After ripping up carpet on the main level, hauling out the fountain in the backyard, swapping out doors with new locks, replacing a leaky toilet with a new wax seal and installing all new appliances, Josh and I finally decided to actually settle into our new home. But the dust never really fully settled for the following 6-8 months. One of the first (and probably most important) rooms we decided to tackle was the bedroom. We figured it was the one room we could find to rest our heads after the long nights and weekends of work we had ahead of us. And thankfully, the bedroom was mostly cosmetic fixes.

The first thing we started with was removing wallpaper. A lot of people complain about this part, and yah it’s kind of a bitch, but in the grand scheme of things, the right products and tools can make all the difference! We used a wallpaper remover and a scraping knife and some other random drywall knives. The previous home owners had a real love for textured wallpaper which in some instances (like on our kitchen ceiling) is pretty rad, but the bedroom paper just had to go. The following weekend we sanded down the pine woodwork, removed window sashes (also sanded) took off doors, patched holes and gouges with drywall mud and gave everything a final prep for some fresh paint.

One of the bigger challenges we faced with this project was finding the right primer for the trim which Josh will talk more about in a follow-up post. We decided to spray the trim with a sprayer we borrowed from Josh’s boss. Spraying was kind of a no brainer for us since Josh has the experience and I really love the crisp finish sprayed paint can achieve. The room already had a chair rail, so we decided to roll with it and paint the walls with two colors. Olympus White by Sherwin Williams on the top and Naval also by Sherwin Williams on the bottom. We don’t get a ton of light in our bedroom which is why Naval practically looks like black (which was the intention).

Things I’d do differently next time:

1. Pick a different primer. (we’re currently experiencing some bleed through).

2. I would also be WAY more careful when handling window sashes. Unfortunately, I leaned all the sashes against our fence on a really windy day and the wind knocked a sash over and it shattered (not something you want to spend an extra $300.00 on amidst a budgeted project).

But overall, we’re really happy with the results. Following our quick 3 day bedroom makeover, we made a trip to IKEA and completely reorganized our closet shelving unit which we’ll chat about down the road. Stay tuned for a follow-up post where Josh talks all things paint.