Shut the Front Door!

Apparently, curb appeal is the difference that sells nearly half of the homes on the market, according to Zillow.com.  Remember my whining about how my house has seriously started lacking just that?

My front door has been bothering me for about a year now.  It was natural wood.  It disappeared completely in light of the purple+magenta (purgenta?) door on the front porch that is 40 shades of disappointing.  It looked like this:

The plate under the doorknob has rubbed the finish from the door when a screw was loose.  That crack on the bottom right is a seam that bothered me as well.  None of the detail of the door could truly be appreciated.  I took all of the hardware off of the door and set out to paint.

But first... primer!

After applying 3 coats of Zinsser Bullseye 3-2-1 primer, the stain in the wood was locked in nicely.  See how the door is a yellow-ivory color compared to the siding? That was after the second coat.

on the floor to the left is a wooden shingle that came off of the house...
and on the right is our "emergency" backpack

I really liked having the front door white.  It completely blended into the siding, but *sigh* I just love how great things look when painted white.  Until I saw the color it was meant to be, that is.

I had a quart of Glidden Peacock Blue mixed in a Behr Paint + Primer high-gloss base, then cut in the first coat.  

I'm only 5 foot 4.. stepladders are all over my house

 The first coat was pretty uneventful, as was the second:

I ended up putting 3 coats of paint on the door over the course of a week to really give it an opportunity to dry well between coats.  I took the hardware off and painted everything, including screw heads, with Rust-Oleum's Universal All Surface Spray Paint in Oil Rubbed Bronze Metallic.  I had taken photos of the entire process, but due to an unforeseen error, they didn't save on my camera's SD card.  I have ordered a new one, but the rest of the photos were taken with my phone, via Instagram.

The rain started and the door seemed to be a bit sticky, so I didn't want to attach the knobs just yet.  I found a burlap wreath pin on Pinterest, saved some change here and there, and picked up supplies to make it using Stone Gable's burlap wreath tutorial.  I found that working with burlap made me sneeze a whole lot (even with allergy medicine!) but it was super easy and cost roughly $15 to make.  Lastly, I applied a very friendly "hello." from PreciousEmma on Etsy.  

This is how it turned out!

Well, it looked great, but I still wasn't done.  I screwed the hardware back in and started a little Halloween decorating a bit early.  This does have an Instagram filter on it, but this is a good representation of what the door looks like at night (and completely dry).  

I can't tell you how much I love it!  It has definitely upped the curb appeal of the house by instantly transforming the blah wooden door to a friendly, inviting, cozy sort of door.  In Dutch, those feelings are called "gezellig," which connotes a feeling of belonging and welcoming and quaint and, well, an entire cascade of feelings that make you smile.  

Even though winter is coming ("You know nothing, Jon Snow!"), I'm still slowly working on a sleeping porch.  I don't imagine I'll have much more free time this semester to work on it, but my biggest priority for it is finding a screw that will fit the bed frame.  Eventually.  When I can both have my wallet and time to set foot in a hardware store.  I'll leave you with this work in progress, though:

so much painting to do!  

Until we meet again, friends!

*while a lot of brands were mentioned,

I was not compensated or affiliated with

any of them in any way.

I did send PreciousEmma a photo

as an appreciation, and she made it

the photograph to represent her listing

with my permission.