Look on the bright side. I remodeled my home while I was pregnant with twins (Mistake No. 1). In the remodel, I replaced all carpet with lovely white berber (Mistake No. 2 - what was I thinking - and why didn't someone stop me)? Assuming the twins would always be infants, I did Mickey Mouse babies wallpaper (Mickey Mouse in diapers). (Mistake No. 3) I had built-in shoe racks for the babies for shoes that would fit no larger than a a one-year old (maybe two) (Mistake No. 4) I could go on and on - I didn't have a clue. But after several rounds of in vitro trying to get pregnant, nobody had the heart to reel me in. But I digress. After the twins were born, I would frequently put down a pallet on the floor with plastic underneath and let them lay on the pallet without a diaper to "air out". One of them rolled off the pallet and pooped in the floor. Being a new parent, it didn't matter, I smiled, and said "isn't that cute" and I scrubbed and scrubbed, but it would come out. Oh, well, we laughted, in a few years, we'll look at that spot and laugh about where he pooped in the floor as a baby. Well, the laugh was on me. Within a few months, that carpet was so nasty, it looked like the whole town had come by to poop on the carpet. I bought a steamer and cleaned that carpet about once a month, and it still looked like crap. No pun intended. Then, when one of the boys had his tonsils out at three, he threw up blood clots on the floor - BTW Oxclean did wonders with that. When we sold the house, the new buyers were pulling up the carpet before we were even out of the driveway. Anyway, I have brown carpet in my new house, maybe too dark, but I'm over it already. Just in case.

Zinsser makes a great primer. The others are right though, it won't go on evenly like your final coat. You're doing fine. :) I painted a wood desk last summer and when I finished with the primer, I thought the same thing, "oh, what a mess I've made." But then I put on the first finish coat (a black high gloss paint), all of my doubts went away. You may need to put on two coats of your regular paint though since you're covering the wood and primer. I would put one coat on and then see if you even need to fill those corners. A little spackle will work - no mixing needed. When you first apply it it will be pink and then it dries to white. Then you can lightly sand it and paint on your final coat. Also, as others mentioned..use a really good regular paint brush. It will have finer bristles and give you a nice, smooth application. The inexpensive brushes have courser bristles. Believe me, the brush does make a difference. Bottom line is... you're doing great! :)

This is really weird. After reading this post, I did a search as usual using "hopi crape myrtle" as the term and got a reasonable result showing many threads I remembered. I took a screenshot of the search page and started to post it, saying that Houzz seemed to have fixed the glitch. But I couldn't post the screenshot, and when I went back and made a new search I could no longer perform the search - it had reverted to the situation NHBabs described. As a test, I just tried to post a pic of a hummingbird that I posted yesterday and it won't post today, so Houzz has several problems going on. It looks like they're working on it since there was a momentary correction. Claire

I love the house color with the stone. I do agree that the shutters can go, maybe just “beef” up the trim a little so the windows look finished. The white trim isn’t awful but I would live in the house for a year and then decide..black trim could look nice with the other colors you have. Front door colors are a matter of taste. If you have a lot of green landscaping you may want to pull a shade of that to your door. If you have a particular color landscape, flowering shrubs and plants in a color you love,, you could pick a shade of the flowering plants to put on your door. I built my house a year ago. I have HardyPlank siding in Deep ocean blue, black trim , black standing seam metal roof and a chartreuse front door. I like to use plants (in planters and pots) around the front of the house that pick up the front door color. I get a lot of compliments on the color combinations and especially on the front door color. You are still looking at a building lot. Things will look much different when you have some landscaping, even if it’s just some bushes the builder puts in. Look at landscaping designs on Houzz, in magazines and Pinterest . You will see things much differently after living in you house for awhile. Take your time making decisions, your perfect home will come in time.