Perfectly Patterned

Right now my husband and I are living in an apartment off base. Our landlady told us that we could paint the walls as long as we didn't paint in bold colors. However, since my husband will be getting out of the Army in roughly six months, we really didn't see the point in investing time and money into paint. So we are left to cover our drab, white walls with what we can. Now, my kitchen is teeny-tiny. Seriously. Not a lot of wall space. And the biggest section of wall I have in there was blank.

See what I mean. It's just screaming " I'M NAKED!!" I've looked at different places, and all of the decor that I have found was either too big to fit or too expensive for our current budget. Cheap is what I like. So, one day while I was washing dishes (by hand, no dishwasher) I noticed how much I really like the pattern on my cereal bowls. My everyday china is an awesome collection of hand painted pieces that have the same colors and similar patterns but each "piece"(ie dinner plates, salad plates) has its own take on the design. I really like the bowls. Check it:

Pretty cute huh? So, I thought, duh! I'll paint that! Now I have to admit, I was a little wary of this. I am no artist by the worlds standards. But the more I thought about it, the more I convinced myself that I needed to do this. So I set to work. I used acrylic paint because it is usually what I always have on hand. Its cheap and it dries super quick. 

A trick I learned in a painting class is that you can usually trace what you are painting with yellow because all of the other colors you will use will cover it. Like so.

[got excited and painted the middle cross before I even realized. haha]

Then I got to work:

And then finally, it was done!

I am pretty darn happy with it. It's not perfect. The lines are no completely straight, and somethings aren't the exact same size. But it's mine.

Now to get my husband to hang it...