Graham's Room Redo, Phase 1: or How I learned to stop worrying and love faux brick

Hello Blog Readers:

This year has been crazy busy I tell you.  Our new little house in California is a work in progress.  Between working and running after our little ones, we've been revamping the rooms one by one.

One day Graham's speech pathologist calls me and starts asking me the most unusual questions about my house. 

"Did you used to have a wood burning stove in your living room?" 

"Yes..."  I replied, puzzled.  Not going to lie, little creeped out too.

"Did you have a yellow brick wall in your kitchen?"

"Yes.  God, yes."  (We went full Elton John on that wall and said Goodbye.)

 Finally I got round to the heart of it and asked, "Why are you asking all these weird questions about my house?!"

She laughed, "Your house was on House Hunters Renovations last night!"

We had to wait for a re-run, but we finally saw the episode.  If you're not fans of the show, HHR is one of the newer iterations of House Hunters.  They give a shorter time span to the "ringer" houses as I call them, the couple picks the house they're going to buy, and then showcases the renovations they do to their new house.

So the episode was filmed while we were in escrow and was one of the houses the couple did not select.  The list price of the home was also falsified.  HGTV does this a lot, sorry to ruin the illusion. 

The couple was pretty merciless to our house, it was interesting to see what random TV people thought about the place we now call home.  We agreed with a lot of it.  There was one room in particular that wasn't even photographed on the multiple listing sheet. 

Perhaps you can see why the realtor decided to skip the photos on this room.  In addition to that incredible brick veneer/faux wood paneling combo, there was this bizarre CC TV camera in the opposite corner and upper kitchen cabinets mounted on the side walls (light oak, the 90s are still alive and well!).  I don't even know.  I walked in that room and shook my head a lot.

As you can surmise from the crib, this was our older son Graham's room.

Now Graham loves cars.  Love is putting it mildly.  He loves the Cars franchise, but he also just loves cars in general.  How they work, driving them around, taking them apart and then fixing them.  He's a mechanic on the make. 

So we decided to redo his room as auto garage.  Kid style.

I had never worked with chalk paint, so I decided now was as good a time as any and that the brick wall would be my guinea pig.  I had so much fun!

 So the color scheme of this brick and mortar had to go.  I don't think black mortar was ever in style.

I did base coat of taupe (left over from painting our living room) on the bricks and the mortar just to even the whole wall out. 

I actually did 2 coats of taupe because black paint is pretty tenacious.  Painting over deep colors like navy blue (more on that later) and red can be taxing.

Don't you just love how I taped off the wall so there wouldn't be paint drips?  I used to be meticulous about stuff like that.  Then I had kids.  I can tell you that painting this base coat took two naps and 3 cups of coffee, for what that's worth!

I really dug the chalk paint.  I just used one of the DIY recipes you can find with friend Google, but I would totally buy a branded chalk paint in the future.  It just takes all the guess work out of the equation. 

Onto the color.  I wanted to do the actual bricks red. 

I painted each brick individually because that's how I roll.

I used a 3" flat chip brush for the face of the bricks and a really lame kids paint brush for the sides of the bricks.  I should not have cheaped out here, but it was all I had on hand at the time.

For color I used a Behr interior flat color called January Garnet. 

The red went on pretty great even with one coat. 

This gives you an idea of what the chip brush covered and what the small flat brush had to fill in.  It was a bit of work, but it was worth it to get appropriate coverage.  Otherwise I would have gotten a lot of red paint in the mortar. 

Here is two coats of red paint.  Great coverage.  I also applied Minwax Paste Wax over top.  Just one coat.  It has a really awesome REAL BRICK feel now. 

The distractingly ugly curtains are Graham's black-out curtains.  Don't worry, they are not long for this world.  You may be wondering how I was going to go about cleaning the paint drips I got on everything.  My solution was simply to cover everything up.  So the white walls had to go next.

