How to Paint a Rug - Part 2...the Big Reveal!

It's time to finish up my painted rug! As I mentioned in a previous post, my dining table is 9ft long and expands to 12 ft, so I purchased two Ikea rugs with the plan to stitch them together. 

Many of you know I'm an HGTV-junkie, and consequently I've seen Sarah, Candice, and even David (yep, we're on a first name basis) stitch rugs together countless times. How hard could it be?

Famous. Last. Words.

Ok, it wasn't necessarily hard as much as it was tedious and time-consuming. I had to bust out my thimble, which made pushing my needle through the rugs much easier. I'm sure a heavier duty needle would have made the job even easier, but I decided to just tough it out with what I had.

I started by lining the rug edges up together. You may recall that one of my rugs was an inch shorter than the other. I started sewing the edges that did not line up. By doing this I was able to stretch the short rug so that the seam would be.....um....seamless. I spent a lot of time reinforcing the stitch on the edge to make sure it would hold up long-term.

Then I started making the long journey down the width of the rug....up close, you can obviously see the seam, but when you stand further back it's less noticeable and will be even less noticeable once it's under my dining table.

And so, I sewed and sewed until the rug was done. Whilst sewing, I was able to get a good look at the paint job, which had been dry for several days. At that point, I made the executive decision to apply a second coat of paint. I had hoped to avoid more painting, but the color wasn't as deep as I wanted in certain spots. I figured a light second coat of paint should do the trick. And it did!

Of course, Aybee ran all over the rug like a crazy person, causing me to run to the kitchen for Folex and paper towels. Argh. Luckily, my beloved Folex took care of the blue feet marks Aybee left on my white stripes (again).

It's a bit difficult to see the difference in color in the picture below, but in person the color is much more consistent and the blue is deeper and richer. Yay!!

And, now it's time for the big reveal.....To refresh your memory, here's the OLD rug. I never liked how it brought the energy level of the room down. 

BEFORE

Adios old rug!!

And here's the NEW rug:

After these pictures were taken, I ended up adding one of my table leaves to the table, adding an additional 9-10 inches of over-hang to either end of the table. 

Now that I've successfully painted a rug, I think one of my next projects will be to paint my dining chairs. Yep.....PAINT the dining chairs. I got these chairs on super sale from Overstock.com so I didn't have much choice in the color. I'm thinking a light/medium grey with brushed brass nail-head trim will work much better in the room. I found a great upholstered-chair-painting tutorial on Pinterest. I'll be sure to let y'all know how it goes!

Thoughts? Who's ready to paint a rug?