Art of the Dot

I love clothing. More importantly, I love clothing that makes you feel confident and happy and stylish. I love following trends but also making my own rules. I love mixing expensive pieces with department store bargains. I love stripes. I love bold colors. I love vintage finds and accessories. I love shoes and right now, I love polka dots!

If you haven’t taken a second to notice, polka dots are everywhere. I’m not sure if it’s the simplicity of the dots or the innocence they portray but I love them. They make me smile and feel carefree and yet somehow bring together a bit of sophistication if worn correctly. Here are a few shots of some fun pieces that are floating around.

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Don’t you love it?! If you’ve never worn polka dots before I challenge you to buy something and you’ll see just how carefree it can make you feel! Now, while I can go on and on about clothes and accessories and all things that make a woman feel pretty there is a project somewhere in all of this and guess what it has to do with?….have you figured it out? It’s Polka Dots!!

You see, at one point this summer I was checking out some of my favorite thrift stores when I made a purchase at one of them. To be honest, I don’t remember what it was, all I remember was that when I got home I realized that my change did not match the total cost. The next day I went back to get my money and LOOONG story short I ended up taking home a cute bamboo tray for hardly anything.

This tray has been sitting on my desk waiting for a makeover but I just wasn’t inspired by anything until a few dots entered my life. It is often said that a woman’s home is a direct reflection of her wardrobe. Ok, maybe that isn’t often said and maybe I heard it once or made it up but I swear it’s true. If you are someone who can take risks with their wardrobe then why not with the way you decorate your home. So with that said it was time for me to dot this baby up!

The first thing I did was wrap the handles up in painters tape so that they wouldn’t get paint on them and then took it outside (a well ventilated area). I primed (without sanding…watch out this chick is dangerous!) and painted it in a glossy white.

Once it was dry (I waited 24 hours) I brought it inside and went on a search for the perfect dot. I decided to use a pencil eraser. The only problem was that all the pencils I had had erasers that were used up. Apparently I make tons of mistakes!!

Lucky for me one of the erasers was flat enough that it made the perfect circle and why yes, it was Papa Smurf that saved the day. Isn’t that always the case? So I grabbed my black acrylic paint and made a little puddle on my paper and dipped the eraser in and lightly tapped it on the tray.

{My advice would be to practice first on paper. I found that adding a good amount of paint and a quick tap insured a perfect dot. If you take too much paint off before the tap then you end up with only an outlined dot}

There was no rhyme or reason to the placement of the dots. I just tried to space them as evenly as possible. Once all the dots were done I took it outside again and sprayed it with a water based polyacrylic that I have to seal it.

{A little before and after shot shall we…}