Painting my door and stenciling a rug for my front porch!!

I painted my front door!

It used to be this brown color. This picture is a couple years old and you can see even then there were some nicks in the paint. Suffice to say -- it needed a new paint job pretty badly!! 

I decided to go with black because it's classic. But my porch needed something to go with the new paint job. I have loved Cutting Edge Stencil's Houndstooth Stencil from the first moment I saw it.

So I thought it might be fun to stencil a houndstooth rug for my porch!! 

Cutting Edge Stencils sent me one of their amazing Houndstooth Stencils as part of The DIY Club.  Then I headed down to my local hardware store and found an indoor/outdoor rug for $19.99! So I brought that home and got to work. 

The first thing that I did was I taped the edges of the rug. Since the rug was a different size than the stencil, I wanted a nice, crisp border going around the edges of the rug. 

Then I started stenciling at one corner of the rug. I used the same paint that I used to paint my front door. And I also used a foam roller.  

**One tip I recommend is to have a piece of newspaper handy to roll the excess paint from the roller before you roll it onto the rug. 

**Another tip is to not push too much on the stencil as you roll - it can stretch. 

I pushed a little too much and it made my lines a little wonky, but overall I really love my new rug! 



It makes such a stylish statement!!

Shelley made me a really cute House Number vinyl, but it's been so cold that I haven't been able to put it on yet :)

Have a great day!!

xoxo



PS -- It has been so fun to see YOUR favorite projects of 2011. I have spent the last few days going over them and they are amazing!!! I will be wrapping up my favorites tonight and announcing who won the custom brooch!