Chalkboard Refrigerator Project

My latest project is my refrigerator door ... other than generally decluttering my life ... that's material for another post.

Here is the original artist. The 19 month old is so proud of himself! This incident spurred me on to my decluttering mission I have been on. This is permanent black marker he found in my former junk drawer (I now no longer have one of those) ... yes, I know you can put child safe latches on the drawers, but that's for another post, too. I was helping the 3 year old to get dressed one Sunday morning (my husband had already left for church to help with the media ministry that day, and I was at the house by myself getting us all dressed for church). Anyway, I walked around the corner into the kitchen and didn't really panic. After three kids, nothing surprises me too much. He was in mid marker stroke and only slowed down when I fussed at him.

Anyway, I've gotten lots of advice about how to get permanent black marker off of a white refrigerator, and I researched on-line, too. I used nail polish remover, rubbing alcohol, various all purpose cleaners, WD-40 ... nothing budged it. So, for about a week, I didn't worry about it, but knew I would have to come up with something to fix it.

One day while I was cooking in the kitchen, a thought popped into my head. "I wonder if I can paint the refrigerator door with chalkboard paint?" I got on-line and researched it and found out that you can!

I bought a little can of black chalkboard paint for about $7 at Wal-mart. It was with the stains and paintbrushes. The directions said to use a paintbrush, but I had seen them applying it with a small roller on the cable home shows. So, I bought a small foam roller. I cleaned the refrigerator to make sure all of the various potions I had used were gone. Then I lightly sanded it. The directions said to use 2 coats of paint, but the websites I found said to use three coats. So, took the handle off, added a coat of paint. I waited 6 hours between coats. I still have more than 2/3 of the can of paint left.

I let the final coat dry overnight. Then the next morning I "seasoned" it ... used the long side of the chalk and went back and forth until the entire thing was covered and then erased it.

This is a picture the 5 year old drew on it afterwards. They had so much fun with it, it solved my marked up refrigerator problem, and it looks great. We will eventually have this refrigerator in the laundry room of our new house, but for now, it is great for what we need. I may do the top door and paint on the lines for a two month calendar. But, that's a project for another day.