I would like to tell you that I decided on this amazing slate grey color myself.  But that would be a lie.  Laura came over and dumped 3 paints together and said, "This is the color you seek."  One coat in and we were already totally in love with it.  For optimum coverage, this needed 2 coats.  I ended up having to go to Home Depot and having them color match Laura's concoction.  I've had horrible results with color match before, but this time it was bang on.  So that was nice.

Some of the trim in the room was oil based navy blue and some was not.  So that had to be unified.  In other words, no more navy.  And the mirrored closet doors were not my friends either.  More on that later.

Next step, eliminate wood paneling.  Another of Graham's fondest playthings are magnets.  He has all kinds of developmental magnets designed for teaching letter and shape recognition.  We had a small magnet board for him in our old house in Oregon, but we decided to go for the gusto here.  We decided to do a magnet wall.

Nate got sheet aluminum (it's in the roofing department) from Home Depot and used a grinder wheel to cut it to be flush with the window frame.

This stuff is pretty sharp, so we wanted to make each sheet sit exactly flush next to the other.  That way no little fingers would get pinched.  The sheets are 4 foot square from what I recall.  I think we used four of them.

The aluminum sheets are all different.  Some have imperfections.  I actually like that, it gives more of a garage feel.  I cleaned the aluminum sheets with Steel Meister because they have kind of a weird oily residue at first. 

So that's it for Phase 1.  Whew.  Doesn't seem like much in pictures but it was a barrel of work! 

Stay tuned for Phase 2, where we ditch those curtains, use some stencils (You knew that was coming, right?), put up some molding, and someone gets a big boy bed!

Thanks for reading.  If I can help one random person on the internet learn to love their faux brick wall, this was time well spent.

Etspiration Wednesday: Chalk Paint

I can't believe we've had this blog for three months and haven't done an Etspiration about Chalk Paint.  Now I know 99% of you just nodded your head in agreement.  For the 1% of you who asked, "What is Chalk Paint?"  I will briefly explain that Chalk Paint is goodness in a can.  You can check out the official website here, but the short version is that it's a specially formulated paint which you can thin with water to use as a wash or thicken to apply as an impasto.  It is remarkably flexible and lends itself especially well to mimicking the look of aged items.  It gives paint the perfect patina.  So that drab oak table you found at a garage sale can end up looking like it was sitting in some Paris apartment holding a classy Mademoiselle's teacup.

A few of our Feature Friday items have been crafted using Chalk Paint, including The Schoolhouse Cabinet and The Feedsack Stripe Table.  We're always on the lookout for other great features.  If you'd ever like your stencil project showcased on the blog, just drop us an email.

Here's a small sampling of some great items on Etsy that are finished using Chalk Paint.

1A:  Victorian Pedestal Rocker Image Courtesy JunkDrawerDivas
1B:  Farmhouse Country Cottage Pantry Server Image Courtesy StiltskinStudios
1C:  Duck Egg Blue Pedestal Cloche Image Courtesy ShabbyDecor
1D:  Nest With Graphic Stencil Image Courtesy Maisondestencils

The Pantry Server in 1B is really terrific.  You've got to visit the Etsy page for a better look.  My tiny picture does not do it justice. 

2A:  Peacock Stencil Image Courtesy Maisondestencils
2B:  French Provincial Drum Table Image Courtesy Seases
2C:  Instant Wall Collection Turquoise Image Courtesy LoriAndTheLittleBird
2D: Hand Painted Yellow Mirror Image Courtesy SummerWindInteriors

That yellow mirror is truly stunning.  SummerWindInteriors also has it in aqua, which I love.  One of my favorite colors.

