Mo’s Kitchen – Part 1

Every year the kids and I take a few weeks and drive to Utah to play with family. We send the boys to baseball camp at BYU, play at my parents’ cabin, shop, camp and enjoy the cool nights! 
This year I had the special treat of getting to paint and decorate my sister’s kitchen! (We call her “Mo” after Mohanna in the old Johnnie Lingo movie. She seriously is a 10-cow woman!! If you haven’t seen Johnnie Lingo, check it out!)
Anyway, Mo’s kitchen hadn’t been painted since 1999! It was a creamy yellow and she wanted a farmhouse update! 
Before:

She wanted gray walls, and had painted her basement in Benjamin Moore’s Revere Pewter, but was worried that with all of her dark woods, Revere Pewter would look too beige. I agreed. 

So we tried some samples of Sherwin Williams’ Repose Gray, and Agreeable Gray. 

Design Tip: ALWAYS paint a few test samples to try in the room before you paint. Don’t just look at pics online to decide your color, and don’t try to evaluate how your entire room will look using the teeny tiny chip at the paint store. Lighting, woodworking, and built-ins all factor into how the color will look on your walls! 

I buy the sample sizes and either paint a board to move around the room, or paint sample colors directly on the wall so I can evaluate what the color looks like in corners and next to permanent features. 

Our test samples in Mo’s kitchen were a lot darker than she wanted. She has a beautiful dark wood ceiling so dark paint would make the room feel smaller. We needed a warm light gray to keep a bright fresh feeling in the room.  
So we chose Agreeable Gray, and had the folks at Sherwin Williams lighten it by 75%. (Meaning, they only add 25% of the color to the can.)

That test proved to be too white, so we took the paint back and had them change it to 50%. 

This pic is Agreeable Gray, and the paint around it shows it lightened by 50%. (Meaning, they added 50% of the color to the can, making it 50% lighter.)

Armed with our Sure Line edging tools and paint brushes, we cranked up the music and began! 

The color was a perfect soft, calming and very subtle gray that brightened the room and made it feel fresh! We were thrilled! 

While we painted, we danced, giggled and even cried a little! We solved the world’s problems while we worked, and I just loved spending so much time with that incredible girl! 

I’m so excited to share the results!!