Craft Studio Wall Color - Robin's Egg Blue

Hi, I happened on to your site and love it! I have been looking everywhere for a robin egg blue paint and have many samples on my wall but not one is the "right" one. I am wondering if you could tell me the name of your robin egg blue? Also the red for the cupboards? Absolulty love them- I am a red fan and boy those cupboards look great? ~J.

Hi J.!

Thank you for visiting my blog and dropping me a note - I love "meeting" my visitors!

I actually mixed the robin's egg blue myself. I had a couple of Martha Stewart shades of green and blue on hand, plus some white and a little black, and I just mixed until I found the shade I was looking for. I painted a sample and had it color matched at Lowes and it was perfect! I'll give you the formula/code that is printed on the top of the can and hopefully they will be able to mix it for you, too. Keep in mind that every paint mixing machine at hardware stores is slightly different - they don't all have the exact calibration, even within the same store. So your color may not be *exactly* what my color is, but really close. Also, if you have paint mixed on one machine and need to go back for more, make sure they use the same machine.



This is what it says at the top of my can:

Manual Dispense
107-17.5
101-13
103-10.5
Valspar Eggshell Base 1

As for the red, I posted just this morning about this very question...feel free to check it out here! If you have any other questions, please let me know and I'll be happy to help!

~Kim

Kitchen Cabinet Color

Hi Kim,

I stumbled across your site today and love your cabinets! Do you mind telling me what color you used? We are about to redo our 1970's kitchen and I love yours!!!

Thanks so much,
~S.


S., This may be the most asked question I receive in my emailbox:) There is just something about red! The red paint color is from the Waverly line and it's called "Cherry"
in the satin finish. The off white interior and basecoat color (also a satin finish) is
called "Homestead Resort Parlor Taupe". At one time, it was part of the "American Tradition" line of paint but I believe it is now called "Valspar". I bought both these paint colors from Lowes.

Kitchen Curtains

Hi Kim

Oh my gosh!!! I love what you did to your kitchen!! I too love reds! I think it is wonderful that you are able to make a room look so lovely and spend so little. I was wondering if you could tell me where you bought the kitchen curtains. They are darling!!

~G.

Hi G.!

Would you believe that the curtains above my kitchen window actually aren't curtains at all! They are actually pillow cases that I found at my local Goodwill. I discovered that they were just the right length for our kitchen sink window and I hung them using curtain rings with clips. New sew!

At one time, the curtains that I had in the dining room were just queen sized sheets hung with ringed clips as well. I've since moved them to my living room and now have linen curtains in the dining room. I purchased the linen curtains on Ebay, new in their packages, a panel at a time until I had four panels. They originally came from West Elm but I only paid a fraction of the cost!

Kitchen Island Paint Process

First let me say I love your kitchen!! I am a sucker for red anyway! Thats all my accent colors through my house..although mine is tradtional I have always loved the cottage look! My question is. We are putting in a new countertop and building a island. I was wondering how you painted yours..what color you used and how you did the glaze? It was either go black or white glazed..I am leaning toward white..any info would be great!
~P.

Hi there, P.,

Yes, I do love red, too! Always good to hear from another red lover!

I wish I could give you some info on my island but I actually bought it just the way it is and didn't paint it myself. I'm not exactly sure what was done by the furniture crafter, but it looks like a flat, cream color paint was first used and then it looks like the island was glazed with a dark brown glaze. With the excess glaze wiped off, the cream paint takes on an a darker, aged appearance.You may want to try this on some test boards and see what you think.

~Kim

Painted Subfloors

Hi Kim,

I have been searching thru your blog trying to find out how you prepped your floors to paint them, but couldn’t find it. My husband and I want to do the same in our kitchen, dining room, hallway and bathroom. Did you fill nail holes and seams between the plywood boards?

~J.

Hi J.!

You know, because this was what we thought would be a very temporary floor solution, I did not take the time to fill nail holes and caulk the seams. In hindsight, and because we *still* have our painted subfloor (much longer than we expected), I would advise caulking the seams for a nice, smooth look. I would check with a paint professional at your hardware store and ask what caulk they recommend. As far as the nail holes go, usually the heads of the nails used for subflooring are quite large and unless they are deeply set into the plywood, I don't know if they are really fillable. The nails in my subfloor were pretty much flush with the surface. I just painted right over them and don't even see them.





I've used oil based porch paint for one bedroom in my home (after priming with an oil-based primer), but for the rest of the house, I used latex primer and paint. The oil based porch paint is preferrable in my opinion because it dries much harder and is definitely more durable. I was reluctant to use it in the rest of the house because it does take a while to dry and with kids and pets, there was no way we could stay out of the living room and kitchen for the duration of the drying and curing process, not to mention that there are more fumes with oil based products.

~Kim

Painting Brass Headboard

Hello there!
I just bought an old ugly brass headboard off of Craigslist
and have dreams of painting it. I searched the
internet & found your " Buh-Bye Brass Headboard - You've Been
De-Blinged" post! Absolutely wonderful!

Anyways, question....do you have to sand it at all before hand? I found
numerous posts that suggested it... but dread the thought. I hope not!

~C.



Hi there C.!

