(Not Quite An) Ikea Hack

I was inspired by the chalk table hack over at IkeaHackers. Really inspired.

Recently, we had a dinner party and I hauled the kids' table from my son's room for the smaller kids to dine. It hadn't yet left the dining room because I've been a little distracted... I was recently using the table to take some pictures for my Etsy shop and realized the table was pretty messed up. Pondering the question "Who paints a childrens' table WHITE?", I realized that a chalkboard surface would be PERFECT for this table.

Before!

I took the sander sponge and went over the top of it lightly and then wiped it clean with a damp paper towel and left it to dry overnight. This afternoon, I dragged it outside and taped the edges off, but neglected to take the legs, etc. You can tell by the overspray. Whoops! That's a happy accident, though, because the white paint is pretty messed up and I've got some turquoise that I can hit it with later on to match the bookshelf in the boy's room.

Gratuitous product shot

I used Krylon spray chalkboard paint in "old school green" as the Helpful Guy at my locally owned hardware store called it. My son was born on St. Patrick's Day, and he loves green, so I thought "What the hey! He'll LOVE it." and you know what? I love it too. With the turquoise, it's going to look really cool.

On to the painting process. LIGHT application. Really. You don't want to over do it and leave the spray stream in one spot or it will make nasty puddles. Spray paint is one of those things that there are no shortcuts at all. Do it right or don't do it at all. I followed the instructions to the letter including the "shake can for 2 minutes after ball starts to move inside before using". It's like a "shake weight", but WAAAAAY less suggestive.

Pretty cool, huh?

After I'd gone horizontally and vertically a few times, I let the table sit and dry while I went and dealt with the dresses that I posted about earlier. Then I went back and repeated the process. Then I ate some lunch and fooled around on the internet for a while to let the paint dry completely before removing the painters tape. Let's just say I'm DEFINITELY repainting the table turquoise. ;-D

Oh and here's the Shake Weight commercial. I wasn't kidding when I said it was suggestive!

There's even a His and Hers version! OH MY.