Hallway makeover: Almost done!

This year, I pledged to tackle the beast of a hallway that runs the length of our house, and make it look something other than blah. Last year's idea of painting it chocolate brown (Behr's Belgian Sweet) worked for a little while, and then I decided it was just too dark:


So, I undertook the task of re-painting it gray (Sherwin Williams' Requisite Gray, color-matched to Behr paint and primer in one...which is awesome, by the way). It took me a good two months, because I only worked on it sporadically for an hour or two at a time when Elliana napped or the girls were in bed for the night:


The problem was, it still looked pretty blah. I like the color better, but the ceilings are so high, and the hallway is so long, that it's still just this HUGE expanse of space that seemed to swallow up anything I put on the walls. Enter (drumroll please) Uncle Nicholas and his handy-dandy miter saw! He came over today and put up a chair rail for us, which I think looks awesome and really breaks up the wall space:


I got this big mirror at Marshall's for $25 (and really, could've gotten an even bigger one) and moved our family photos from white frames into skinny black ones, so this is what the first section of the wall looks like now:


The photos aren't great and it looks much better in person, but you get the idea. I still need two more vertical photos for underneath the mirror, and then we're going to get a console table and I-don't-know-what-else for that second section of the wall that's still blank right now...but so far, it's shaping up pretty nicely, I think! Maybe we'll attempt picture frame wainscoting one day if we're ever up to the task.

On a side note, Keira went to Home Depot with Bear the other day to pick up caulking and ended up picking out a paint sample for the pink color she wants for her "bedroom makeover." More painting?! Especially painting of rooms that have already BEEN painted--a lovely shade of purple, I might add--when we have three bathrooms, a master bedroom, and a laundry room that are still the color of regurgitated oatmeal?! After I reattached my eyebrows to their proper location on my face, I gave Kiwi the only appropriate response a loving mother in this situation could give to her darling pink-loving daughter:

"That sounds like a Daddy project to me!"