I spent this weekend in a haze of paint fumes.

This color sort of freaks me out.

The boy and I finished approximately half of our painterly adventures. For the bathroom, we applied three coats of this wacky dreamsicle orange. For the accent pillars in the kitchen, main room, and bedroom we went with a deep rich blue.

The deep blue we'd planned on; the dreamsicle orange just sort of happened on the spot in Home Depot. We were down to between a woodsy green and seafoam/minty color. We assigned 1 to the green and 2 to the seafoam and said on the count of three to throw out the color that we liked. I threw 1; he threw 2. So we went back to the drawing board and within five minutes had picked out this color, "Marmalade" and hence forth there was no going back. We wanted crazy for the bathroom, we got crazy for the bathroom.

To be fair, the blue wasn't exactly a conservative choice either. I knew I wanted something a little stormy that would compliment a light grey. I also wanted a really vibrant, solid hue that would stand out and attract the eye. Despite having some initial reservations ("oh my god, it's so... blue"), I'm really delighted with how it turned out.

The rest of the kitchen will be in the medium blue that's swatched on the wall.

Bedroom

Here you can see both pillars in the living room and kitchen.
More importantly, you can also see some of the awesome huge cactus that we purchased on impulse.

Lessons learned thus far in painting:

• Unless you are really really set on a specific color, it's a good idea to get samples and throw them up on your walls/contemplate them. We changed our mind a couple of times after seeing the colors actually on the walls.
• Don't skimp on the paint, both in quality and quantity. We went with Behr's ultra premium for the blue and Behr's erm, not ultra premium for the orange. Ultra was $6 extra/gallon and required barely even two coats; the other needed three thick ones, which warranted another hour of work. I think that when it comes to paint, you end up getting what you pay for.
• If you're using a brand new foam roller, run a lint roller over it a few times to remove fuzz that would otherwise end up in your paint.
• Use tape. I'm not really sure why the guy at Home Depot told us we wouldn't need any...perhaps he thought we were modern-day Michelangelos. Even if we are able to craft perfectly straight lines....tape still just makes everything faster and less nerve wracking.
• Use the blue kind, not the masking tape. Neither is perfect but the blue one's better.
• Peel off the tape approximately 15 minutes after applying your last coat. When pulling it off, try to aim for a 45 degree angle.
• Take breaks early and often. Give your brain and arms sometime to recover between layers. We motivated/rewarded ourselves with Italian ice, Breaking Bad (aside: this season is bat shit crazy), and Thai food.
• If person A is handling edges with a brush and person B is using a roller to get most of the color on the wall, have person B follow person A's "path" across the room. Don't let A's paint get to a semi-dry state where B's work will create weird textures, or vice versa.
• Remember to have fun. Life's too short to be fretting over the right color or shade forever and ever. Unless you're living in the home that you plan to be in for a very long time... then I guess it's ok to fret forever. But really, the worst that could happen is that you just go buy some more paint and do it all again. 

Next weekend will be the kitchen (medium blue) and all the rest of the walls (light grey). More paint-fume-induced wisdom to come.