i found some really inexpensive frames at the thrift store, but they were all different shades of wood and somewhat different styles. although i am hesitant to make the commitment to put nails in the wall, i'm getting tired of looking at bare walls! (although for a while, just having paint on the walls was a huge deal because our house looked like this.)
so, i decided to whip out some white ceiling paint (5 gallons has painted all of our ceilings, trim, and sometimes we used it as primer...) and now it's on my thrifted frames, too! i realize this is kind of a dumb suggestion: use old paint on old frames. but here are my tips:
paint outside. paint smells, it's messy, and all the newspaper/plastic in the world won't stop that accidental paintbrush-drip on your floors!
use sticks as drying racks. i dug out some thick logs from our firepit, which was kind of messy because every time i shifted the sticks, i got charcoal on me. and then sometimes on the newly painted white frames. oops.
take the glass out of the frame before painting. it's way too hard to try and paint neatly, and it takes too much time to scrape the dried paint from the glass. this isn't a window--you can pop the glass out before painting the frame, and it'll save so much time.
let the frames dry outside. no need to bring them in until they're dry!
once they are dry, gently scratch the edges for a more weathered look. this also helps take care of any brush-strokes and imperfections in the paint job (because i'm no artist...and basically slapped some paint on them.)
stay tuned for part 2: how i end up using them on our walls!
what do you like to decorate with? any crafty projects you've done recently?
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