Hmm, hehe, how to give you the bad news....I did sand my headboard. But all you have to do is just scruff it up a little to give the paint something to adhere to. You don't have to sand the brass down to bare metal. Not at all. Just "scrub" it with some sanding paper like you were scrubbing a pot or a bathtub. Then you can clean it off and spray it with canned primer. After the primer is dry (I would wait a day just to make sure it has set up and cured), you can then paint. Spray paint is the easiest and leaves a nice smooth coat though you can certainly brush the paint on. I used a satin finish, I believe.



I hope this helps - let me know how it turns out...I love to see photos!

~Kim

Craft Studio Ceiling Makeover

Kim,

I stumbled upon your post today of the (craft studio) ceiling makeover and loved your idea for the skylights. I have the exact same situation in my master bedroom right now as our skylights were leaking so we took them out and replaced roof over them and have plywood staring at us now. I would love to implement your idea, could you give specific instructions as to what was done? Did you buy windows that matched the measurements? And did you just paint directly over the plywood? I'd love to know the specifics on how you accomplished it.

Thanks so much,
A.

Good morning, A. It took me a good long while to figure out what in the world we were going to do about the plywood "holes" that were left in my craft room when we removed our old skylights. Yes, I just painted directly on the plywood, priming first. To get the faux sky effect, I used a base coat of "bridal" blue (a very light blue), and then on top of that, I painted on robin's egg blue mixed with a bit of glaze. Lastly, I stippled on the clouds using white paint mixed with glaze, blending it into the blue a bit. It took a few layers of the white glaze.

The next step were the "windows". We didn't buy actual windows, but we made them ourselves. There is no glass. We just lined the perimeter of each square hole with trim pieces (4 total, cut to fit). You can also add another layer of slightly narrower trim right on top of the first layer to create a bit of a recess and to beef up the frame a bit.

Next we added the grid. Only three pieces of trim created the grid - one long piece attached vertically and then two smaller pieces placed horizontally at the center.

We primed and painted all of the trim pieces before nailing them in place because I didn't want to risk getting a lot of white paint on the faux sky. After the trim pieces were nailed in place, we caulked the seams, puttied the holes, and carefully painted a final coat of white.

For us, there was already some moulding around the outside edge of the window (the old skylight) itself, so we just left it and didn't have to add anymore, but you certainly could if you don't already have it.

Here is where we began:



And the result:

Cabinet Moulding

Where did you get those amazing moldings on your cabinets?! I'm totally inspired!!!

~E.

E., all of the moulding /trim pieces on our cabinets came from either Lowes or Home Depot. It took a bit of trial and error to add them as we had never done carpentry work like this before, but I think it was well worth the effort - much cheaper than replacing the cabinets! I think that if anyone doesn't want to spend thousands of dollars to replace their cabinets but doesn't feel comfortable adding trimwork themselves, they would still save tons of money by hiring a carpenter to do the work. (I think at one point I was wishing we had just hired someone, hehe!)

We started out with plain oak cabinets like this:



We added beadboard to the sides of the cabinets and then various moulding / trim pieces to the top and bottom:



This is what the cabinets looked like after during the priming stage:



And finally painted red:

Brick Paver Backsplash

Hi,
You'll never believe this, but the reason I came across your site was because I was looking for these exact pavers that you purchased at Lowes. I have had my eye on those for a couple of years to use when we remodled our bathroom. They were exactly what I was looking for and the price was great. Much to my disappointment, I went back to Lowes on Friday and to a different Lowes today only to find out that they no longer carry them. Even asked the sales associate if they had the name of the vender, no record of them left. So, I came home to begin my search on the internet - even checking Lowes web site to see if there might be some remaining trace of origin. I gave up hope and started checking site after site after site, and Lowe and behold I found your site. Can you imagine my surprise? You are my very last shred of hope. Can you tell me the name of the company that makes those pavers, do you remember? If you do, could you please get back to me and let me know. I would really appreciate it. ~T.

T. - I wish I could help you here. After our brick paver backsplash project was completed, I took the unused bricks back to Lowes. I poked around my garage today to see if I could find one of the empty brick boxes, but I must have thrown those out long ago. I haven't been to my local Lowes in a while but the next time I'm there, I'll check and see if maybe they still carry this line of reproduction brick pavers here. If so, I'll let you know what company makes them. If anyone else has any info about these bricks, please feel free to let us know. When I bought mine back in 2007, they were about .53 each.

Kitchen Furniture and Inspiration

Hi there,

Just discovered your blog today and love, love, love your beautiful kitchen. Where did you get that fantastic island? Where did you find all your beautiful inspiration pictures for your kitchen. You have done an excellent job in creating the feeling that those pictures invoke. Thank you.

M.G

Thanks, M.G!

We bought our kitchen island, dining room table, and a few other furniture pieces at the Nashville Flea Market from Fuzzot Furniture. They make their furniture from old architectural and house parts from 80-140 years old. The tops of my island and dining table were once was flooring! Fuzzot is out of Alabama but travels monthly to various flea markets to sell their creations.

As far as the kitchen inspiration photos (below), if you click on any of the photos, you will either be taken to the source of the photo or a link to the photo will appear.

I find inspiration in general from just about anywhere and everywhere! I love the Cottage Living, Country Living, and Country Home magazines as well as visiting inspirational cottage style blogs. I particularly love the romantic and simple style of some Swedish bloggers such as this one (my favorite!).

~Kim