Garage Steps Can Be Pretty Too

With the warmer weather arriving, it was high time I did something about the pathetic state our garage had fallen into during the winter months.  A couple of weekends ago, my husband and I power washed the heck out of that thing.

Do you have a power washer?  It is so choice.  If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up (name that movie!).   You could have eaten off that garage floor when we were done.

Anyway, after it was all clean, I started looking at ways I could spruce up the place aesthetically.  Is the garage immune to looking nice & pretty?  I say no.   And I had my sights set on the steps.

Here is a before picture.  So blah.  And unnecessarily so.

I went and got myself a pint of turquoise paint to match my glorious wall of bins (which I will post about soon) and painted them.  

Ah, much better already!  Even my garage can't escape my complete and utter obsession with that color.  

But I wanted them to be a little something more.  I wanted them to be personal and welcoming.  So I had Shelly at Say Anything Expressions (my fab SIL, btw) send me the negative space of some vinyl lettering for stenciling purposes.   I wanted a little saying that would make everyone who walked up those steps feel glad they were there.  (***Stencil now available in my Etsy shop!  HERE is the listing)

I lined up the phrase where I wanted it to go and then took off the backing and applied it to the steps just like I would if it were the positive space of the letters.

I then mixed these two whites (one flat and one with a little shimmer)...

And began painting/stenciling with a foam brush.

When it was (sorta) dry I peeled off the vinyl.

I think I probably should have taken my own advice and sealed it with Mod Podge or even the turquoise color first.  There were some spots where the white paint seeped under the vinyl that I needed to touch up later.  It makes sense since those steps are not exactly nice & smooth.   Learn from my mistakes, people!

But, after a little touching up and a quick shot of clear acrylic spray paint to help protect it I got this!

I finished this, made dinner and then had to run to a church meeting.  And I have to admit, even though I had done this just a couple of hours before, it was nice to read this when I got home.  Isn't that funny?  I was like "Yay!  Someone is so happy I'm home!"  I hope my kids and husband feel the same way when they get home from their various activities throughout the day.

It's the little things, right?