Saturday, January 3, 2015

She Wanted Concrete Floors

     Happy 2015! We are looking ahead joyfully and expectantly to whatever the year has in store for this crazy family!  

We've not been here in awhile so let's get reacquainted.
     We are a mom and her girls who have love for anything creative, DIY, and thrifty. It usually takes the whole team to complete any project: Tyler {oldest} has an eye for design and is our color and graphics expert, Jessica {middle} has creative vision and keeps us organized and on track, and Tori {baby girl} is our resident prankster/comic relief as well as wielding a pretty mean paintbrush.  She's currently a missionary to the Sakalava people of Madagascar, but will rejoin us in October.  I'm the mom to the three and my husband, Clay, and I are also very blessed with awesome sons-in-law and 2 beautiful grandsons.  I bring years of paint expertise to the mix.
     
Here's what we are so excited to share!  

Faux stained concrete floors painted in 6 hours for less than $250!
From this~

 to this!


So, let's get started.

     Middle daughter, Jessica, and her husband, Russell, have bought a cute little newlywed farmhouse and it needs lots of love.  So she says, "I want stained concrete floors!", and proceeds to rip up the carpet in their bedroom. We have a little problem with just going for it sometimes.  Unfortunately, the concrete floor underneath the carpet is terribly splotchy with ugly stains on it, so it can't be repaired. But Jess is determined to find a way and her tenacity pays off. Our 6 hour project soon produces an unbelievable result!

     Jess researches staining concrete and it involves lots of messy and toxic steps we don't want to deal with.  Her solution for a quick, inexpensive and easy fix? "Let's paint the concrete to look like concrete!" Great.  Bring on the team.

     Tyler chooses this palette from Behr which we are immediately in love with.  The girl has a color sense that is unparalleled!  What we find is that it's the perfect combo of colors to resemble real concrete!



     Jess gets all three colors mixed at Home Depot in Behr Porch and Patio Floor Paint in a low lustre finish.  Most rooms will need:

  •  1 gallon of the lightest color, Pebbled Path, for basecoating
  • 1 quart of each of the remaining two colors, Tarnished Silver and Tar Black, for glazing (the link will take you to gallons, but at least you'll know what you need!)



Then she and Russell get busy cleaning and prepping.  They sand a few rough places, vacuum, sweep and vacuum again.

{see the problem? staining wouldn't have been pretty on this surface.}

     Jess rolls on a coat of Zinsser Primecoat 2 and lets it dry overnight.


Then she rolls on the base coat which is the lightest of the three called Pebbled Path.  Such a pretty color even all by itself!  And it looks like plain concrete!


     She ends up letting that dry overnight as well.  Although this project took several days to complete, the actual time spent was only about 6 hours.

     Next comes the glazing which is what Jess needs me for.  All the years with my painted finish business aren't wasted~  it all stays with you and seriously, you never know when one of your offspring might need a floor done.  Once we do a bit of the project, though, she is confident that she could DIY this!

We mix 4 parts glaze to 1 part paint, but with a twist!


We pour 4 parts glaze into a disposable metal baking pan.  Then we drizzle 1/2 part of the Tarnished Silver paint on top, then drizzle 1/2 part of the Tar Black on top of that.  There is no set pattern, just drizzle back and forth.  The pan pictured above was after we had dipped into it a few times.

Here's how we measure: small sized plastic disposable bathroom cups.  Fancy.


Pour 4 cups glaze into the baking pan, then drizzle 1/2 cup of each of the two paint colors on top.  You will remake this mixture many, many, many times throughout the process depending on how large a room you are working on.

Now for the very high level and only for pros supplies to apply the glaze. Yes, we're letting you in on our fabulous little trade secret!
  • plastic grocery sacks {free}
  • duster refill pads {$5 for 10 at Dollar General, their brand}


Jess and I work as a team and I have to say, this really helps to make it go faster.

Jess dips the bag in the drizzled glaze/paint mixture and dabs it in about a 2 ft x 2 ft area.  Then I follow behind with a swiffer pad,patting and softening as we go,


We work from the outside corners toward the door.  Plan ahead so you have a way to escape without stepping all over your wet floors!


{my cute Jess}

If your pattern begins to look to stripey, make sure you make some areas wider and some narrower, making a rhythm in the patting of the glaze.

Once finished, you can take the glazing mixture and fill in some areas if needed.  See pics below to see where it looked like a stripe in the top one and I went back and widened some of the areas with  more glaze, dabbing on with a grocery bag and softening with a swiffer pad.



Finally, Russell rolls on two coats of sealer...

{thanks Russell. nice hands.}

And DONE!




It's a good idea to wait 24 hours for paint and sealer to dry, and 48 hours before moving furniture back in.  Always keep felt pads on furniture legs when placing on painted floors.

We hope you've been inspired with the ease of this project. It turned out even better than expected!
Happy painting!
Y.