Living Room: before and after

It's been about a month and a half since we started working on the living room. We started with the popcorn ceilings and painting the beams. Since that was mostly my project, Elliott decided to take down the wallpaper and try to fill in the paneling. After talking to a friend who had a similar room makeover, we decided it was best to hire someone to do this job! It took a long weekend to finish the walls and the poor guy had to practically redo the whole bottom half. Luckily Elliott payed attention to his technique because he had to make a few repairs himself. When we primed, we encountered some "bubbles" so Elliott basically had to start from scratch to patch a few spots. We finished the trim and painted the walls and just when I thought we were going to put our house back together, we started ripping up carpet! That was the next task on our list but we are having a little party here tomorrow so I wasn't anticipating starting another project so soon! Laying wood floors was pretty much Elliott's job and he did most of it during the week while I was at work. We decided to only do the living room, hall, foyer, and dining room (yes, we had carpet in our dining room! gross!) for now and tackle the bedrooms after the party.  I contributed by painting the shoe molding and cleaning top to bottom before bringing back the furniture! My favorite part, of course, is arranging the furniture and hanging curtains and pictures (or asking E to hang curtain rods and picture hooks which is literally his LEAST favorite thing to do). Oh we make such a great team ;)
ok ok so here are some pics...beware

 large wall- chair rail separated exposed paneling from wallpaper

same wall-chair rail and wallpaper removed, beams/trim primed

same wall-paneling covered/textured

same wall-primed, paint going on!

AFTER!! (still a bit unorganized)

backdoor/laundry room door BEFORE

backdoor/laundry room door AFTER!

FINAL

no window treatment yet, still bringing in furniture and getting things on the walls!

We painted the walls Benjamin Moore Edgecomb Gray. It's the same color as the hall, guest bedrooms, and eventually kitchen when we tackle that! It's a great neutral and the front rooms (foyer, dining room, and keeping room) are all a blue gray so it blends well. The floors don't show much in these pictures but they are 100% better than carpet! I've never been more thankful for wood flooring! And just as a little treat, this is what was under the carpet...

some very very old school linoleum!

Even though our house is old, it feels so new and clean! After we get through this birthday weekend we'll catch our breath and finish up floors so we can start on the kitchen and bathrooms!

And we have these to thank for helping us get through it all...

(and to help celebrate E's bday) Have you had them? They are great!