I think what happens when you go to the paint store and see all the colors that are available is that you become overwhelmed. Many colors start to look good that you normally wouldn’t think of using in your home. The desire to have a modern, sophisticated look in your home takes over and suddenly you envision the homes you have seen in magazines and you want to live in one of those homes.

I can envision things that others apparently can’t see. When my husband and I go paint shopping, he doesn’t see sophistication; he sees tan and white and maybe a light blue. The combination’s elude him. However, I have an advantage. He normally goes along with whatever I want. I didn’t say I was always right, I said he normally just goes along. So, needless to say on occasion he has been able to say “I told you so”.

For instance, the time I decided to paint the living room red. This was something that I had seen in a magazine and it really looked great. It was not a candy apple red, but a more subdued color and it made the room look…you guessed it! Sophisticated.

There was a little more discussion this time than normal when I told my husband I was going to paint the living room red. He mumbled a few things that I couldn’t quite make out but I distinctly heard the words ‘out of her mind.’ However, I was determined and red it was.

After painting for days – my husband was determined that this was all my project – I finally had the red living room I wanted. Next came putting everything in place and hanging the curtains. When everything was in place, I have to say I began to have doubts. I could distinctly hear ‘out of her mind’ over and over.

I looked at the magazine with the beautiful red living room and then I looked at my creation. Something just was not right. Was it all the designer furniture in the magazine? I certainly could not afford that. But my furniture was fairly new and it should not make that much difference. Was it the curtains? Yes, I think it was. Off to the store with magazine in hand, I found curtains that were very similar to the ones shown and back home again I hung the curtains.

Sitting back and looking around the room, even with the new curtains it did not have the look I was after. I studied and studied the magazine trying to figure out why my living room did not look sophisticated. At five o’clock when my husband walked through the door, the room was bare, the curtains were down and drop cloths covered the floor. Half the room was covered in a primer and the other half was still red, but this time he didn’t say “I told you so.”