We Put the "Multi" in Multi-Task

You know that we Rhynes are not satisfied unless we have several projects going at once, right? I'm not talking about doing dishes and laundry and vacuuming and cleaning up toys all at once, because that's all in a day's work. I'm talking about serious home improving, multiple-trips-to-Lowe's-taking, measure-twice-cut-once-ing, legitimate brainchild of Bob Vila crossed with Martha Stewart stuff. If you design it, Andy will build it (or he'll just design it and build it based on your rough idea, that works, too). If you say it can't be made, Katie will make it--no custom orders in this house! So amidst Andy's fence-stension project (post to come!) we decided to paint our front room...the piano room...the parlor? Do people still say parlor? It's the room connected to our entryway that houses a dainty desk for the computer, the baby grand piano (like you do), and that's pretty much it. The room, with the frosted glass panes on the windows (an Andy project: the windows don't open and we wanted to avoid sun damage to the piano) and the walls and the front door, was very...white. There was just too much blandy blandness happening there, so we decided to jazz things up with some PURPLE paint. Now, many of you would shy away from purple paint, thinking that it would feel like living in a grape, or that it would look like a little girl's bedroom, or that it would clash with the mahogany piano. We managed to surpass all these things and leapfrog straight to awesome. I hope you can feel the energy in this post, because I am in LOVE with the paint! I will forewarn you that it doesn't translate perfectly to pictures, so you are not getting the full effect, but I will post them here nonetheless. We painted the wall behind the piano and the half-wall that the staircase is on, and the adjacent walls are either a nice beige "macadamia" color, or white. After getting some serious painting done on Sunday night, I stripped the painter's tape off on Monday morning while Alton followed around behind me, collecting the sticky tape balls into one giant armload, which he carried around the downstairs like a teddy bear. He asked me to hold it for him while he took a drink from his cup. Adorable.