I can never pick colors out of the blue, (no pun intended) but need an inspiration piece to give me a direction...be it either a pic from a magazine, a piece of art, a vase, very often fabric I'll use in the space, or once, even the color of my cat's eyes. But once I have a color direction, all the other choices are so much easier. Not only that, but it will often take me in directions that I'd normally never ever go with surprisingly good results. Have you thought about getting a color inspiration first?

Well, I went through heck and back trying to find a paint color for my bedroom with all the variables, including orangey wood doors and trim, and even more orangey furniture that I hated but will have to live with for a while, and a blue carpet. Orange and blue look horrid together in my taste and also orange is a very unflattering color for me in most cases, other than a deep copper or dark terra cotta. I am a summer/winter colored gal, according to the old "Color My World" way of speaking. The best I could do was search online for paint colors recommended for toning down orange wood. I know there are several schools of thought, but I thought a color with no yellow or green undertones would be good considering the other pieces in the room. However, those purple-grey colors really didn't play nice with the orangey wood and just looked too sillyputty undertoned to me. They were OK writ small but I didn't want to look at them on the wall. In retrospect, I should have gone with a brownish color (with low chroma?) instead of a grey or cream colored one, but what I picked was good and really I could not afford any more color samples. Eventually the carpet is coming out in there anyway and being replaced so I can go with a brown tone then .

I rather like a green for the walls, as well. It references the green in your pretty quilt. Take a look at November Rain by Benjamin Moore. It appears to play well with a variety of colors.

LOL. Now I see why you said not painting the fireplace gave you one less thing to do. Hard to advise on the stair rail and paint without a clear idea of where you're heading here. The walnut stain and either of those paints would probably be safe choices, though I would wait to paint till the very end. You'll want to coordinate paint color with your furnishings and your floor, which I'm guessing is brand new.