$8 Chalkboard- Holla!

Thank you for all your sweet comments and/or questions about my chalkboard! I really love it and have enjoyed using it thus far during my pregnancy. Soon after finding out I was pregnant, I went to ICM and picked up this old frame.

Here is a step by step tutorial of how I made the old frame into an adorable chalkboard!

Here is the "after" of the chalkboard. I painted the glass and also the frame itself.

Ok, so this is what the chalkboard looked like when I bought it. It was pretty old and dusty. It had probably been in there a while... The backing had a cardboard and paper backing that would have been a little difficult to remove...So I decided to take the easy route and tape the frame off then prime and paint chalkboard paint directly onto the glass.

It was marked at $16.00, but it was "all frames are half-off day", so I got it for $8+tax, not too shabby!

I was planning on painting the frame a neutral color (a nice off-white or light grey), but really liked the gold on THIS FRAME found at Miss Mustard Seed's site. After seeing that beautiful frame, I knew I wanted to keep the frame gold. I loved the contrast between the bright gold and the stark black of the chalkboard. Instead of having to paint the frame, I tried using metallic touch-up pens on the frame. The gold wasn't the exact same color, but you would have had to look very close to tell the difference. Since I figured no one would be examining my frame that closely, I touched it up with the pens and moved on.

Next step in the process was to tape off the outside so I could paint the glass. I used just regular painter's tape to attach some extra paper I had lying around. The paper helped to keep any stray paint off the frame while I painted. I thought I had some primer left over from another project but really did not, so I ended up using some flat finish black spray paint to prime the glass. I did about 3 coats, letting it dry between each coat. Here it is after the primer.

 (**Side Note** you can see all the cypress that Hubby will use very soon for his outdoor kitchen in the back of these photos! Who is excited about that?! Oh, just me? Well never mind...)

And here it is after 3 coats of chalkboard paint. It was still wet, so please excuse the shine on the board... I used valspar chalkboard paint. The paint tells you to wait 24 hours between coats, but who has the time or patience for that? I waited about 3 hours and it was perfectly dry between coats. You will also read on the internet that you must "prime" the chalkboard by rubbing chalk all over it before you use it for the first time. I have done this in the past and it made my chalkboard look messy and the while bits never came off. This time I did not prime the chalkboard, and I have written on it twice now and the chalk comes off nicely with just a wet rag.

 I didn't take a picture of this, but when I removed the tape, the gold paint from the frame came off as well :( bummer. I had some folk art acrylic paint lying around the house so I used that and a sponge brush to paint the frame itself. The "new" gold was a little more muted than the original and I actually ended up liking it better.

Anndddd here is the finished product! This was the first message we wrote on the board and used it in our announcement blog post about our pregnancy! I love the way it came out. Painting directly on the glass made the paint super smooth and makes it very easy to clean as well. I most definitely was inspired to make my chalkboard from the lovely Jessica @ Little Baby Garvin. Check her out for her own chalkboard tutorial and her weekly pregnancy and baby updates as well!

Thanks for stopping by! If you make your own chalkboard, let me know how it turns out! Weekly pregnancy updates start Tomorrow!!! :)