While we had that can of blue paint open... we kept going. First the mudroom closet, then the powder room vanity, now: the bookshelves! The bookshelves prompted a few little updates on this end of the living room.
Here's where we started when we first got the house. A sea of blue carpet (Kyle was taping off some potential furniture arrangements) and bookshelves on either side of the fireplace.
We couldn't do much moving before the floors were in, but we could move books, so the first thing we brought to the house were boxes and boxes of books for these shelves. They were in no particular order, which is sort of driving me crazy, but they were at least out of boxes. We also brought the mirror off Kyle's dresser and propped it up on the mantle.
Then we got floors and furniture and it was starting to look much more homey in here.
[Note: If I misled anyone earlier, I'm sorry. We did not DIY the floors. We decided to "do" the floors, in that we decided to pay for that right now. We bought our flooring from Lumber Liquidators and hired a flooring contractor to do installation. /end disclaimer]
See, so homey with the toys all over the floor and the Sunday afternoon nap going on.
Painting the bookshelves has been on our list for a while, so on Wednesday all the books came back down (still in no particular order) and more blue paint went up. We primed the walls first because the backs of the bookshelves were painted with the same semi gloss white paint as the trim and were pretty slick. Kyle did all the painting this time, getting the first coat up while Hamish and I were at church on Wednesday night.
I had to go to Home Depot and get more foam rollers for the primer, so while I was there I picked up mirror hanging hardware, so the mantle mirror would be more than just propped up. The hardware came in two pieces--a track for the wall and a bracket for the mirror itself. It was pretty simple to attach both pieces, and link the two brackets to hang the mirror.
Kyle finished the second coat of navy on the bookshelves on Thursday morning, and we got everything put back together yesterday.
I love the finished product so much! We think the navy is just right touch of color and depth behind the books.
Oh, and as an added awesome bonus? Kyle got the gas fireplace working! Now we can cozy up with a fire just in time for fall. I love our house.
Loverly!!!