Did you know you could use all of Miss Mustard Seed's Milk Paint (MMSMP) as a stain? I love using her paint called Curio to achieve this gorgeous dark color stain. The beauty of this type of stain is that there are NO harsh odors or chemicals that you get along with normal stains. You know the type... when you open the can and the smell practically slaps you in the face. In this blog I will walk you through on how to achieve this rich color on bare, untreated wood.
First, lets get our ingredients ready. Of course we need our MMSMP in Curio then our mixing cup and stir stick, plus our measuring instruments. I must preface this by saying that I try to recycle as many things as possible. You will notice my cup is from Starbucks; this is because my husband had an every day addiction to it so I asked him to please bring me home his cups. I just clean them out with a little soap and water and they are good to go! I think I must have a whole cabinet full by now. Also my stir stick has duck tape on the end because I didn't have a short stick so I just broke a long one in half. Now to the measuring...
When you use this paint the normal ratio is 1 to 1 but in using as a stain it is 3 to 1. For this project though I chose to do a 2 to 1 ratio. That is 2 parts water to 1 part MMSMP.
I chose to do it this way because I wanted to do less coats and particularly because this bare wood didn't have that much grain striation so I knew it would probably be a solid dark color with no grain showing through. Mix the water and the paint for a few minutes and let the pigments dissolve for about 10 minutes. Once 10 minutes is up I give it a really good stir for about a minute and it should be really runny feeling.
Here is what the piece looked like before I painted it. Notice the bare, thirsty wood. It really could use some TLC
I used a light sand paper to open up the grain and also to remove any rough edges of the wood. Cleaning off the piece after sanding is really important, you can use a vacuum or some Windex and a rag.
Applying your first coat is so exciting because you start to see your piece transform in front of your eyes!
Check out how the wood is soaking up the stain, just incredible.
I always paint with the wood gain because I think the application looks visibly better after it dries. Untreated wood is so much fun to stain because it is so thirsty and unlike most paints that just sit on top (latex), MMSMP actually gets absorbed by the wood. This is what the piece looks like after 3 coats of the Curio stain. I will use hemp oil to seal it and make the piece come alive. Hemp oil is an amazing natural wood reviver and sealer. You can use it on wood that looks like it needs some TLC. It also works wonders on leather shoes. I will do another blog in the future just on hemp oil, but for now lets marvel at the HUGE difference it made in this horn coat rack.
The left side does not have the hemp oil and the right side I applied the hemp oil with a brush. I did 1 coat of hemp oil and all of it soaked in and then I applied a second coat and some of it soaked in and the rest sat on top so that told me it was sealed and I wiped off the excess with a cloth.
Most of these pieces will be going to my booth at Deja Vu this weekend including the horn coat rack.
Thank you so much for reading! If you have any questions just comment below. Stay tuned for my next post!
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