Thursday, June 18, 2009

How I Crossed Over to the Dark Side

I know I said I'm a trendsetter, but this is one trend I'm a bit late on. I read a lot of decorating blogs and it seems everyone is grabbing up old furniture and painting it black. Just look how darling black and white can be:

bathrooms (this might have been where I started sweating b/c I NEED some black in my house!)

I'm loving the black and white.
But here's the thing. My husband sort of thinks there is something really wrong with painting wood. If we found an old table at a yard sale, he would want to sand it down and stain it....NOT paint it. He loves to work with wood and has built me furniture over the years. I agree that wood is beautiful., but how am I gonna get me some black and white in this house?

Plus, it doesn't really GO with my house. I always lean to deep red. Maroon. Ruby. Garnet. It's all over my house and I don't even remember how it got here.

That happened to me at the old house with blue and yellow. One day I looked around and nearly every room had blue and yellow in it.

And then it hit me.

The homeschool room!

When we originally moved in, that room was going to be a home office for my husband, who was part-time youth minister at our church at the time and really needed a place to work. (He still needs a place to work but there are no more places.) I started getting black accessories, mainly inspired by some curtains I had seen in a magazine. I made those curtains out of muslin and black ribbon.
I can't believe that's the best picture I have of them.

And I got my beloved black shelves from IKEA.

And I bought a black trash can. And spray painted some baskets black to go in the shelves.

And THEN.....we turned that room into our classroom. So, you already have black in the homeschool room, right Brenda?

Right.

So what's missing?

FABRIC!!! PATTERN!!!

See, I was making a male office. It was plain. Sterile. (read: boring). But now that it's a classroom, and I find myself in there several hours a day......

...shouldn't it be fabulous?

I think so too. I'll share more of the dark side when I get it done!

5 comments:

  1. pretty amazing! just last fall i took my parents old rockers that i grew up with and (gasp!) spray painted them black. same with a little shelf in my living room, a basket and a bunch of old frames (hung a bunch of black and white photos in them). who knew i was cool?!

    you go girl with that school room!

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  2. I think some red would look real good in there. Looking forward to learning more about the Dark Side. LOL

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  3. Haha I agree with your husband about wood furniture. I think it's criminal to waste good, beautiful timber by painting it. LOL.

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  4. I was JUST looking at those pictures on Nester yesterday adoring the bathroom thinking I needed more black in my home---this must be a sign!

    Many blessings...

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  5. YAY for the dark side!! You're too cute, Brenda.

    S will get used to the painted wood. Maybe you should remind him that if you paint it black and he doesn't like it, he can always sand it down and re-stain it.

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I don't get to talk to a lot of actual grown-ups during the day, so your comments make me really happy! :)