Updating Mirrors with Spray Paint!

I was hard at work hardly working the other day and started thinking about possible new projects and what I didn't like about our house and solutions to those things.  One thing that stuck out was the mirror situation on our first floor.  We hung one old mirror I've had since my freshman year in college that I bought at the antique mall that used to be in the Lansing Factory Outlet Mall (right in between the period between when it used to be an outlet mall and its current state of ghost town) above our awesome pie safe in the living room.  It helps bounce light around from the window, but I realized I had grown weary of its dirty goldish frame.

The mirror in its home.

I decided it was time to update the mirror, help it tie into the room better, and serve as a fun splash of color by spray painting the frame a warm yellow to match our end table pet bed.  First, we took it off the wall to prep it for painting...

Here you can see the color a bit better.

And then I used some pages from one of my thousands of catalogs that arrive daily (seriously, I think we could re-side our house in catalog pages...) and my beloved Frog Tape to cover up the mirror itself.  Of course, Elliot was there to provide quality assurance...

The spray paint we went with for this project was Rust-oleum's glossy "Warm Yellow".  It's not quite as mustardy as our end table, but it was that or frightening neon yellow.

Seriously, he's always there...

Then it was out to the backyard to get a-sprayin'.  The trick is shake it up a ton (at least a minute to get started) and once you start, keep your arm moving and never just blast in one spot, or you'll end up with nasty runs and drips.  Here's the mirror after one coat:

Honestly, two coats doesn't look much different, so let's just skip to the grand reveal!

He's on the floor now since we haven't finished painting the wall where he usually lives, but look how nice it pops on the blue wall.  It looks so bright and happy!  However, as you may be able to tell, I didn't think to tape down the middle of the sheets (as you can see it lifts slightly on the previous picture) and now there's a slight dusting of yellow in places on the glass, but we'll just scrape that off gently.  Live and learn.

So, following the relative success of that project, we moved onto our second target.  We have this large guy leaning up against a wall in the hallway by our bedroom that I like to use to check myself out before heading to work, since our bedroom is too small to have one.  This mirror is a relic of Overlook and used to live in our master bathroom where the bright white trim popped against the gray walls, but for some reason, it just wasn't doing much for me here.

I hauled him over to the living room and did the same taping up (this time with packing paper to save time) and, of course, remember to tape all the seams to avoid a similar misting as the yellow mirror received.

And of course, I couldn't have done it without the assistance of three petsons.

It was back to the yard to spray him... this time with the assistance of our brand new sawhorses and a can of Rust-oleum " Lagoon".

Much easier than crouching in the dirt... and check out our bits of grass!

After one coat, we had this:

Then with another coat and some little touch-up spurts:

So shiny!

Since the Lagoon only came in a satin finish and I wanted a finish as shiny and glossy as possible, we also picked up a can of the Crystal Clear Enamel for both protection and shine.  You can't really tell much of a difference in photos, but we're so happy with the results.  It looks super bold, vivid and shiny.  Definitely an upgrade from the boring ol' white.

I absolutely love the vibrant blue and it looks awesome up against the Gossamer walls.  I think we're going to go ahead and mount it on the wall, so there's no risk of pups or kitties knocking it over.

So, we're really happy with our results and the fun pops of color they add to our house.  In case anyone out there wants to go spraying up their junk, I'd definitely recommend gloves of some sort unless you want to go to work the next day with slightly speckled blue hands.  Like I said, shaking a bunch beforehand and throughout the spraying is crucial, as is swaying the can to avoid drips.  As you'd expect, the Frog Tape worked wonderfully on the glass and pealed off nice and easy without leaving any sort of gunk behind.  We had rain here, so the mirrors couldn't sit outside to dry, but I'd also recommend leaving any spray painted pieces outside at least overnight unless you like a nice fog of VOCs lingering in your house.  Overall, it was a quick and easy project and only cost about $12 to give us two practically new mirrors.  Win!

And now for the obligatory adorable Dexter photo:

He was our little helper as we worked outside... and by "helper" I mean "dirt and moss eater", as evidenced by his little grimy beard and dogstache.  That's our baby bichon for you.  :)