Final Colour Choices!

Brad and I have a system. I basically decorate and he trusts me entirely.
It's sweet. Kind of like him and our banking/financial planning. Say what? I know nothing about it. But he does, and I trust him.
But I do like to include him if he wants in... and though he's basically trusting and flexible, he likes to have a say in the paint colours. Fair enough, I say. But we have a system for that too.

I love it because it insures I still can stick with what I had planned for the decor, but he loves it because his opinions matter:
I choose several shades of a colour. Shades that may vary significantly, but ones that I feel similarly about. Then we talk them through together, and he gets the final say. I usually know what I want-ish but I need a second opinion, and whose matters more than the other person who will be living in the space? It works perfectly for us and it's how we chose the 7 colours in our current house and the 4 in our new house.

So earlier today I went on the Behr website to check out their colours. I had done so previously with Benjamin Moore, but our Home Depot doesn't sell BM paints, so there was really no point. Same colours and shades, but in the Behr line, later to be matched with CIL Smart Paint + Primer which costs a bit extra but has amazing coverage and saves you a layer of priming. The crazy thing about looking online is the drastic difference in person. I guess I should have assumed that, but I figured it's 2011 and technology is a good indicator of what a real life image looks like.... not even close. Most of the colours I chose online seemed shades darker or lighter or blue-r in person, so they were immediately out. Definitely go in with an open mind, because what you plan online may not be what you leave the hardware store with!

So, for the bathroom I'd thought Spirit Whisper or Celery Sprig
We went with Feldspar. It's actually the shade directly above Celery Sprig. The other choices were either too yellow or too beige or simply too dark.

For the bedroom I basically "narrowed" it down to every other blue/grey combo available, thinking it would be Rain Washed or Aqua Smoke or Water Mark or Country Mist or Tide Pools or Marina Isle.
We went with Rain Washed. Most other colours were too grey or Brad thought they were too light. Our current room is charcoal grey, so you can see why he's be hesitant for such a change!

For the main colour of the house - meaning the living room/ dining room/ hall ways/ office/ and stripes in the kid's room I knew I wanted a soft grey that was cool and not too dark. Online that seemed like it could be any one of Contemplation or Pensive Sky or Rhino or Reflecting Pool or Sterling.
But in person, it was obviously Sterling.
We both agreed the second we held out all the swatches. Never thought such a major decision as the paint colour for nearly our whole house would be so simple!

We're also doing an accent wall in the office, which will mostly be covered with white built-in book shelves so it's more of a pop of colour rather than a full-on accent wall. Only one colour seemed interesting to me (we wanted a rich dark blue of sorts), and that was Quiet Storm.
We went with Moonlit Pool. Quiet Storm was more of a navy and we wanted hints of green.

We're also painting our IKEA microwave cart and island to make them look more original/unique. The colour choice was turquoise, so we narrowed that down to Blue Jewel or Brilliant Sea.
In person, Brilliant Sea was really green, so the Blue Jewel swatch won us over instantly.

Then the kid's room (under the grey stripes) and the kitchen (under the cabinets) will be a basic white with one wall done in chalkboard paint (which we bought in black).

So glad that's over with! And that Brad helped me make all of these decisions. Online it seemed so simple and so many colours seemed perfect but at the store it was a lot harder and in some cases, I was so off in my research. But I'm really thrilled with our choices!