Stretchad, Do the kitchen the way you want. Once it's finished, you may look at the rest of the house with fresh eyes, and you may decide to redo the trim (I would replace rather than just paint). No matter which colour you choose for the kitchen, it's not going to make the 80's finish in the rest of the house go away. Unfortunately :>( We are doing a complete reno of a 70's house from top to bottom (not quite 3000 sq ft), and at the moment not one single room is untouched, ie every where is in disarray (well, except for the laundry room), if the ceiling hasn't been torn down, or the walls gutted, then the room is filled with boxes of flooring, new toilets to be installed, furniture and boxes from some other room being worked on... so I feel your pain! Really, if all you need to do is replace trim to update your whole house, you're laughing!

Kevin, forgive me for asking, but what are the dark spots on the walls? Could it be mold? I read your post last night and wondered if you WANT to keep the pink walls or if you're looking to do something else? Could you expand on your question, so people could offer more help? Do you want to work around what is there, or remove it, and do you want to keep the pink? Is the current furniture like the bookcase and white painted bureau staying? What is your budget for making changes?

Hi thank you!!! A chandelier would look gorgeous, but I think the functionality of a fan wins out for us because with ceilings this high and a mountain climate, we need the fan to push the hot air down to the rest of the house in the winter. Is there such a thing as an attractive ceiling fan? (serious question!) I think we'll just put the little book case upstairs in the loft, which is desks and another book case anyway. So funny that y'all like the arches! We are so stuck on them. What do you think about squaring the one that goes to the staircase but keeping the others? It would sort of balance the visual impact of the other 4. Are you saying cover the beams with wood or just paint to match the room? or would you do another color? I have no design sense, but I see the potential too!

Thank you all again, so much. I genuinely appreciate the time everyone has put in to help me (and my family) come up with a solution that will improve our living situation!! Some overall thoughts... I hate to just stone wall any suggestions, because I'll take it all and you never know what will stick - but some things that are probably hard limits for us are: The sectional has to stay. Blah. It has to stay together, all in one piece. Also blah, I know, but although it's a relatively small thing, we actually sorely need the arms on all ends with two toddlers literally bouncing around on it all day. We DO use our fireplace! Only in the winter months, but I admit I love it (more than my husband, who is in charge of log chopping/lugging/fire building/cleaning XD) and having a fireplace was a big sell for me in getting this house. So I would be heartbroken to cover up the fireplace. I can't find the exact measurements of our living room, but... we probably have about 5 inches of squeeze through space between the sectional and the walls. It's awful!!! I know, I know. We learned our lesson big time. However... @rrah Hello, you have blown my mind. WHOA!!!!!!!!! I am thrilled to share that you've inspired a huge paradigm shift in how we look at our entire house. SO the update is: We are measuring and brainstorming and seriously trying to move our entire living area - blessed sectional included! - into our sunroom! Which up until now has been a playroom/dirty living room where the animals hang out. We are measuring and trying to see how to move our entire dining room into the living room! I may even get a new kitchen table out of this! Woohoo! Maybe best news of all - this shift will leave our dining room empty, and in a spontaneous moment, my husband half-jokingly suggested that it could be my craft room aaaaaaaand the idea has taken root and will not budge and now I may have a ground floor craft room (easy for me to work on my many many projects AND cook and keep an eye on the kids) and my husband will have his home office back without getting wrapped up in yarn and thread every step he takes! I'm SO excited! Wow! I never would have thought I could have every single thing I wanted in a house from this house and I was okay with that, but now I'm actually maybe going to get so many things! Now what's best practice going forward? Everyone's help here has been invaluable! When people ask a design question here, is it customary to start a new discussion for every new question? Shall I just keep adding new questions here? I feel like as we embark on this whole shift I will need more advice! Thank you so much everyone!