Inspiration

The living/kitchen/dining room is the next room that Drew and I plan to tackle. We still have some things to finish up in the bedroom (there is NOTHING) hanging on the walls. But the problem is we don't even have window treatments in the living room and at night you can see all the way into our bedroom. To him its simple, we get some blinds, slap them up, solved. I don't want to spend the money twice buying everything though so I know I really need to nail down a color scheme quickly so I know what to go for. So I've been dancing around the internet collecting pictures, trying to nail down my style and what I really want.

Drew always laughs when I tell him I'm doing this, he says that I want to 'live in a magazine photo, but you can't do that.' I disagree. I left my job yesterday and he said that if I don't want to I don't have to work any more. Well I do want to work, but I need some time. But for now that frees me up to clean all I want and actually live in a magazine photo... on a budget.

The hardest part about this room though is the fact that is it part kitchen. I want to create a really comfortable feel in there, like both he and I can step in and know we are 'home.' Because at some point or other both of us will be spending a lot of time here alone. For Drew it's when I have to go to weddings or the like back up North in my home and he can't get time off of work, and me when he deploys. I will be spending more time alone than he does, but more importantly I want him to feel really comfortable when hes here... without making it a giant man-cave with blackout curtains, surround sound, and beat up old leather chairs.

We already picked a color for in there... but we haven't actually started painting more than just a swatch (we have to hire someone to do it, the 18' ceilings are a bit daunting). But this is what we picked.

Which is funny. On here it looks more greige or purple but in the natural light of our room it looks quite blue, and in the evening it looks more grey. Perhaps I'll slash more of the swatch on the wall and try to take a decent picture to show you later on.

But these are what I pulled for inspiration. We were thinking going with more of a blue and green theme because I'm fond of my new Anthropologie knobs I got for my table (I got a second pair!)

I got the ceramic instead of the acrylic for the table because the color matched my awesome coral lamp (look at comparables or the TJ Maxx and Anthropologie post!) better. Those two pieces I would love to keep in the room as well. So they are pretty much our jumping off point!

Without further ado, these are the rooms I was drawn to.

We are planning on doing the blind/curtain duo like the last photograph. Though I'm a bit nervous. Our trim and crown molding is white, which is good, but its hard to match whites for blinds so we were probably going to go with dark wood, and I wanted to bring in the color and pattern with the curtains... but I'm afraid it might be TOO dark. 

What do you think? Should I go white with the curtains and bring the pattern elsewhere? Try to make my own romans and pick a fabric I like?