Basement Before and After!

Good morning! I am so excited to share with you my basement photos! It is not totally done, but getting close! It was tough taking pictures down there....I definitely need to work on my home photography skills! ; )   I hope the pictures do it justice.  We started with knotty pine...ugly. Dated. Dark. Gloomy.  After the repairs were made to my drain tile and Permaseal repaired the crack in the foundation, we decided to paint the knotty pine.  My husband was dead set against it at first.  I believe he called me "crazy." and "How could you want to paint knotty pine?" and, " Do you know how expensive that was back then?"  Um yea. I can paint it because it's Ugly with a capital U.  And yes, honey, it was expensive BACK THEN! Welcome to 2012.  What finally convinced him you may ask?  My hero......Pinterest!  I showed him all the before and after photos...and he finally caved.  (Thank goodness he came to his senses!)  So we cleared all the crap clutter and got busy painting.  Okay....we didn't actually paint, we hired someone to do it.  ; )

 So this first set of pics is Brian's work area.  You can see all the crap clutter that we had.  And the part of the wall that had to be taken down.  And of course the new desk, white walls.....

This next area was Kyle's gaming/LEGO area.  And now the more updated version with track lighting and a brand new painting on the wall.  So much cleaner! 

This was our couch/TV area with an attempt at a gallery wall. My new gallery wall uses track lighting and photo ledges to ensure that my photos are always straight.  I converted all of my photos to black and white and spray painted a few frames and mattes in lime green.  It really pops against the white walls!

Here is a close up of my gallery.  

Here is our fireplace and TV area.  The fireplace seems to stand out more now with the white walls.  I love all the shades of green and such. 

Here are a few of my decorative items.....

My window coverings are being made by my very sweet MIL out of burlap.  I am loving how they are coming out!

I hope the pics were clear enough and do the basement justice.  It is such a cozy, warm, and inviting space now and am so glad that Pinterest was able to sway Brian into seeing my vision for the room!

Have a great day!!!