Thursday, November 1, 2007

Willkommen, bienvenue, welcome!

Well, golly, who would have thought that so many of you would want to see my polka dot bathroom? But here it is, by popular demand:
I got very tired of living in homes with white walls, and although a lot of my friends have homes that are just lovely in shades of beige and offwhite, I like a little color in my world. OK, a lot of color. We have painted nearly every room in this house since moving in. So while we're at it, let me take you for a little tour of the Crayola box that is my home. This purple is the playroom. The walls are decorated with a poster from our first Mardi Gras here (2005) and feathered masks bought cheaply in the French Quarter. I love it.Our living room and kitchen are this shade of green. (the painting was also bought in the French Quarter. We couldn't quite afford a Michalopoulous but this imitation I bought off the fence of Jackson Square makes me happy all the same) I wanted red, but my husband voted green, and he won. I hated it when I started painting it, but love it now. It's very relaxing, and goes very nicely with the navy blue wall we have by our fire place:

This yellow is our kitchen nook... bright and sunny for the grumpy Mommy in the morning. (the polka dot bathroom is off of the kitchen, and the dots are the blue, green and yellow that are found in the living/eating areas of the house)We get tons of compliments on the red in our guest bedroom. Hot Apple Spice. Yummy.Forest Green for our office. It can get a bit cave like in there at night. My husband likes it that way.MQ's bedroom was this pale yellow when we moved in. I stuck these little wooden bugs to the wall with poster putty. I bought them for a quarter each. The room also has dragonflies and butterflies, and when I want to redecorate, I'll just pull them down. My husband says I'm going to be known as the lady who sticks strange things to her walls. I'm OK with that.MQ's bathroom - blue with brightly colored fish. Oh, and sharks.
Our bedroom is the same color blue (I just used the leftovers for MQ's bath!) Along the ceiling I attached a wave of stones with poster putty - interspersing them with dried sea stars. It looks really cool, if I do say so myself.

The master bathroom continues the theme, only in green.
So there you have it, a tour of most of my home. Well, the paint, anyways.

43 comments:

Chaotic Joy said...

Your home is really awesome, I LOVE how it is so colorful and reflective of your personality. But it's the polka-dotted bathroom with the striped shower curtain really rocks my world. How did you do that? Did you use a stamp? Stencil? You must share.

thailandchani said...

Oh, I really like all that color! Definitely! One day if I ever own my own house/condo/whatever, I want to fill it with color.

the dragonfly said...

I do so love all the color in your house. Actually, I love your house. I fell in love with it when I saw the red front door. :)

painted maypole said...

I debate all sorts of ways to do the dots before coming up with the perfect solution. Here is the secret to the polka dots: paint removable contact paper. cut out the dots using a die cut machine (a large round paper punch would work as well). stick dots to wall like stickers (you can even pull them off and replace them if you don't like the positioning). Enjoy!

Victoria said...

The dots are awesome!

painted maypole said...

p.s. the dragonfly used this same technique but cut out stars for the Little Mister's bedroom. So cute.

Chrissy said...

I'm in love with those polka dots. I like the stones on the top of the wall, too. So creative! I really love how a room feels with a bright new coat of paint. Makes me want to go to Home Depot....

Julie Pippert said...

I love your bright colors!

We are the same here. :)

Julie
Using My Words

Amy said...

It's adorable! All of it. And the polka dots are a fantastic idea!

niobe said...

You are amazingly creative. The hot apple spice color is wonderful. And the polka dots even kind of match your blog template.

Jennifer said...

Bee-u-tee-ful!! I am swooning over the guest room color (LOVE!) and our family room and my home office are *just* the sage color of your kitchen. (Again with the LOVE!) I'd love to see more of the playroom -- it sounds fantastic too.

Quick note to Chaotic Joy: My youngest son has a polka dot bedroom. We made our own stencils out of a stiff plastic after tracing various circle sizes (from coffee cans to soup cans to soda cans) and then taping the stencils to the wall when painting. We did it all in random order and the dots are different colors. It wasn't "easy", but it wasn't too tough. And it looks great!

Blog Antagonist said...

Ohhhhh, I love color too. Unfortunately, my home is mostly decorated in ca. 1980 decor, thanks to the previous homeowners, whom, apparently, we unaware that wallpaper should not be applied over bare drywall.

And your idea with the poster putty was very inventive! I'm impressed.

Suz said...

I have a brown house (by preference). I love seeing what others have done with color ... fun, fun.

Beck said...

I LOVE all the colours in your house - beautiful!

Family Adventure said...

I like them all, but my favourites:

- the polka dots (lurve those, what a fabulous idea!! Do you have high ceilings? They look high)
- the red guest room
- the purple play room

Those are just my faves, but they all look great. In fact, the kitchen/living room green is lovely, too, now that I've had a second look. Oh, and your bedroom, too.

All right...I love them all. When can I move in?

Heidi

Anonymous said...

