Almost 12 years ago, while rockin’ a very pregnant belly and kankles (those beauts that appear when pregnant while retaining enough water to fill a small reservoir), I bought these fun, striped, cork bottomed placemats. Fast forward a decade plus, to not just everyday use, but everyday use by five people over those years; two of whom believe that their food is holy water in need of being sprinkled on the congregation during Easter Sunday mass. One of the three has outgrown this, thank heavens.
before
It dawned on me that I had some great self adhesive jackalope wallpaper that hadn’t been used in a recent addition. I grabbed the six placemats that were showing their age and cleaned them really well to make sure there weren’t any traces of meals on the surfaces. Keepin’ it classy.
I had on hand:
*self adhesive wallpaper (WallsNeedLove)
*Mod Podge
*newspaper or plastic to protect surface
*white paint
*foam brush, medium size
*fine sandpaper (150)
*pen for tracing placemat on wallpaper
*scissors
*x-acto knife
Using a black pen, I traced each placemat on the back of the wallpaper, making sure that every placemat had at least one full jackalope on it. I recommend using a black or blue pen because a pencil doesn’t make a clear enough line to cut on.
Once the placemats were good and clean, I painted each one with white paint, using a foam brush. I had to apply three coats so that the stripes wouldn’t show through the wallpaper once it was placed on the placemat. This went fairly fast though. Maybe it’s the dry Idaho air that made the drying time happen speedy quick. Ha.
Peeling the backing off the top of the traced and cut out wallpaper, I lined it up with the top of each placemat, stuck it on at the top and then peeled the rest of the backing off of the wallpaper as I secured it to the rest of the mat. I made sure to press out any air bubbles once the wallpaper was adhering to the mats, then brushed on a light layer of Mod Podge around the edges, followed by a light layer on the top of each placemat. Once these were dry (thank you again dry Idaho air), any rough edges were lightly sanded. Some edges called for the x-acto knife if the wallpaper was not flush with the mat, a bit more light sanding and finally, another light layer of Mod Podge.
after
I think these placemats turned out fun! Little Lady, Little Red and Little Man think they’re “cute”, “funny” and “magical” (comments not in any specific order)! Mister likes them because they look a whole lot better than how they previously were. Even for Mister being a complete guy with maybe only 10% metrosexual in his makeup, he was beyond insinuating how the former placemats needed to go hang with the angels. Oh, wait! What’s that? Oh! I hear the angels clapping and telling me, way to get my craft on!
This was a fun and easy project to do! Therefore, if you have some placemats that have seen happier days, go snag some self adhesive wallpaper, the needed supplies and craft on, baby!
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