Taping Jobs and Stripes

Stripes, who doesn't love em? Let me help you get a super clean paint line for those awesome stripes.

This was the very first room that I did when we moved in to our house. I was excited, as you can tell.  (No, I didn't make the beautiful quilt. My mother-in-law is a very talented quilt maker.) So I pulled some colors from the quilt (great design tip) and did my stripes.

Side note: If you don't know where to start in a room you can go to a fabric store and find something that you love and revolve your whole  room around it.You can also do the same thing with an art piece you love.

First paint your entire wall your lightest color. if you are doing a two tone grey stripe do your light grey all over then tape for your darker grey. So I did the light pink in this room.
Next measure and mark. Every foot or two I put a little pencil mark.
Now tape. When you are done get a tongue compressor a quarter  or whatever and just run it along the edge of the tape where the new color will go. To make it as tight as you can.

 (I so wish I had a pic of me up there painting. Terrifying stairs below, and over a decade of dust.)

SEAL EDGE. This is the step that is going to give you a really clean line. I saw it on an HGTV Show once. They used a clear gloss and sealed the edge. My cheapo brain thought, I don't want to buy clear gloss. So I do it another way.  I painted the green, taped, ran my tongue depressor, then I painted GREEN over top of it to seal the edge, instead of buying a whole thing of clear gloss. Then I let it dry and painted white over top of that.

Lots of steps but so worth it! Especially when we are talking your main rooms.
In my living room, kitchen and dining room I did my version of crown moulding. I love the Craftsmen Style. I love thick moulding and those details. Well I didn't have moulding but I did have paint so this is what I came up with. People always comment on it (makes me feel so giddy).

Hope this inspires you! I have a long list of things I am excited to share. Thanks for the comments and the love, it really was so unexpected and nice! I appreciate it so much!