SFGate

Dytecture Be warned that once you started painting or staining the medium oak trims you should do it for the entire house.

mdm Design Logic Doesn't sound like you are loving the medium oak, so I would say do not be afraid to paint it. Starting with the fireplace. Yes, white. You can still have dark wood floors with white trim.

timandt @dytecture do you think I can start upstairs with all dark wood floors and white trim and have medium oak downstairs? I have 4 year old pergo floor that the prior owners put in. I hate to tear them up right away. I want to do the remodeling in steps. What do you think I should do? First thing I want is to pull the 10 year old carpet out of the bedrooms and hallway upstairs and lay dark wood. Paint white trim. And stain (dark) or paint (white or black)my bathroom cabinets upstairs. Then maybe fix up the master bath and kitchen. Not sure what to do?? I have about 4,000 to play with for now. Then next year... I may have a little more. I just want to slowly improve. Not all at once.

mdm Design Logic For sure you can start upstairs and do it in stages. Just find an obvious place to stop painting the trim. A tip from personal experience would be not to paint your steps if they are wood. It looks nice and you may eventually want to do it, but once you do you have joined the trim paint from upstairs to downstairs. If you stick to baseboard and door frames upstairs, you can certainly leave the 1st floor trim and flooring as is. Assuming that the fireplace is on the first floor, you could consider painting it, but not trim colour, perhaps a chocolate brown or even a red or blue depending on your design style. You can always change it up when you get to painting the main floor trim.

timandt Ok. My question now is ... The stairs are carpeted. The carpet I'm trying to get rid of.... What do I do? I have my mind set on dark wood bedrooms and was going to do hallway.. I have allergies to all this dust in our carpets. I need them gone. Stairs come up from living room and that is pergo medium oak floor With medium oak trim. Helpppp!

mamala53 I have the same problem with medium oak everywhere and am also trying to figure out where to start. I have shiny brass everywhere to replace to add to the problem. Please post photos timandt.

timandt I think for brass door knobs I'm just going to spray paint them. That's an idea for you too....

nancymic I have one dark wood floor and the others are the regular oak. The dust on the dark floor is ridiculous. Always looks horrible. I wonder if others have the same problem. The oak floors don't show it. Just thought I'd throw that out there. Spray painting doorknobs sounds difficult. I think theyre inexpensive to replace...

timandt Oak doesn't show dust. But dark looks better. I'm ok with swiffering the floors a lot. It will help me to keep the dust level down in my house bc my allergies are terrible and I have no clue how much crap is in my carpets...that's why I hate them so bad!

Barbara Griffith Designs I would paint the fireplace white, then just start painting your trim white. wherever you have starting & stopping points until it is done. Can easily change the color of the cabinets using Rustoleum Cabinet Transformations and choose a color. It is easy, inexpensive and available at Home Depot. If you have standard heavily grained oak, I suggest not glazing, which is an option, it will only highlight the grain that I think you would want to diminish. Here is the link to their website to look at colors and how it works. http://cabinets.rustoleumtransformations.com/colors.php