Hello Youtube friends and welcome to my channel if you're new here my name's Deidre from our upcycled
life and i do lots of diy content thrifting upcycling repurposing if you like that kind
of stuff we'd love to have you follow along so make sure you like subscribe and hit the bell
for notifications so you don't miss any great diy content today I'm going to show you how you can
make your chalk painted projects or furniture have a nice smooth finish sometimes when you're working
with chalk paint it can have a grainy texture or you can have your brush strokes that kind of
show through and I'm going to show you a little tip that can kind of eliminate a lot of that and
it's a simple easy technique so today I'm going to show you how you can do that one easy step
let's get started okay for this project you're going to need a little dish of water and I'm using
my homemade chalk paint you can use any kind of chalk paint or this will even work on your baking
soda paint and I'm using a really good paint brush i really like this Wooster it works really
good and if you're using a cheap paintbrush you'll get a lot more brush strokes so invest in a good
paint brush when you're using some chalk paint and you want to dip your paint brush in water
you want to start painting with a moist paint brush before you put it in your chalk paint
it just helps the chalk paint kind of smooth over your project a little bit better
um and you just want to put a liberal coat over your [ __ ] project now i actually got this um
cupboard door out of the landfill i saw it i knew it would make a wonderful sign
so i scrubbed it up with soap and water let it dry thoroughly and if you're using chalk paint
you don't have to prep it before you don't have to sand it or anything you're just ready to paint
away so I'm just gonna paint every which way you don't have to worry about brush lines or strokes
every which way and put a good coat over the whole project
now when I'm working on a project i like to pour the chalk paint that I'm going to be using
into a separate container i don't like to use it right out of the jar that it came in or what i
made it in because when you're introducing extra water into it it could make the paint go bad and
rancid and sometimes you'll get a really bad smell if you've ever noticed that and it's usually from
contaminating it with the water so put it in a separate container before you start painting
okay the first coat is completely dried and now I'm putting on a second coat
same way no system just paint all over you don't need to go in a certain direction
okay i let this dry completely and now I'm putting a third coat on i probably didn't need
a third coat but i just wanted to make sure i had really good coverage to show you this technique
okay i hope you can see this there's some grainy spots
and lots of brush marks so let's get started and get rid of these
what you're going to need is a dish of water and a very fine sanding block this is 220
and we want to polish the top of that chalk painted surface without removing any paint
it'll remove all of the rough surface and it'll give it more shine so you're just going to dip it
right into the water until it's moist and then you're going to sand down your whole project
and go back and forth in all kinds of different directions it doesn't have to really be a pattern
and as you're scrubbing away with this sanding block you'll start to see the brush marks fade
and you'll start to see any little granular bits kind of get sanded away and if you find
that it's getting a little bit dry you can dip it back into the water and then keep sanding
and I'm just going to take a rag and wipe away any of that dust that I've created or any little bits
that have kind of gotten into the corners here and make sure it's nice and clean and just sand again
until you start to see that you're getting that nice smooth finish that you're looking for this
process will not work with latex paint because latex paint has a plastic base to it so it already
has that kind of shiny sheen to it this will work on chalk paint or on your baking soda paint
and once again I'm just going to take the rag and just get rid of all those little bits of dust
now this just took a couple minutes of sanding and you'll see already how much of an improvement
it's made just using that sanding block that's just a little bit damp to wet sand your project
okay last step grab some packing paper something that doesn't have any color in it you want a plain
color crumple it up into a ball and you're going to rub it all over your whole project and that
packing paper is going to work like a polisher and it's going to finish off your project
really nice which you didn't get with the sanding block it'll finish it off with this
paper the packing paper works almost like the finest sandpaper that you can buy and it's a lot
cheaper than buying sandpaper if you just have packing paper and you can use it for this step
and look how nice and smooth it worked it has just finished off this cabinet door perfectly
now if you know me in my projects i like everything to be rustic and distressed so
i took this outside and i took my hand sander to it and i distressed all around the edges
and i think it looks fabulous nice smooth chalk painted
finish with a nice distressed edge and I'm ready to finish off my project
now I'm going to turn this into a sign doing my mod podge reverse graphic transfer if you haven't
seen me do any of this I'll put a link up here above in the card or down below in the description
it's a really easy technique and you can create so many wonderful signs you don't need stencils
and you don't need a Cricut and you just print off your graphic on a laser jet printer apply your mod
podge let it sit overnight rub it off and you'll have an amazing graphic on your project okay this
is sad overnight I'm just taking a damp rag I'm just wetting that paper until you can start to
see the graphics come through and then we're ready to rub off the paper and as you're rubbing off the
paper you will expose your graphics and it'll look wonderful and here's the finished sign nice smooth
chalk painted finish i added a really beautiful graphic and you have a wonderful sign for your
home so give this technique a try and good luck with your project thanks so much for watching
today's video and if you have any questions or comments leave them down below i love to read
them I'll be sharing so many more diy thrifting repurposing videos so if you aren't already
following along make sure to hit that subscribe button and the notification bell and that will
let you know when i upload my next video see you real soon take care and have a great day