Guest Post...Wall Stripes

Happy Monday everyone. I have my first guest post from my good friend Lindsey Houston. Lindsey and I went to high school together. Since then, Lindsey decided to leave the frozen tundra for warmer climate and currently resides in Florida with her husband and their cute dog.


Here is the pretty cowgirl :)

Guest Post - Harvest My Design

Hey ya’ll I’m Lindsey and I blog over at Harvest My Design! I’m so thankful and happy that Bridget has asked me to guest post… It’s my first one, yay! My blog focuses on mostly interior design but I also through in some hobbies, fun and a lot of my dog. I’m a little bit country, but ever since seeing the movie Country Strong, I try to be a lot of country. J Hope you enjoy!

Bridget has asked me to post on the wall stripes I recently did in our master bedroom, so I’ll try to give you a step by step tutorial on what I did.

The first thing I did of course was pick out the color I wanted to use for the stripes. We were lucky enough to move into our home with freshly painted walls that are tan in color. The color I chose to contrast with the tan color that was already on the wall was an off-white hue called ‘Country Dairy’ by Behr.

The next step was to measure and pencil out the stripes. I used a ruler to make sure my stripes were 1 foot apart and I used a long level to make sure my stripes were completely straight from floor to ceiling. This was much easier than I anticipated and keep in mind if your lines are off a little bit here and there it won’t be noticeable when you’re done.

Once I had my straight lines penciled in it was time to begin taping off the stripes. This was the most time consuming phase of the project, but relatively easy to do. I made sure I placed my painter’s tape just a hair inside the pencil marks so that the new paint would cover up the pencil lines I had previously drawn. The most important thing to remember in this step is to press over your painters tape with a flat edge such as a credit card, which is what I used.

 After the stripes had been taped off it was time for painting to begin. This was fast and easy… I gave each stripe two coats with my roller brush and went around the trim, ceiling and sides with an angled brush. I have found it’s much easier to do my edges by hand instead of trying to tape them all off, so as you can see I didn’t tape either side of the wall or the ceiling.

I let the ‘Country Dairy’ color dry for 24 hours and then I pulled off the painter’s tape. When pulling off the tape make sure to pull away from the fresh paint. Once you’ve pulled off the tape you may a few spots that you’ll need to touch up whether some paint bled through the tape or the tape pulled off some of the older paint… regardless, make sure to have a little bit of each color available for touchups. Note: if you don’t have previous paint color that was used you can cut a small sample from the wall and take it to be matched. In my experience Sherwin Williams is the very best at matching paint.

Ta Da

Items needed for project:

Paint

Paint Brush

Paint Roller

Level

Pencil

Ruler

Painter’s Tape

Drop Cloth

Step Ladder

Important Tips for this DIY Project:

Make sure to use a flat edge to go over the painter’s tape before you begin painting… it really works!

Always take your painter’s tape off pulling it away from the fresh paint.

Don’t be intimidated by this project… it’s much easier than it looks.

DIY Network also provides a great tutorial that can be seen at the following site: http://www.diynetwork.com/how-to/striping-paint-technique/index.html

Thank you Bridget for asking me to guest post on your blog, so fun! I hope this helps anyone who wants to try this DIY project, happy painting! If you have any questions stop by my blog and ask away.