3A:  Antiques Stencil Image Courtesy Maisondestencils
3B:  Cottage Chic Roll Top Desk Image Courtesy ArtByJuliet
3C:  Yellow  Curved Leg Foot Stool Image Courtesy cabinintheheartland
3D:  Aqua and Yellow Cane Jewelry Chest Image Courtesy MagiaMia

I love the idea of a roll top desk.  I've got an iMac, so I'm sadly constrained to having a computer armoire due to space requirements.  I love that both the roll top and armoire concepts allow you shut away computer mess.  This roll top desk is something special though.  Check out how ArtByJuliet echoed the diamond shape from the shelf bracket in the stencil pattern on the sides.  It's a work of art.

4A:  Primitive Wooden Kitchen Shelf Image Courtesy Sienaslew
4B:  Decorative Shabby Floral Box Image Courtesy GroveRoots
4C:  Handpainted Corbel Shaped Sconces Image Courtesy DaphsSmallWorld
4D:  Bed & Breakfast Stencil Image Courtesy Maisondestencils

These sconces (4C) are just too great.  I can see them holding candles or very small sculpture in a room with classical details.

Thanks to our Chalkrific Etsy sellers for use of their images.  See you on Friday for a fabulous stencil feature!

Feature Friday: The Feedsack Stripe Table

I have got the coolest feature for you guys today.  One of our readers, (and giveaway winners!)  Stephanie at Southern Charm Cottage, transformed an oval coffee table into a ridiculously cool feedsack inspired chalk paint work of art.  Here's a nice view of the top of the table so you can see the finished product.

She started out by using Annie Sloan Old Ochre for the base coat.  Then she added Annie Sloan Graphite for the stencil itself, and Annie Sloan Duck Egg Blue for the stripes.  She freehanded those stripes!  I know I would have been anal retentive about that with my blue painter's tape,  so props for that!

The antique look comes from the sanding and waxing, which was the next step.  I think this is where chalk paint gets really amazing.  Because the middle picture here looks good, right?  The stencil really pops against that blue stripe, the colors contrast well.  But then...

Instant antiquing!  The legs look just fab with all that wear on them.  I love chalk paint.  We seriously need to do an Etsy round up of great chalk paint works because they are everywhere.

Thanks much to Stephanie for letting us use her photos.  You can check out the blog posts about the table in her sneak peak and finished product posts.   You can also access her blog, Southern Charm Cottage here.  You can take a look at the Chateau de Cheverny stencil here in our Feedsack category. 

Have a wonderful Memorial Day Weekend everyone.  Are you grilling?  Going to the beach?  Here in Astoria, we get flooded with campers out on the coast for the long weekend and we hide indoors.  A 5 minute trip across town will take over an hour.  Laura told me we should drive to Portland since all the city-dwellers will be gone.  :) 

See you next week!

Feature Friday: Schoolhouse Cabinet

Dear readers, I've been remiss. I've been hosting a blog for Maisondestencils for one month and I haven't mentioned Chalk Paint once. I know many, many of you are familiar with this fabulous paint. It is the perfect way to give any project an aged, slightly distressed worn look. Our feature this week comes courtesy of the fabulous blog, Lady Butterbug and it is a Chalk Paint masterpiece.

She found an old schoolhouse cabinet at a yard sale for $50 and transformed it completely. The two Chalk Paint colors used are Paris Grey and Old White. She mixed the Old White with Clear Wax and waxed over the Paris Grey.

She scraped, sanded, and used steel wool to distress the cabinet for an aged look that feels 100% authentic. She also went over the doors with Dark Wax for contrast.

For an interesting twist, our feature this week utilizes the same stencil from our last feature, the Thonet Chair.

She used Hotel L'Avenir on each door of the cabinet and stenciled with graphite.

One great tip she mentions is to use a long level for cabinets where doors are uneven (and let's face it, many antiques have quirks like this) so you can level your stencils more easily.

The finished product is really terrific. She keeps the cabinet in her Chalk Paint room as a way of demonstrating painting techniques.

Lady Butterbug's original post can be found here.
Her blog is here.
The stencil used can be found here.

Thank you very much to Lady Butterbug for use of her images.

Happy Friday!