Craft FAIL

I read a lot of blogs written by Craftees. People who restore Goodwill finds from the depths of hell, make artwork from materials that cost less than two dollars, go on baking sprees, cook things without using a recipe and just create all around fabulousness (I'm looking at you Poverty with a View and bigger, better, best). I'm jealous of them. I love that they post all kinds of great tutorials that I can follow but I want to be able to look at something, wave my magic Craftee wand and create something that people adore.

So imagine my joy when I spotted these pretties in the dollar bins at Michaels

and some V-day inspiration came to me. Why - I could spray paint these little frames a lovely shade of pink (because what could Craftee doesn't adore spray paint), throw some cutesy scrapbook paper in as a background and then cut out coordinating L, O, V and E letters. Are you picking up what I'm putting down? Cuuuuute, right?!
Well, it sounded like a good plan. I picked out four frames and some hot pink spray paint. With my 40% off a full price item coupon, I spent less than $10. Woo-hoo!! Let's go!

Mistake #1 - the frames. Picture frames are easy to spray paint, right? You pop off the back take out the glass or plastic and go to town - no fuss. Unless you fail to check your frame construction and discover during craft prep that the back looks like this:

Excuse the blurry shot. I have unsteady and unmanicured hands.

So backing is attached and so is the plastic. Hmmmm...let me think about this. OK - so it's not as easy as it was supposed to be, but I can make this work. The filler paper (is there a technical term for that?) can be trimmed down to cover the plastic. Voila!

Mistake #2 - the paint. I found the perfect color among the selection at Michael's. It was a deep hot pink called Rhine River Rose. It was a Krylon H2O Latex paint. Spray paints are all the same, right? WRONG. In my case anyway. Even if I had googled "how to use latex spray paint" BEFORE I commenced my disaster-making ways, I would not have found anything to deter me from the path I was about to go down. No one else seems to have a problem with this paint. In fact, every blog/website sings it's praises - "it's low VOC," "you can use it indoors," "it dries so quickly," "mistakes clean up with soap and water." No one has written, "Latex spray paint will turn your Valentine's Day craft into a gooey, sticky mess like this:"

This picture doesn't do justice to the epic disastrousness I created.

That's a little better.

"And because won't even be dry a full day later OR wash off with soap and water, you will have hot pink fingertips for three days." Nope - everyone else seems perfectly fine with it.

OK - so mayyybe I shouldn't have painted in the garage in sub zero temps. Since it is low-VOC paint - I probably could have used the slightly warmer if slightly more dungeony basement. Maybe the right temperature would help the paint dry.

Mistake #3 - the paper. As you may notice in the above pictures, the brilliant idea of using paper to cover the parts that needed spray paint protection did not work. Because, genius, what happens when coated paper gets wet? It curls up. Good call on that one.

I'm going to give it one more try before I trash the project. I am going to attempt to re-paint in the basement in hopes that the "quick dry" claims exist in the recommend temperatures. I will attempt to wash the spray-painted clearness with soap and water. If that works, I'll store them away and deal with the paper next year. If not, I'm sure I can buy what I'm looking for at Target.