Wide Open Porch: Wide Open Poll

This summer's task: Front porch update!

And we've made lots of progress already. Wanna see?

You're tilting your head with scrunched up eyebrows right now, aren't you? Because it probably doesn't look like a whole lot of progress without a reminder of what it looked like before. Here's that reminder:

An entirely screened in porch. Two cottage-y screen doors on either end. But after strolling our street several times since we've moved in, I one day realized that my favorite houses were the screen-less ones. Pinterest is full of homemade solutions to un-attracting mosquitoes and flies, so surely we don't need the screens, right?

Absolutely right!

How about a comparison shot?

Do you see how big and open it is now? We're loving it. Even Tim, who is always a bit leery of my "brilliant" ideas is loving it. There were thoughts of not wanting to sit out there because the screening gave a feeling of being closed in a bit -and there's always some comfort in that. But this is such a quiet neighborhood and de-screening has opened our view up so much that Tim has sat out there a lot already.

A couple of Mondays knocked "remove screen frames" and "remove carpet" off our porch update to-do list. The last couple of days we've welcomed flies and cool breezes into our house as the freshly painted door dried. My dad installed a new light (notice that above? Fan on the left, new light on the right...) The rest of the list looks something like this:

• remove screening
• remove screening frames & half wall
• remove (really ugly browny-pink) carpeting
• paint front door & new hardware
• re-screen storm windows & paint them
• replace some board on wide steps (the set of steps shown in picture)
• rebuild porch steps on other side of porch & finish off exposed edges of stone wall
• paint floor & stairs
• new light fixture
• add some shade loving plants in decorative pots
• paint plant holder (from yard sale two years ago) 
• new house numbers

(I think John & Sherry have something going with their blog lists. It feels like quite the accomplishment to cross things off 'online'...!)

So here's the thing - I'm in need of some help! I can pick paint colors for the inside of my home with joy. With gusto. With delight. The exterior? Eek! That's difficult stuff! I've come home with a few sample pots of paint and can't decide which one I'd prefer or if I should start over again. 

Help! 

First, let me explain. In order to pick the porch paint, I need to have the exterior house colors decided. The previous owners painted the siding, the trim (on the porch only) and the soffets (half way only) for a quick spruce-up-for-selling-purposes. (that's my guess anyway - because who only paints half of the soffets?!) So I've got a light khaki paint, a pale cream yellow paint, light lineny-tan soffets and eaves, white windows and a couple of other mismatched sections around the house. Understanding my desire to paint? It might not get done this year...but I want to nail down the colors so I can keep this porch update going.

Take a look...

Option A is extremely difficult to see in this picture. It's basically what's on the siding now with a bit more punch (you'll see it far better in the next set of pictures...promise!) And the trim color is similar, but less yellow, as I'm not a yellow trim kinda girl. 

Option B is a potentially "boring" option - a browny gray with less contrasty trim. But it goes great with the stone and brick. And there's a part of me that likes monochromatic and "boring". 

Let's take a different look at it:

This is the side of the house (that you may've never seen?) and the jut-out window where our piano fits into.

Sidenote:  I just mulched for this garden I've created since moving here for the first time and although the grass looks terr.i.ble!, I just love what mulch does. 

I gave a quick one-coat of each color, so it's not the best paint job. But hopefully you get the idea? My plan (at least I think it's my plan) is get rid of all white, so the window trim will all be painted and so fade into the background a bit more. This blog post confirmed my suspicion that while I love white a whole lot, sometimes no white is a good thing too! 

Now. You're help. S'il vous pleat. 

Option A? Or B? Or C? Which is think again. And if you have any suggestions, believe me, I'm all ears. Because this process baffles me. (am I allowed to say at this point that both of these colors look way better in real life than in these pictures? just sayin'...) Let's have a vote:

Which Color Folks?