Lovely. I'm in an all white house now, but that will change. (Your green is the color I used to have in my kitchen. I loved it.)

Rima said...

This post makes me want to take up a paintbrush! We have some color in our house (a cranberry red bedroom!), but it doesn't begin to approach the loveliness that is the House of Maypole.

I must say, though, that when we bought the place, the living room was lemon yellow and, despite the fact that I thought it would serve to cheer me up during a long cold winter, it did the opposite. Made me kind of batty, so we did paint that room a neutral beige.

Jen said...

See, I knew I liked you. Color is so important in a home.

painted maypole said...

BA - our home had wallpaper applied over drywall in all of our bathrooms and the kitchen, which we learned the hard way (peeling the paper and half the wall, too). This is apparently the way that builders save money these days. I am more than a little peeved. Rather than redoing the whole wall, we have painted over wallpaper in these places (most of it was painted over before we even got here). Not the best way to do it, but better than leaving the ugly wallpaper...or the half torn up wall. Sigh.

Unknown said...

cool, with poster putty? My husband's gonna kill me if I start up with that...what fun, though!

blooming desertpea said...

You've got a great home. I wish I was that bold to paint the walls with different colors. Then again, I already feel bold putting navy blue carpet into the kids rooms ...

Run ANC said...

I hate white walls too.

I need something like poster putty for the baby's room, but have had no luck. Where did you find it?

Kat said...

You've got great style! I love color too. When my hubby and I moved into our house every room was off-white. Blahhhh. Now our kitchen is terra cotta, our dining room looks like cream coffee, our bedroom is a mossy green, the boys' room is light blue, the upstairs bathroom is a suede brown, and the baby's room in yellow. The only thing we left off-white is the hallway and our living room (which we will probably change too).
Oh, and I love the polka dots!

painted maypole said...

NoMo- poster putty can be found at walmart, Kmart, Michaels....

flutter said...

I require your bathroom, thank you, that is all.

carrie said...

I love it, all of it! And I am so happy to see that I am not the only one with color on my walls (and I do not count "beige" as a color!)!

Heidi Hyde said...

Love it! So cute.

-HH

Candygirlflies said...

Okay, so now we have ANOTHER thing in common, PM... I am a chronically addicted house-painter. When I ran out of rooms here, I started painting for friends...

Love your colour choices. Esp the playroom purple. I did a gorgeous lilac colour in a guest room (now Child Number One's room), and my husband thought I was nuts to try it. But, it turned out just beautifully, and the colour mellows so nicely as the light in the room changes...

And your decorative touches?! Fantastic.

xo CGF

MamaGeek @ Works For Us said...

Wow, I feel like I'm looking at a Better Homes and Garden website with those rooms! My husband would just faint if I was so bold! Kudos!!

Mary Beth said...

I love the colors and every house should have yellow somewhere in the kitchen. It is such a cheery color and, in my family, the first place everyone heads when they come over.

I am in awe of the stones along the tops of the walls. I have tons of those left over from teaching kindergarten, where they made wonderful counters, and I am inspired to decorate my room. Now all I need is my landlord's approval:)

soccer mom in denial said...

Oh of course you would have a Michalopoulous-like print! We have a print (not a painting) of a NOLA home in our stairwell. He used to have a gallery in our capital city and still paints buildings typical to here.

So when we are rich (hahahahaha) we plan on buying actual paintings - one of NOLA and one of here.

But yet another reason why I like you....

Helen/Spike and Drusilla OK Citizens said...

I hate white/off white/beige walls too. Since I have always lived in rented apts/houses white/beige is the general ccolor scheme. I love all your colors especially the apple spice.

Unknown said...

Love them all!

We have this many white walls in our house:

Zero.

Catherine said...

Hey, you're very talented! Let me know when you want to tackle my house...
catherine

Anonymous said...

Oh pretty! I love the red! It's fabulous!

Aliki2006 said...

I love all the color, and I truly LOVE the ladybugs! I'm with you--plain is boring, and colorful, decorated walls are the best.

Magpie said...

I love your house. I love the stones on the walls. It's cheerful and fun.

The ceiling fell down in our bathroom in the city. They fixed it, but didn't repaint. Instead of painting, I glued (glue, not poster putty!) old CDs on the ceiling - my silver cloud. They were all layered on one another, with the shiny side facing down. I'm sure the super had a cow when we moved out.

thirtysomething said...

Love this!

Mad said...

We too live in a box of crayons. I wouldn't have it any other way. I LOVE your polka dot bathroom. MQ's playroom is the same colour as my living room.

Christine said...

i love it!!! i also have every single room in my house painted a different color from green, to yellow, to orange, to red, to brown. . .

b*babbler said...

I love the colours in your house, but definitely adore the bathroom!

Amy Y said...

Love, love, love it!! Want to come help me do mine? Or at least help me find cool colors?

Flower Child said...

I love this! I love colorful walls - alas the husband doesn't share my feelings. We've got color but nothing like the Apple Spice - I will do that in the kitchen. So beautiful!