Ikat Stencilled Wall

So I had just stencilled our foyer wall a few months ago. I made a homemade trellis stencil and used my Folk Art craft paint in the color champagne. It gave the wall a nice shimmer, making it look silver in some lights and gold in others. The background paint is Benjamin Moore Revere Pewter. I loved the way my stencilled wall turned out, but it needed more punch!

Then I saw this stencilled wall on this blog http://www.ourfifthhouse.com/p/house-tour.html:

I needed to have it, too!!!! She had bought her stencil, but I resolved to go the cheap route! Yay for cheap! I wanted to just make a homemade one. This was ALSO so I could get started right away! Yay for instant gratification!!

So I found this blog http://bread-n-chocolate.blogspot.com/2011/07/ikat-and-so-can-you.html, and she showed how she made her homemade ikat stencil. Woo-hoo! Here's her stencil:

So I determined to do the same thing: get a piece of 8 1/2" x 11" paper and fold in half and try to freehand copy her design as best as I could:

I used my trusty Fiskars sharp scissors to cut this. The sharp points were ideal for cutting out the hard-to-reach places. Then I traced my cut-out onto a piece of cardboard:

I then cut out the cardboard. This is sturdier to use for a stencil than a flimsy piece of paper.

Then I proceeded to paint the top of the wall (I was going to do chair rail and moulding on the bottom like the inspiration pic). I used ACE Royal paint in High Hiding White (eggshell finish). I didn't prime before. It took me three coats to cover the old paint. (I left a command hook in the middle and didn't paint under it since I'm just going to hang my painting back over it anyway.)

Then I positioned my stencil at the top middle of the wall (this is important so the wall will look symmetrical) and filled in with my round sponge brush and Liquitex Mars Black paint. This is just what I had on hand. Then I proceeded to finish the first row. Then I did row two (scattering the spacing so they weren't directly under each other), and so on and so forth.

Hubby's reaction? "It looks like a transformer autobot." He's kind of right:

Progress is made on the wall:

The bottom half of the wall painted with primer (Kilz):

Then we installed a chair rail and painted one coat of semi-gloss paint on the bottom part of the wall:

Then I did another coat of semi-gloss paint (ACE Royal High Hiding White):

Then we installed picture frame moulding. I spaced 3" from each edge. I still have to caulk and paint one more coat of semi-gloss on the bottom.

Here it is all done:

Then I added back in the deco foyer table:

Hubby doesn't like that the moulding is covered up now. Maybe this table will see a little move in its future?

Palm Tree Painted on Half Bath Wall

So when we moved in our home, our half bath had this big, blank wall when you walked in. It drove me nuts. So I bought one of those sticky vinyl decals that you stick on the wall. It was 7 feet high. This would fill the wall up nicely. Unfortunately, it was a white, shiny  material, and my hubby hated it. So away it had to go!

The only problem was in removing it (in my haste), I hurried to rip it off, and damaged the wall in the process. (I have since learned that to remove these wall decals, aiming a hair dryer at it will make it come off without ripping off the wall.)  I had to use a lot of joint compound to make it look smooth again. Then, after i used the joint compound in certain areas, the outline of the palm tree decal was still on the wall. So I decided to just use regular paint and paint in the outline so it would look like I had done a huge mural! (Except, of course, I cheated, it was really the decal that helped me do this.) The bathroom wall color is Benjamin Moore Ashley Gray, and the palm tree is painted with Benjamin Moore Smokey Taupe paint.

If you are able to just draw a palm tree freehand (I am not), by all means, that would save you the aggravation of tracing something. But if you can't draw a palm tree freehand and you want this look and don't want to stick something on your wall that could possible ruin it when you remove it someday, buy one of those vinyl wall decals and just trace it. I think it was around $30 for the decal (bought on etsy.com).

I really like the effect it gives the room. It makes it more interesting.