Seeing Red

Wow feels like forever since I've posted anything. I blame the holidays and the fact that we've been mid-project since December so there just hasn't been a whole lot of anything worth sharing (we are working on completely redecorating our master bedroom and bathroom, and it's been a months-long process). But today I wanted to share some pictures of a super simple, easy update in our kitchen that makes me super happy.

See, we've had this ugly knife-block for years.

I never really enjoyed the way it looked, espeically in our newly updated kitchen that makes the light wood stand out like a sore thumb (a really boring, sore thumb), but also never thought twice about doing anything with it or to it until Pinterest gave me a lightbulb moment... PAINT IT. Duh. After sufficiently face-palming over the fact that I had never thought of that on my own, I got to work thinking about what color to make that bad boy.  And in a risky move I went with....

RED.  Red definitely did not come to mind initially as a possible color choice.  My initial thoughts were colors that would be super matchy-matchy with the blue and brown tones. I was thinking deep, warm jewel tones like a nice forest green or eggplant purple.  Those would have been nice too, but also rather predictable and JCPenny-esque.  Red came to me as an idea after I randomly happened to notice the small pops of red that were already in place in the kitchen and living room...

My brain tends to yell 'MERICA everytime I think of red and blue together, which is partially why I never thought of red in the first place, but I realized that the lighter, non-'MERICA shade of blue in the kitchen and living room did not paint quite as patriotric of a picture when paired with the red as I had feared. Rather, it's a super fun, funky and unexpected pop of color in an otherwise low-key space.  I love it. Particularly because it then inspired this...

This came to be in a really random way.  As you saw above, the umbrella picture was always there (and played a big role in motivating me to go red with the knife block).  Then, while hunting through a basket of stuff in our yet-to-be-unpacked "office," I found that boat print, which is actually a card Phil got me for our anniversary last year.  I thought it was an awesome card and noticed immediately that the red flags matched the red umbrella almost perfectly.  Another lightbulb went off in my head (my head was getting pretty bright by now), and I knew it needed to join the umbrella picture in the kitchen.  Initially I stuck it on the wall unframed, but quickly realized that looked way too random and unfinished. Then yet another lightbulb went off (you might want to grab your sunglasses at this point) and I remembered we had a gorgeous red frame sitting unused in the basement.  Bada bing bada boom, we now have even more awesomely funky red pops in the kitchen that make the knife block seem totally not random and it all just makes sense now. And I love it! Oh and in addition to the sentiment of the boat card Phil got me, that umbrella picture is very sentimental as well.  Phil bought me that print when he visited Paris with his family a looong time ago, back before we were even dating (back during the time when we were really good friends, and knew we were head over heels in love with each other, but kept fervently denying it to ourselves. And each other. And our friends. And our significant others at the time. Yikes. Let's not go there).  So not only does the red = super funky and awesome color pop, but that little corner of the kitchen is now also full of sentimentality and warm fuzzy feelings of love.

See how well the red ties together now? Now if only I had some less boring, fugly kitchen towels. It's on the to-do list, I promise.

So there you have it. This update cost me a whopping $0, given that we already owned the frame and the card and the knife block.  The red paint was lovingly offered up by my friend Megan who made the mistake of buying a gallon of paint for her fully-windowed french door (and therefore had ample leftovers to share). 

Lesson(s) Learned: Don't be afraid to go bold with colors! Especially in a more neutral space, unexpected color pops can turn your place from drab and nothing special to super unique and fun and YOU.  And as with most house projects, patience is a virtue.  Take some time between your lightbulb moment and actually executing a project... you never know what kind of awesome inspiration might come your way during that period of time!

This post reminded me that I haven't shared the befores and afters of our kitchen yet! You've seen some hints of the "after," but I'll have to show you the before as soon as our kitchen is clean enough that I can take some more pictures of it. Don't hold your breath.... but I do have yet another chapter in the Book of Red to share very soon. Get excited.