HandsOn Network

Ingredients

• Cleaning materials (buckets, broom, sponges, soap, water)
• Drop cloths/tarps
• Eggshell or satin finish paint
• Low tack masking tape
• Paint thinner
• Paint trays
• Paintbrushes
• Primer
• Rollers, large and small
• Sandpaper

Directions

 For Prep:

1. Remove all obstacles in the work area.
2. Items can be moved outside of the room or to the center of the room.
3. Be sure to cover those items with a tarp.
4. Remove hardware such as faceplates on electrical sockets, light switches, doorknobs, hinges, and handles.
5. Examine the walls and identify areas of damage or dirt.
6. Remove particles/things that do not promote a clean, flat surface.
7. Once the walls are clean and smooth, mask the room.
8. You can use low-tack masking tape to tape around fixtures that can’t be removed from the walls.
9. Cover the floor with drop cloths.

For Activity:

1. Pour the paint into a tray and roll the roller several times to soak up an ample amount of paint.
2. Roll the paint slowly onto the wall so that the roller will apply more paint in one coat than if the roller was run up and down.
3. Running the roller in a “W” pattern is also effective in spreading the paint.
4. Use small rollers or paintbrushes to paint any hard-to-reach areas.
5. Allow the paint to dry.
6. Apply a second coat.

Tip:

• LA Works makes saving paint and reducing clean up time easy. They place bags inside paint buckets and then fill the bags with paint. Brushes and rollers are then dipped into the bags.
• At the end of the day, paint bags can be cut at the bottom and recycled/saved to a paint can. No clean up of the bucket is required.
• Hands On Birmingham painted both vertical and horizontal stripes on walls. They then saved extra paint for other projects and were able to expand the scope of the project.
• Hands On Greater Buffalo painted themed classrooms throughout the building. For the science classroom, they painted fish and animals, for the geography classroom they painted a world map, etc.