Turning $1 Placemats Into Awesome Works Of Art And Fueling My Spray...

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When life throws you lemons, you make lemonade. And when your apartment throws you a ripped place mat, you bust out the spray-paint!

For those of you who follow me on Instagram you may have noticed that I've been putting a lot of work into the dining room lately, starting with my $80 DIY-ning Room Table Since tables need place mats, I grabbed a few simple "AVSKILD" cork mats from IKEA for less than a buck a piece... Peep these bad boys below! Awesome right!!?

All was well in the kingdom of Diningroom-landia, when one fateful afternoon one of the corners of my beloved mats ripped. It was a dark and gloomy day for the citizens of Diningroom-landia to say the least...

Luckily scissors and a little bit of creativity came to the rescue! I traced a circle with a pen and a string old school compass style, and got to cutting. I even had enough room on the corners to make a bunch of coasters! WIN.

Next, I used some blue painter's tape to mask out some crazy patterns. I'm not going to lie, I had WAY too much fun with this part. There's something about taping away with reckless abandon... sigh

Whoever said "Diamonds are a girl's best friend.", did NOT understand the joys of metallic spray paint.... Seriously. Maybe I was feeling a little inspired by Mad Max this weekend... but I didn't even CONSIDER another color. (Now that I think of it though, neon green would be awesome too.. hmmmm. Round 2 anyone??)

Here's what I used. Peeling the tape away felt like Christmas morning. UGH. SO satisfying.

The paint is so reflective it almost has a foil effect on the dull cork surface. Obi clearly approves. He's got a thing for stripes..

To be honest, the coasters were kind of an afterthought in an effort to avoid waste, but I think I like them better than the full-sized mats! I did NOT expect them to turn out so awesome.