the actual painting part, it is the prep work that I dread. I hate the taping, the plastic covering, and the intricacies of painting nooks and crannies (lots in a bathroom and kitchen...ugh!) before you can go crazy with a good old paint roller to cover a wall. Come on, you know exactly what I mean. :) There are professionals out there who are, well, professionals at this stuff and they have the time, experience and most of all, patience to do this kind of job.

Stay tuned for before and after pictures. Painting may not start until after the holidays because it will take me that long to research reputable painters and pick colors for each room.

Any good decorators out there? Ahem...Nealy? Suzanne? who want to give me advice and ideas? :)

Children's Museum-11 months later

Since the weather was very chilly today, we decided to go to the Minnesota Children's Museum in St. Paul. We got a great deal through our local library. Two free admissions, then $2 per person up to 5 people after that...so we only paid $2 for what is usually $8.95/person! If you live in the area, check out Dakota County libraries...it is such a great deal! We took Julia there for the first time in January, 2010 (see details here). What a difference 11 months makes! Julia again had a blast this time around and we again spent a majority of the trip in the water works area. Here are some pictures of January's visit and then our visit for today.

Little Julia

Julia today

Little Julia

Julia Today

We did convince Julia to go to a few other exhibits of the museum, but of course mommy had to coax her in the trying things out instead of saying "back to water".

Blowing bubbles with daddy (in the water area of course)

Running up the ramp, playing peek-a-boo with mommy in the life sized ant hill

Of course we had to do some painting in the Creations area (they had lots of yellow paint-Julia's favorite)