There are two expanses of brick wall on either side of our front door. I have tried a few different ways of breaking up the space and making it look more decorated, but since brick doesn’t play well with nails or 3M strips most of those attempts have failed. When I found wood stars at Target, I had the idea of grouping them together to create decorations that would fill one of those blank spaces. The star shape fits in well with the Americana look of our porch in the summer, but the color needed an update. I had a great time playing with chalk paint to make these distressed wooden Americana stars.
DISTRESSED WOODEN AMERICANA STARS
WHAT YOU NEED TO MAKE DISTRESSED WOOD STARS
The key to getting the distressed paint finish of these stars is to use chalk paint. Chalky paint dries extremely quickly. The short work time allows you to use multiple colors of paint with little downtime in between layers. Chalk paint also dries to a pretty matte finish, which is very appropriate for a distressed Americana project.
NOTE: I found these wooden stars at Target a few years back, so you likely won’t be able to find the exact same stars anymore. You can find other wooden stars in your local craft store or online.
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- chalk paint
- wood stars
- sandpaper
- paintbrush
HOW TO MAKE AMERICANA STARS
The stars I used had a light blue finish on them when I bought them from Target, but I really wanted them to match the other painted decorations on our front porch. For this star, I began by lightly sanding the blue finish down, then I added a coat of deep red chalk paint. After it dried, I sanded that paint down and applied a coat of white. I allowed that layer to dry, and then I sanded once again, making sure all three layers of paint were visible.
I repeated that process on this star with a light blue chalk paint followed by a medium blue paint.
Finally, this star was painted with the medium blue paint and the deep red chalk paint, then distressed the same way.
I added some nails to the wood trim near our porch ceiling and hung the stars from long lengths of twine. For $9 worth of wooden stars and some paint that I had on hand, I was able to add some one-of-a-kind, patriotic decor to our already Americana-themed front porch!
You might like these other chalky paint projects:
WET DISTRESSED CHALKY FINISH TABLE
[…] A few weeks ago I was on a Target run when I spotted some AMAZING items in the the dollar spot. I got a little grabby as I snatched up the things I wanted most. I mean, there were other ladies shopping the spot and they only had so many of each item so… I panicked. But these wooden stars were too perfect to pass up. They were all originally a sea blue color which was very pretty, but not what I was looking for. I will be telling you more about their paint makeover later this week. […]