Ikea Ribba Frame Upgrade, just a little tweak

I have been jazzin' up my staircase for a few weeks now and have procrastinated a bit on the final touches.  I can say that for now, I have decided to hold of on the moulding boxes that were going to go under the chair rail.  I am really enjoying how the two toned wall comes off as being more modern rather than traditional, at least to me, so I think for now I will leave it as is.  The other factor that led me to this decision was the thought of many framed boxes going up the wall after I hung the Ikea Ribba frames that I had bought.  Oh right, I also decided against a full on gallery wall, lots of indecision over here which is why I have been working on this wall for so long but alas, plans have been made!
The wall is not done yet because I am always a chicken at starting a project that could potentially ruin a wall and involve more work to fix it.  Once I start these projects they are never as scary as I make them out to be in my head, I know a lot of you know what I mean here.
Back to my little Ikea frame upgrade.  Of course I was in Ikea a few weekends ago picking up the 19x19 silver ribba frames to go up the stairs.  While visiting Centsational Girl's blog, I came across her finished staircase (AMAZING by the way), you can see it here.  I loved how open the big silver frames made the space feel and I knew immediately this is what I wanted rather than a lot of pictures packed together.  Although I love this look as well I just knew it would seem too cluttered for my stairs.

Centsational Girl: Finished Staircase

The ribba frames are perfect, well almost perfect.  The mat was a little yellow which made me second guess if these would work with my ultra white trim and faux beadboard look.  (Trumpets) Duh, duh-duh, DUH!  Shanna to the rescue!  You can actually flip the mat over and the other side is white-oh happy day :) 

What I had done before knowing this was buy five separate mats that have slightly smaller openings for the pictures and had the ultra white mat I needed.  Needless to say I spent a little extra cash for the mats but now that I put them side by side with the standard ribba mat, I find myself torn. 

This is where you guys come in, so check this out.

Here are both mats, first is the ribba mat, second is the upgraded mat:

Even though I spent a little extra dough I think I am leaning towards keeping the second mat.  Maybe just one more shot to help you decide:

So, what do you think?  Smaller mat that was an extra $12 or stick with the mat that came with our dear ribba? 

Almost there everyone, happy Thursday! 

See you swoon,