Weekend Project: Fruit Welcome Mats
By Thehousethatlarsbuilt
@houselarsbuilt
We're slowly making our new apartment into a home inch by inch. We just barely got a bed last week after sleeping on a mattress on the ground for the past 4 months! On one of my Ikea runs I picked up a circular welcome mat that I thought would be fun to turn into something and yesterday I got it--FRUIT! Plus, once you cut it in half, you get two mats for the price of one. Score. It's so easy and would make a great weekend project. One of my all-time favorite purchases from Anthropologie was a welcome mat in this semi-circle shape that had a lovely pattern on it. I knew I didn't want to make it so complicated so this fruit version is a simpler idea.
Materials: circle rug from Ikea ($20!), spray paint (white and yellow for lemon & red, black, white, green for watermelon. I used gloss because it turned out to be stronger than the satin), sturdy scissors, kraft paper or any other paper that's wide enough to cover the mat, x-acto, plastic sheet for protecting the ground, coins to use as weights, ruler, Sharpie
For the watermelon mat
Step 1: Fold your mat in half and mark it on either side with a Sharpie to reference as the mid point. Make sure your line goes with the grain of the rug.
Step 2: Create a line down the middle with your ruler
Step 3: Cut down the center. If you've made your mark with the grain it's a lot easier to cut.
Step 4: Spray paint the rugs white to act as the base color.
Step 5: With your paper, trace the outline of the rug and cut it out. This will act as your stencil.
Step 6: For the watermelon: Cut two rings out along outer the edge about 1" for the outermost and 3/4" for the inner.
Step 7: Cover the middle part of the watermelon.
Step 8: Leave the innermost ring on and cover with coins to hold it down.
Step 9: Spray the outermost part green.
Step 10: Once it's dry, cover with the ring again.
Step 11: Take off the center covering and spray it red. Keep going back and forth. I sprayed mine quite thoroughly and came back to it after 10 minutes.
Step 12: I let mine dry overnight. The next morning I covered the middle section back up again and traced where I wanted my watermelon seeds.
Step 13: Cut out the seeds with your xacto.
Step 14: Replace the stencil and hold down with coins. Spray with black. Let it sit until dry.
For the lemon mat:
Step 1: Repeat the same beginning steps as the watermelon, but after spraying it with white and letting it dry, spray it with lemon. The white will help the yellow color come out more.
Step 2: Cover the outer rings with your stencil from the watermelon and hold down with coins.
Step 3: Make your inside stencil by creating the shapes of the inside of the lemon with a sharpie and cut out the pieces. Secure with coins.
Step 4: Spray paint it white and let it dry.
DONE! I'm finally glad I have a green door to nicely show off my new fruit mats.