hallway reveal.

The time has come. I know you have been holding your breath! :) I got inspiration from these two lovely ladies.  Heather from http://www.blessedlittlenest.com/ and Sara from http://www.sara-mincy.blogspot.com/ . I love both of these blogs and always come away feeling refreshed and inspired. They are both simple and lovely. Two of my favorite things. Remember this is how the hallway looked before our mini makeover....

I have always wanted to do this to one of the walls in my home. And since I saw Sara's I knew I would be just waiting for the right place to apply it in our home. I even told her so.  While I love this mirror and I liked it in the hallway it always posed a problem when I was choosing an outfit in the morning. Because it is in the hallway, I would have to fully dress before I could decide if I liked a certain part of my outfit, since this hallway is right off of our living room and kitchen. With growing boys around it is not appropriate for me to come out half dressed to see if I am diggin a pair of pants. My boys do not enjoy seeing their mother in a bra. Understandable. So, this mirror needed to move into our bedroom, where it has. This left a fabulous blank wall. I was growing tired of the stripes, they have been there for many years. I was also itching to have some kind of colored wall. While we have a lot of color in our home, almost all of our walls are white. Not anymore. Here is our Book Wall!!

Isn't it fabulous!! Not really a ?, we love it. Every time I see it, I smile. I love this wall!  Now, I am not the first to do this. But we did take the idea and make it our own. WorkinMan and I work very well together on projects like this. He is very open with letting me try just about anything in our home. And he will always help and usually do the brunt of the hard work. You know math, power tools, measuring, all the stuff I don't enjoy. :)  I showed him pictures of book walls that I liked and we discussed how we could do this with all the supplies found here at home. We heart free.  He said that we had some of the old barn wood from my parents cabin left over and that he could make the narrow shelves with those. I thought that was an amazing idea. I love the look and feel of this wood. So rustic.

He cut them to size and also notched a large area in the back for the books to sit and lean and not slide off. So there is a lip at the top. As I said, I wanted to add some color and had seen where Heather had done a wall of colored chalk board paint in her home. I put that in the back of my mind and knew I would try it somewhere in our home. This was the perfect spot to add a bit of color on the wall, but not too much.  It seems that while I love color, I don't like it on the walls in my home. I get tired of it too fast. So adding color to my accessories and fabrics is perfect for me. 
I painted the wall with Rustomeum Tintable Chalkboard Paint in Fresco Red. This was the first time I used this product and thought it was great. I found mine at Home Depot for about $12.

I love the matte look of this red. Red is a little overpowering for me when it has too much sheen. So this having the chalky look of a chalkboard is perfect for me. The boys love this wall! They have been drawing, and reading, and rearranging books. Lots of fun!

The sign at the top says "Never Enough Books." It is perfect for this spot. It was bought by my mom in a little shop on the North Shore for OldestBoy but he kindly donated it to the book wall for us all to enjoy! Thanks Buddy!

On the top shelf I have put a few of my books from my childhood. OldestBoy and SportsBoy can reach them but not Baby. Perfect.
This project was a lot of fun! Tons of props to WorkinMan! He really did all the work, I just did the fun stuff. I am totally spoiled with him around. He likes to make and build things and came up with an awesome idea for this Book Wall!!  We love the shelves, the colors and most of all that all of our favorite books can be seen everyday. I am excited to change the books seasonally, or for holidays. Love books!

Thanks for stoppin by!

Little Mama.

P.S.
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