Stripes Ahoy!

So, I have always always always been afraid of painting any kind of stripes...but this time I was willing to try it because I though it would compliment my dream of doing a monkey/pirate room for my little boy, Maddox. :-) 

The mister and I went to work and after some thoughts on "measuring and penciling" stripes and making sure the lines were straight (and my anxiety getting OUT of control thinking about crooked lines) I decided to use something cause a chalk liner to help us have the perfect straight line to use our blue painters tape. 

I am posting pics and directions below as well as things the mister and I realized we should do and should NOT do...enjoy!

Supplies Needed:

- Chalk Line Reel

- Blue Painters Tape

- Measuring Tape

- Pencil

- Current wall paint color

- New paint color for stripes

Step 1: Decide how wide or skinny you want your stripes. I decided to do some different sizes and I decided to do horizontal stripes to make the room seem wider. If you feel like you need to add some height to the room, do vertical. :-) 

Step 2: After deciding how large/small/thick/skinny you want your stripes to be, bust out your trusty measuring tape and measure (for example 12 inches) from the top of the ceiling or previous stripe. Measure and make 3 marks long the wall. 

Step 2: Measure! 

Step 3: After making 3 marking across to make sure your chalk line will be in the right space and straight, take your awesome and amazing chalk line reel (you'll need a helper for this one!) and your helper goes to one side of the room and you go to the other. Both of you hold the chalk reel and make sure the line is taught and lines up with the 3 markings and.....(my favorite part)....SNAP THAT CHALK LINE BABY!!!! It creates this amazing and SUPER straight blue chalk line! Your chalk reel and painters tape will look like this:

       

Step 4: After you snap those chalk lines, grab your blue painters tape and SLOWLY and carefully follow the chalk line and press the blue tape against the chalk line. Repeat until all your lines are chalked and taped! After all your lines are taped, take a credit (oops sorry Dave Ramsey...) take your DEBIT card or library card or whatever and smooth out any and all bubbles/lines/snags etc from the tape. This will help ensure smooth, perfect lines. Your tape will now look like this:

Step 4 (my mister is amazing!)

Step 4

Step 5: Here is where your current wall/paint color comes in handy! This may seem tedious and like too much extra work but it makes the WORLD of difference in clean, crisp and perfect stripes! Take your current paint color and take a cut-in brush and brush every single edge of painters tape. What this does is seal the edges of the painters tape where you might have missed. That way any leaks, bubbles or bleeding happens with the current paint color instead of the new one that you'll be painting. This creates the perfect line. Your wall should now resemble this: 

Step 5

Step 5 (looks bad but it's SO good!)

Step 6: Now is the moment!!! It's here!! Time to add your fabulous colors to your stripes!! We added multiple colors and we planned it out ahead of time so we didn't make a crazy mistake the day of! ha! Anyway...I let our paint dry 4 hours before peeling off the tape. When you peel off the tape peel away and down at a 45 degree angle to ensure no paint coming off with the tape. :-) And for the reveal....

Step 6- YAY! 

Step 6 - BOOM! Victory!

So folks...there ya have it!! Fabulous stripes...not too many tears or hair pulling...and his room looks AMAZING!!!! Thanks for reading....I am posting the rest of Maddox's Pirate room reveal in a few! 

Love you all! Muah!

Anna & the Mister :-)