How to transform your home with paint.

Do you want to know how to transform your home with paint? When Monte and I built our first house in 1994 we were on a very tight budget.

We had been living in a two bedroom single wide trailer. When we had our fourth son things got incredibly tight. We had all four boys in one bedroom for awhile. To make that work we invested in a bunkbed that was a double on the bottom and a single on top.

That took care of the three oldest boys and then the baby was in a crib in the room.

Designing our Home

When we finally took the plunge to build a home we sold the single wide and built in the existing location. This was long before we had internet and a computer. I hadn’t heard the word internet at this point. I knew what a computer was but not many people had them in their homes.

My point is there was no pinterest or etsy or IG or Facebook etc. I didn’t have cable either. There was one show I like to watch each day while my kids were napping. It was shot in Toronto called ‘City Line.’

If I remember correctly each day of the week had a focus. I think Thursday was home decor and DIY. A lot of their tutorials involved paint and painting techniques. Do you remember rag rolling or sponge painting? Wow. That’s a blast from the past.

I spent a lot of time looking through magazines and books with blueprints. Of course what I was drawn too was way more expensive then what we could afford. I started sketching out our house plans on quad paper.

Doing it Ourselves

We had our home framed and then we got busy doing a lot of the work ourselves. We did hire a plumber and my dad did the electrical so things were done to code which is important.

While we were building I dreamed of painting walls and doing painting techniques. This was my first time designing and creating.

I will admit it was a bit of a hot mess. It was definitely a learning process for me. We did all the drywall and painting which was a huge learning curve.

How to transform your home with paint

I fell in love with paint in this house. It was the first time I ever painted a wall that I can remember. Luckily I am a naturally good painter. Not sure how that happened but I’m grateful.

I loved bold dark colors at this point. Can you say 1990’s and forest green. Yup I painted that in my living room. This room had a vaulted ceiling. Not only did I paint the ceiling but I wrapped the paint onto the ceiling because we’d created a smooth surface border for this purpose. Classy I know.

I would be mortified to walk into that house now and see some of my design choices. If you’d like to see a few samples of my painting techniques check out this post. Sorry old school pictures so they’re poor quality. Hopefully the current owners have repaired some of the craziness.

But it was a learning process. The biggest thing I learned was how magical paint is. I did eventually change the hunter green to a rust color that worked with the couches I owned. I will never bring out a picture of those puppies because wow.

Why I think paint is magical

I remember rag rolling our basement because I wanted a different look and couldn’t afford anything else. I had the paint and a rag so it was free. It was an amazing way to transform my home with paint.

There are times now that I have a desire to change thing up and can’t afford to do what I want so I change the paint. It makes a huge difference without a huge investment.

Here’s some examples of how I transformed my home with paint

I can get bored with a bedroom or bathroom. Doing a quick paint overhaul makes such an improvement even if you can’t get to the bigger issues yet.

In my front entry I loved everything we did. The only issue was the huge exterior door. This poor door was boring and uninspiring. I would have loved something more flash and pretty but that wasn’t happening any time soon. On a whim I decided to paint it black with left over paint. It was a super quick evening project that made an enormous change to the space. And cost exactly $0 because I had all the supplies from a previous project.

I’m not afraid to paint anything

I don’t think there is anything I’m afraid to paint. If I had super ugly appliances and no money to update them I’d really consider painting them. Especially if I did a little research and saw that it worked. It may chip a bit and need touched up but I’d rather do that then live with orange gold appliances. (I used to have those in our trailer)

I am willing to paint all kinds of furniture. If by chance it’s an antique piece that is real wood I wouldn’t paint it to save the integrity of the piece. But that’s not usually the case for me.

These night stands were found on a 2nd hand sell app. They were inexpensive but ugly so a little paint makes a huge difference.

I would paint any wall and trim without thinking twice. Some things are so dirty, old and gross no amount of scrubbing will make them look great. This is a prime example. No amount of cleaning would salvage this space so I tackled it with paint. The window trim was painted then the wall and baseboards were also painted. A huge difference to a space.

Another thing I’ve consider painting

This is a no brainer but a little tricky. I’d happily paint dated cupboards to give them a fresh new look. Even if the style isn’t exactly what you want painting them makes such a huge difference in the look of the space.

I have painted some bathroom cupboards but never tackled a full kitchen. It is something I would be willing to do. I was close to painting them in our last house but we ended up moving so I saved myself on that one.

Painting the cupboards would be a huge project but definitely worth the money and time investment.

Even Painting Home Decor Items

There are times the paint on an item doesn’t look great. I found an amazing window pane but it was painted horribly. But I could see through the paint and was able to transform the window pane with some sanding and touch up paint to give it the rustic weathered look I was after.

Paint colors and where to buy paint

A few years ago I purchased a Benjamin Moore fan deck that has a plethora of colors. I’m drawn to their Historical Collection so I made sure to get the one with those color selections. It’s not expensive and nice to have on hand.

I always get my paint mixed at Home Depot. The closest Home Depot near me has an excellent paint expert who has helped me out a ton. They’ve had some great training and have lots of knowledge to lend a hand. Don’t be afraid to ask for advice.

Final Thoughts

Hopefully you’ve got excited about how to transform your home with paint and are ready to tackle a fun project. I always have extra paint on hand so it isn’t hard to tackle some of the smaller projects.

Paint is the easiest and cheapest way to make a beautiful change in your home.