A Few Fun Painting Projects in the Bathroom

The bathroom update was initially intended to be a very simple one.  Just swap out the toilet and the vanity and move on.  But when we took out the old vanity, the new one was a slightly different size, which also meant that the walls needed to either be touched up, or repainted.

After assessing my touch up paint situation, I didn't have enough on had for what we needed.  So, I found a half gallon of Behr's Burnished Metal, which we had also used in the guest bedroom and one of the boy's bedrooms as well.  The walls were painted quickly and the update was extremely simple.  Too simple for me....

The stripe lover in me instantly wanted to wrap the entire room in stripes.  But having done typical stripes in the past, I didn't want to go down the same path and have every room begin to look like it is on repeat.  So, I went with stripes around the entire bathroom, but this time they were much more subtle.

I will get back to the stripes in a moment, but I thought I would also share another quick and easy painting project we are adding to the mix as well.

I found a new toy and I have been so freaking excited to try it out.  It is the Critter spray gun and I purchased the tool after looking at easier, brush stroke free painting options and reading reviews.  Seemed like the perfect way to turn any paint color into spray paint!

I am hoping that this little spray gun will be all sorts of fun with upcoming projects, but decided to start small to get the hang of it.  After we recently painted the stripes on the stool in our bathroom with a coral pink color, I knew that the same color would be great for the house numbers I purchased for above the kiddo's towel hooks.  The new spray gun would also me to spray paint the house numbers and give them a nice professional finish.

Not wanting the coral paint to drip, I started by spraying the numbers with a single coat of white spray primer.  This was to give the coral paint something to adhere to.

Once the primer was dry, we hooked up the spray gun to our compressor.  I couldn't have been easier, and once the pressure built up, we did a small adjustment to the nozzle and it started spraying beautifully.

And for fun, because I am always curious to see things working in action, I took a video with my phone while Bryan lightly sprayed thin coats of paint over the house numbers.

Critter Paint Sprayer from Jen Jones on Vimeo.

Then I stole the gun and finished the numbers myself, as I was eager to give this new toy a whirl.  I am deeply, madly in love.

While the numbers were drying, I went back to the bathroom stripes.  As we typically do when painting stripes, we measure down from the ceiling and mark of 12" strips.

Now, if you are all about working smarter, not harder, then you would tape these off before you installed hooks and a vanity.  The stripes were a complete impulsive after-thought, so yeah.... we had a few things to tape around.

I know I have mentioned it in the past {here and here}, and that many of you are already aware of this trick, but it always is worth repeating.  To get the perfect edge when painting stripes, always go back over the edge of your tape with the original wall color first.  Once that layer is dry, it will create a really solid lock and prevent the new color from seeping beneath the taped lines.

Now, for the extremely subtle effect I was after.  Home Depot had put their Martha Stewart metallic glaze on clearance, so I snagged up two at $2.10 each.  I already had a large can of Faux Finishing Glaze on hand from another project, and figured that mixing the metallic glaze with the finishing glaze, I could stretch the amount of paint needed to fill all of the stripes without worry of running out.

In an empty paint bucket, I mixed two containers of the Metallic Glaze with equal parts of the Faux Finishing Glaze.  I used a stir stick to mix and mix and mix some more.

I started by cutting in at the ceiling and around the room with an angled brush.  The first thing I noticed was that it was really hard to tell where I had already painted.  But I kept on going until all of the cutting in was finished.

I then used a small roller to roll the remainder of the stripes.  Ready to see the huge difference a little metallic glaze made to the room?

Womp womp right?  This is one of those moments where I question my time management skills.  Did I just waste taping hours and painting hours on what was supposed to be subtly awesome?

But, I waited and hoped that once the paint dried a bit, that it would become more noticeable.  And the more I looked around the room, the more I really started to notice the difference in the sheen between the original wall and the glazed stripes {the original wall was done in an eggshell finish}.

So, I pulled the tape.

It is really hard to photograph with bad lighting in a windowless bathroom, but I tried to find an angle in which you can really see that there was a difference in the finish.  I love that the stripes glimmer in the light, exactly the effect I was after.

And another view with the painted coral house numbers above the new chunky towel hooks {which were Pottery Barn hooks found on eBay}.

We still have to swap out the outlets and light switch with white versions and re-install the mirror and accessorize.  But once that is done, I will take more detailed photos of the room all finished and share the final result of this sort of quick little update by the end of the week {fingers crossed}.  I also realized after looking at these photos again, that my camera picked up a few places that need extra touch-ups.  Funny how that works.

So, two simple paint projects that added a little extra love to this room.  Have you found a new tool that you are gaga over?  Or have you been playing with any new paint techniques?

**** UPDATE ****  I have had multiple painting snafu's this week, and it all started by touching up areas of the beautiful glimmer stripes and quickly went downhill from there.  Because I mixed two glaze paints, it became extremely finicky and couldn't be matched.  This caused many new sets of brush marks and areas that needed even more touching up only to completely ruin a good thing...  I will be back with all of the details as soon as I can, but just wanted to caution anyone trying this to blend your edging and rolling all at once to prevent odd streaking and blotching.