Now on to my homemade chalk paint hutch makeover.   This is what I started with (please ignore the green painting tape):

As you can see it just faded into the wood logs behind it, and the detail on the piece was totally lost.

First up, I painted the interior with the blue FAT PAINT that I had for my vanity. Much better.

Now onto the exterior, I decided to paint it a soft yellow.  And as luck would have it, I had some leftover builders’ paint from our basement in a soft yellow.  Now off to find a chalk paint recipe, this time I wanted to try a homemade recipe.

Here’s the chalk paint recipe that I found here.

I mixed it all in a bowl and then poured the completed paint in a mason jar.  I kept this tightly closed and poured only a small amount in a tray as I was painting, so it didn’t become too thick.  I used a small foam roller and a bristle brush to get into the corners.

Now I’ll tell you what I did wrong….sigh….I used builders’ paint, my first mistake.  The paint was thin to begin with and barely thickened up with the plaster of paris. And my second mistake, the colour was too light.  See below.

Looks too much like cream instead of yellow.  And the paint is just not covering, even after 3 coats!  As per instructions for working with chalk paint, I didn’t sand the piece AT ALL!  And you saw how dark it was, well if I was to do it over, I would definitely give it at least a light sanding as it was taking many coats to cover the dark wood finish.

So back to the drawing board, or paint store, I should say.  I went with a much brighter yellow…

I mixed up some more chalk paint with the new yellow and now it is beginning to look a lot more like I envisioned.

Much better!

I did give the piece a light sanding before I started with the second yellow.  I don’t know if that helped or not as it still took another 3 coats to cover the piece completely.  So 6 coats in total! YIKES! As I said, I would definitely give it a sanding before I started next time and I’m thinking that FAT PAINT worked much better for covering a dark piece. I didn’t have any trouble with coverage of my library table (but I had sanded most of it, except for the barley twists on the legs).  Click here to see that makeover.

After letting the paint dry for 24 hours, I started waxing.  I used FAT PAINT’s clear and antique wax. I love this wax.  It goes on easily and is easy to work with. It gives such a beautiful sheen.

I love how the apron and leg detail show up now in the lighter colour.

I applied a coat of clear wax first, and then a very light coat of the antique wax and once it was dry, gave it all a buffing with a clean cloth.  The sheen is so lovely on waxed furniture!

VOILA!

It just pops from the wall now and looks so much better.  Sorry for the faded out photos, it’s very hard to take a clear photo here as there is a large window right beside the hutch.

Next project, the matching buffet which I use in the entrance of the cottage.  Stay tuned…..

And an apology if you were trying to get on my site this past weekend, there had been so many visitors that my site crashed!  Wow, I never would have imagined that happening, so a big thank you for visiting and keep coming, we’ve fixed it so it won’t happen again.

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I’m linking this post up to the Power of Paint at Domestically Speaking. Click here to check out all the other fabulous paint projects.