step right in.

Thought I would "welcome" you into our home by showing what we've done to the entry way.  Luckily, most of the trim in this 1976ish house is painted white.  I looove white trim.  You always know that any paint color will look good up against it and it looks so crisp.

I remember one summer when my mom painted all the trim in our house white.  Luckily, at that time, she didn't trust me with a paint brush so I didn't have to take part in that white washing.  However, I remember it taking most of the summer - removing, sanding, priming, painting and putting it all back.  But, man, what a difference it made.

We do not have any windows around our front door, so the entry way can look very dark.  The front door was dark wood, plus the closet doors were wood as well.

Plus, the lovely brass and plastic overhead light had to go.

Luckily, since we know the previous owners who painted the trim, we knew which kind and color of paint to use.  Enter the trusty can of white(ish) paint.  My favorite paint is Benjamin Moore and we used  this semi-gloss trim paint in "dove white" for the front door and closet doors.  I painted the walls "annonymous" in Behr flat paint from Home Depot.  We also made a new coat rack using left over bead-board from our laundry room project (to be posted later).  Voila!

One of the easiest ways to update an older home to your style is to change the hardware.  Got these brushed nickel knobs at Home Depot.

And this new front door handle and deadbolt.

We made the coat rack by nailing bead board to the wall, caulking the edges, adding a 1x4 and then these awesome coat hangers from IKEA.  Please ignore the unfinished wall in the background.

We also got this light from IKEA which looks like frosty glass but it's really plastic.  I think it was only $30-$40 and makes a big impact.

Even though we've been married almost 3 years, we still hadn't ordered any wedding pictures because we didn't have any place to put them in our tiny rental.  So, on our trip to IKEA we loaded up on picture frames and finally ordered our fabulous wedding pics taken by my 5th grade boyfriend Jeremy Arnold.  We also got a floating shelf from IKEA ($40) and then added one of our center piece wine bottles from our wedding.

I'm very pleased with this transformation.  It's definitely my style now and makes a statement that I love.

Come and knock on our door... we've been waiting for you!