Stenciled dining room wall

It really does pay to enter contests online. I think I had a 1 in 3400 chance at winning, not really good odds. But what the heck, I entered anyway. And I'm glad I did cause I won this: 

The contest was through Young House Love's website. I am a huge fan and read their blog daily. Yes daily. I'm obssessed. LOL. Anyway, so glad I won. I got three large stencils in all. This one in the dining room is called Allover Pattern Stencils: Moorish Trellis Large.  The walls are painted with Valspar's Blizzard Fog .  For the stencil pattern, I used Folk Art's Silver Sterling Metallic Acrylic Paint.

Before I got started I had to purchase a stenciling brush, which is basically a bristle brush that is round and flat. You can get these at any craft or art supply store.  I also picked up some stencil adhesive to keep the stencil flat against the wall.  Other supplies you'll need are a cookie sheet and a towel (for rubbing off excess paint from your brush.)

When it was time to get started, I placed the stencil at the top of the wall directly in the middle. I used a long measuring tape to measure the length of the wall to find the center.  I used masking tape to tape up my stencil.  When you start out, you're kind of surprised at how little paint you need. You're "dry" brushing as they say because you wipe off all of the paint from your brush so if you put the stencil on your hand nothing would come off.   After you dip your brush in the paint, and wipe most of it off on the towel, you use a circular motion over the stencil to apply it to the wall. You want to make sure it's not going to drip underneath the stencil that's why you wipe to much of it away.  When you complete one stencil worth, it's time to move it. These stencils from Royal Design Studio have little triangles cut out on the corners so you can line up the pattern. It's also a good idea to check it with a level just to make sure everything's straight.

This wall in the dining room took about 4 hours total to complete.  It's a nice graphic pattern, so it went pretty fast. Some stenciling jobs can take longer depending on how ornate they are. The results are wonderful. Better than wall paper which your kids are likely to pick off. Well I know I did when I was a kid. 

What do you think? We love it. Oh and you see that frame on the wall? That recently came crashing down, so now we have a blank wall again. What should we hang there?

xo

Cathleen