Wallpapering: Black and White and Read All Over

The Love/Hate Black and White Wallpaper

When I was 15, I talked my mother into letting me decorate my own bedroom.  With paintbrushes in hand, I painted the entirety of my attic bedroom in a color palette of two colors: black and white.

Thank goodness for liberal parenting.  They let me stencil on the white walls a black border that consisted of four symbols: a telephone, a female insignia, a peace sign, and...oh, jeez, I forgot!  Anyway, the black stencils, paired with a black and white comforter, black lacquer desk, and oriental room divider made quite the spectacle in my teen dream room.  So, needless to say, I think I've always had a bit of a fondness for the black and white color palette.  Which is why I was surprised when everyone else was so surprised that I recently retreated to my days of the black and white walls.

Fast forward [a lot] of years later.  My sister recently moved out.  If you recall, earlier I did a story on her Tiffany Blue Room which we conquered as part of a Spring Break weekend warrior project.  Well, when she left, the only remnant of her 3-1/2 years with us was one bright blue wall.  

Before - Tiffany Blue

Part of me wanted to see it go because it made me sad every time I walked by.  Another part of me just couldn't find anything in my juxtaposition of spare furniture to match.  And another part of me just wanted to experiment with wallpaper.  So I ordered some discount black and white wallpaper online and I gave it a shot. 

Let me tell you...prior to this project I had ideas of grandeur about putting wallpaper up on numerous walls in the house.  But after fighting with this--pardon my french--BITCH of a project, I no longer desire to wallpaper anything. 

After - Floral Explosion of Black and White Wallpaper

In case you are thinking of wallpapering your house, here's a few notes for amateur wallpaperers that I learned the hard way:

What I wish I knew about hanging wallpaper before I actually did it:

• "Pre-pasted" actually means "barely sticks."
• You must "rough" up (then clean) the walls with sandpaper prior to wallpapering or it slides right off.
• Water temperature is key to soaking your paper and bath water gets cold quickly.
• You need to buy extra wallpaper...not just because that "double roll" forces you to buy one more roll than necessary, but because you will probably use an entire roll finessing the first run of paper.
• First dip your paper in a bath of water, then fold on oneself to activate the glue.  Who knew?  Thank you You Tube...we would have wasted two rolls if we didn't look this up.
• Patterned wallpaper wastes a lot of paper matching itself up.
• Start with a wall that will be mostly covered...practice makes perfect.  Scratch that, practice makes "not too bad."

So, all that work, and I actually am kind of fond of it even though the entire process sucked and took almost 12 hours to do.  As for my sister...she will no longer sleep in the room because she said it makes her dizzy.  I guess when it comes to wallpaper, it's a love/hate thing!

Change the First Impression - In Less Than an Hour!

My first impression of the first house we bought: "Wow! What a great entry!" Of our second (floating) home: "Wow! What a great view!" Of the third home: "Wow! What a lot!" And of our current home: "Wow! You have no idea how nice this house is until you get inside..."

Point to this little exercise? (No, not to tell you we've moved more times than an Army family.)  The point is, with all the homes we've ever bought, the first impression sealed the deal, with the exception of our current home.

That's not to say our house has no curb appeal.  In fact, when the tulips are in bloom, it's completely lovely, with a nice walkway, good lighting, and a nice garden off to the side... 

Our Springtime Blooms

...But it's just not as lovely as it should be.  So, for the past couple months, I have been trying to think of ways to bring it all together. Then, while scanning through Pinterest one day, it hit me! PAINT THE FRONT DOOR!

 

You know, sometimes the answer to a design isn't so obvious.  The obvious design problems are as follows: lime green paint, orange shag carpet, weeds in the garden.

Usually, however, the design problem can not be explained, and my theory is, it's because it wasn't that hideous to begin with.  In this case, the door color (just a plain wood) was just fine.  Fine, but not awesome!

I have to admit my husband thought I was crazy when I showed him the quart of black...totally black...paint.  I think he said, "Really?  You want to paint our stained wood door, black?"  And I believe my response was, "Honey, it's just paint."  It's a good thing I'm usually right...

 

So, out came the paint brushes and black paint, and in came a home with a whole new personality.  You may be asking at this point, "Where did you come up with the idea to use black?"  Well, that was the hard part.  I went down and snagged one of those free color charts from Home Depot with exterior paint ideas.  I found color combinations that used colors already on the house.  Given the colors on the house, the complementary colors were as follows: Forest Green, Brick Red, Burgundy Purple, or Black.  Always a minimalist, of course I chose the black, but in truth, I think that was actually a very non-traditional color choice!

The black also coordinated very well with some accessories I had bought and never used, including an antique pedestal turned lantern ($150 from Cricket on the Hearth in Redmond, OR), black twig house numbers ($3.99/ea from clearance at Pottery Barn), acorn door knocker ($35 from Bend Bungalow in Bend, OR), and an antique mail box from an antique show ($35).  Now all I need is a new door mat that looks like this...

After taking another look at it once the black door was painted, we decided that there wasn't enough black to tie it all in.  We thought about painting the Adirondack chairs black instead of antique white, but opted to paint the window trim, flag pole, and porch ledger black instead ("Gloss Black Universal Spray Paint 245196 (Set of 6)" (Google Affiliate Ad)).  Not realizing it at the time, but doing that really brought focus to the beautiful siding on the ceiling of the entry.

All and all, I wish I would have taken photos of the "before." I got so excited that I forgot and had to use the ones I happened to have on-hand.  The impact is undeniable.  So if you have $25 for paint and an hour, consider painting your front door...and going from "Blah" to "Ah ha!"

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Two Hour Paint Project

I was bored so I painted.  What a difference two hours and a quart of paint can make in a room!

Before: The Fireplace Overwhelmed the Wall

After: Cohesive and Unifed

Painted Pumpkins Are Less Messy

Because my son is only two, I can get away with not going ballistic for the holidays.  This means I don't have to jingle bells outside his window during Christmas, I don't have to have 20 kids over for his birthday yet, nor do I have to carve pumpkins.

Call me a buzz kill if you must, but I actually hate carving pumpkins.  It's messy, gooey, and I have to clean up dried pumpkin off the floor for weeks.  Plus, the pumpkins always seem to rot pre-Halloween, and then I have a big orange stain on the cement outside my door.

So, this year, we decided to "paint" pumpkins instead of carve them.  It was cleaner, more fun, and a lot less messy.  We got the idea from Country Living and Family Circle. 

We started out our pumpkin painting day as we do with so many events: with wine, cheese, olives, and fruit on the back deck.

I painted the front and back of my pumpkins so I could enjoy the view of them from both sides

This was inspired by the creepy Raven poem (Edger Allen Poe, I think?)

This is my son's pumpkin.  He's already an artist!

My husband--a huge Oregon Duck's Fan--painted his pumpkin green.  Then he put glittery gems in the shape of an "O" on it.  It reminds me of Emerald City in the Wizard of Oz.

My sister painted a creepy brown recluse on one side, and painted the backside black then carved out another web.

An easy idea for the non-artistic.  All you need is a white pumpkin and black paint.

Related articles

• Simple Pumpkin Painting (mamasbagoftricks.blogspot.com)
• Celebrity Pumpkin Carvings (perezhilton.com)
• Weekend Project: Create a painted pumpkin display (timesunion.com)