Goldilocks

While we lived with my parents I was able to accomplish a few tasks around their house. One of those being a front porch upgrade.

Mom had these planters out back which had been given to her when her neighbor friend moved away.

They'd been sitting a little neglected for a while. A while is totally subjective.

The first and most obvious difference is that one planter was missing the upper ledge border. That was the reason mom hadn't used them because they didn't match.

It had a pretty simple solution... pop that border off!

It also revealed how terribly dirty the rest of the planters were.

Next was to use a good bit of elbow grease to clean them up. I started off with simple hose water. Yeah, that did nothing. Next I tried a magic eraser, and while I LOVE magic erasers, this task was just too large. I probably would have gone through 5 or 6 of them and they started to disintegrate with all the scrubbing. So I ended up using hot water with some diluted bleach (and gloves of course) and rinsing with hose water.

This was the result:

It was still a little stained but there was no longer any grime to the touch. I covered it with a thin coat of happy yellow spray paint. (Rustoleum's Warm Yellow)

The key was super thin coats! This is the second coat:

Gorgeous right? These were the flowers from Christmas time. This post has been simmering a while ;) What is it about yellow that is just so happy?!

I really love what these did to their porch!

My parents have a white colonial with black shutters and we are planning to paint her front door blue. So this yellow is such a happy compromise with such a pretty pop of color that will look great year round.

And I'm a little sad that they have already started collecting dirt, but a washdown a few times a year should fix that. Now to find some spring flowers!

I love how after the coats of paint and adding flowers that you don't even miss the top border that was the original problem with these! I hope this gives inspiration if you come across anything like this at a thrift store or yard sale! Practically anything plastic can be spray painted with amazing Rustoleum spray paint!!