Nursery Project: Painting and Re-Painting

As I mentioned before, we are preparing for the birth of our first child.  Since we are having a boy, Mr. C wanted to do the nursery using a New Orleans Saints theme.  He is a huge Saints fan.  To accomplish this, we wanted to paint the walls a brown color and accent the room with black and white.  The furniture is all black.

The crib was ordered from Babies R Us online.  It is the Tuscany crib in black by Storkcraft.  This is a 4 in 1 convertible crib, meaning it converts to a toddler bed, as well as a full size bed.  This crib comes in several other color options, but black worked best for the look we were trying to achieve.

While strolling through Ikea one day, we came across this dresser.  We purchased the Hemnes 3 drawer chest in black brown.  We plan to also use it as a changing table by adding a changing pad on top of it. 

Now here comes the fun part, painting the room.  When our house was built, all the walls were painted one color.  So, when we needed to set up the nursery, we knew we wanted to paint and go with a specific theme for the space.  Since we were painting while I was pregnant, I researched safe paint options for a pregnant lady.  According to my list of do's and don't's from my doctor's office, I can paint.  As long as it is not with an oil based product and the painting is done in a well ventilated area, it is safe. 

In my search for the right paint, I came across the Valspar Ultra Premium Interior paint in a satin finish.  This paint is low order and contains zero VOCs (Volatile Organic Compounds).

Here is the room all prepped and ready to be painted.

We initially chose a color called Amber Sienna.  When we selected the color, we looked at the color under the incandescent light simulator at Lowe's.  It seemed to fit our theme.  We did not bring the color home and paint a test square on our wall at home.  This is a big no-no, and you will see why.

We started painting with the Amber Sienna on a Friday afternoon.  As we were painting, Mr. C and I kept saying to each other that the color seemed more orange than we thought.  However, we kept painting thinking the color would darken as it dried.  As it got dark, we were no longer painting by the natural light, rather we began to paint by the light in the room.  The color still seemed off a bit.  So, we finished the entire first coat and decided to call it a night.  Mr. C had to work Saturday anyway, so we agreed to look at the paint job on Saturday and decide whether or not to move forward with the second coat on Saturday evening.

Here is the room before we went to bed Friday night.

Saturday morning came, and before Mr. C left for work, we just had to look at the room again.  It looked horrid!  The entire room was orange.  Worst of all the paint appeared streaky looking because apparently we painted better in natural light.  We decided we were truly unhappy with the color and we would try starting over when Mr. C returned from work. 

Here is what the room looked like in all it's orange glory.

Since we were starting over, we decided to do it right.  We would pick a few colors, get samples mixed and come home and paint sample squares on the wall.  Good thing we did that because a color named Coffee that we were certain would work, ended up looking like gray on the wall.  So, after conducting our color test, we decided on a color called Leather Satchel.

Saturday night, we went back to Lowe's to get the new color mixed.  We wanted to have all of our supplies so we could start painting right after church on Sunday morning.  As planned, Sunday morning, we started painting with the new color.  We completed all of the edges first and then moved on to rolling the paint onto the walls.

Here is a picture that shows the comparison between the first color and the second color.  On the left is the Amber Sienna, on the right and around the edges is the Leather Satchel color.  Much better!  I kept telling Mr. C that the new color looked like chocolate milk.

Here is what the new color looked like in the room.  This is exactly what we were going for and we love it.

And after a second coat...

Before I forget to share with you, here is a picture of the paint can. 

We were very satisfied with this paint.  We had two windows open, but honestly, you could not even smell this paint past the room we were painting.  We were quite impressed with the quality.  Time will tell if it holds up to our son's hand prints.