Let me clarify! We could really do with our hall and living room being painted and I really can't be bothered with doing it and looking after Elijah - so I'm wondering if it's really expensive to get someone to do it...the other thing is, my dad is doing odd-jobs just now and I wanted to ask him if he could do it - but didn't want to rip him off as I know he wouldn't charge us as much as he should....any thoughts? I can't really guess the size of the rooms but they are very small and it is no more than 2 days work I wouldn't have thought!

You could easily paint that in a day! Even with 2-3 coats plus cutting in around ceiling and trim. Love to paint and would come and do it for you for free if I was over there! Shouldn't cost much but always call for estimates and usually pick the mid one. Going for the cheapest isn't always the best option as they usually buy crap old paint and send inexperienced ppl over. x

We would probably buy the paint and get my dad to do it - we only have 2 rooms and the hall so I'm not sure where I would put the baby

You could just hang out for the day in another part of your home. Water based paints are harmless and you can even buy paints now that actually freshen up your home as far as scents go. It also dries pretty darn fast. Will point out that the darker the color..the more coats you will need to cover. Or if you are trying to go from a dark shade to a lighter one..same thing. All you will need to do is to obviously remove all pics/decorations off walls...fill and sand and holes or scuffs with compound.. and buy a style of paint that doesn't have too high of sheen to it..egg shell or satin finish is usually the best. You would need a roller with an extention(broom handle works as long as it has the screw on end)..couple of brushes...painters tape and some drop sheets. The fun part is picking out the color!

We have a few rollers and just need to freshen the colours up - we literally have 2 rooms so nowhere else to go, but we could probably go to my mums for the day or something if my grubby husband didn't scrape bikes and things in the corridor we could get away with buying loads of cheap white, but youre right the fun is in the colour choosing