Painting outdoor cushions!

Several years ago I bought some cushions for my rocking chairs on my front porch.  The first year I brought them inside for the fall-spring to keep them safe.  The next year...notsomuch. I got lazy and just left them out all winter.  Then we moved to the farm and I put them on the rockers knowing that they were faded and not what I wanted anymore but that I would think about it later.

 

"Later" came this summer!  I did some searching on pinterest for ideas about how to revive old cushions.  These are not the chairs we use often.  We rarely sit on our front porch (not sure why, but we always go to the back deck) so I knew I didn't want to dump more money into them.  When I looked into recovering them (which my mom could easily do, she is very talented) I found that outdoor fabric (or anything thick for this purpose) was not cheap!  I would be better off to buy new ones.  But they were perfectly fine other than the fading, so I refused to replace them.

Enter...outdoor latex paint! Don't you just love pinterest!?  Jason says no.  But I say yes!  I found this blog 11magnolialane and thought, that seems easy enough!  I really liked that she was using a paint sprayer.  I have a friend that has a paint sprayer so I texted her and asked her if she liked it before I headed to Lowe's to check them out.  When she offered to let me try it for myself, I couldn't say no!  Thanks, Kala! ;o)

First I had to clean off the old ones.  I chose not to spray these off because I wanted to paint them ASAP, plus they were not super filthy.

Always a zoo on the farm!

So turns out I have what I have called DIY ADHD.  When I was thinking about painting the cushions, I knew I couldn't put them on my horribly chipped and chewed on chairs!  So I needed to sand and paint them, too. 

Then that led to me thinking about the pots next to the chairs - those were old and covered in white stuff.  Again, not something worth replacing, just not pretty any more.

We don't have lava rock yet, so ignore my landscaping!

 I headed to garage and found some spray paint that I thought would work perfectly!  Score!

Super easy and worth the little effort.  But why paint them up if they don't have anything pretty to show off?  So I needed to plant.  I already had some ferns inside my pots but wanted some more color.  I added impatiens and coleus.  I like to use a smaller pot inside to take up space but also help with drainage. 

This year I've turned into a soil snob!  I love using my composted horse manure.  It has aged at least 6 months and is the prettiest dirt you have ever seen.  I like to mix it in with my potting soil.  Josie only grazes in one small part of our field and she eats hay, so her manure is perfect for planting.  I do notice she seems to judge me when I'm scooping it up, though...

Once I planted those, it was time to start sanding.  I didn't take any pictures of that process.  But believe me, it is boring.  I used a hand held sander and sanding block.  Just to get the loose paint off the white chairs. I didn't intend to really perfect them.Wiped them down and got them read to be primed. 

 Look at my fancy painting area.  Yeah, right!  I sat up in the front yard like a true red neck.  What you can't see is my half naked child playing behind me.  But just know, she is there...

That IS a fancy paint spraying machine, though!

I used Kilz primer.  Because I had it on hand.  And you can't go wrong with Kilz.

I let the chairs and cushions dry for a few hours in the hot sun.  Thankfully it was (only!) about 88 on this day.  I gave them one coat of the white gloss paint and then let them dry overnight.

The paint sprayer is easy to use, but cleaning it MUST be thorough for it to work.  So lots of my time was spent doing that!

You can see this table is damage from water and the dogs. 

A few days later I finally got the time to paint the cushions black.  It took two coats after the white primer, but was an easy job.   I chose a basic outdoor paint from Lowes.  With the sprayer I used a 1:1 ratio of paint and water.  I sprayed thin coats and used a tiny brush in the creases of the cushions to make sure paint reached it all.  The heat helped them dry quickly! 

The texture of the dried paint is sort of stiff, but not awful.  Again, these are not cushions we use often.  I know some people have added stuff to the paint/water combo that has helped the softness factor.  I like that they can be sprayed off and the pet fur doesn't really stick to them.

Not perfect, but much better!

I had it my head that I wanted black and white wide stripe pillows.  Thought they would be easy to find.  Wrong!!  So I started searching for shower curtains or other types of fabric to use for pillows.  Found these thick reversible placemats at Bargain Hunt and knew they would be perfect!  13 dollars would get me 2 pillows. Score!  Mom sewed them for me on her machine.  She's so smart she did one side of each pattern on a pillow so I could change them up and have 2 of each pattern at a time.

I had some old pillows in the building that I cut open and stole the stuffing!  Again, using things I have on hand because I'm cheap.

I found the hot pink hydrangea at Lowes.

I still have work to do on the front entrance (possibly using paint gun again!) but for now I am very pleased with the project I finally completed!