Quick and Easy Picture refurb

I got this "Cooking With Jazz" print several years ago when I moved into one of my first real apartments. Its not something I looked long and hard to pick out... it was a leftover piece at hobby lobby that someone had custom framed and matted and never picked up. My mom and I thought it was cute enough and picked it up... When we bought it it had a bright teal mat but somewhere along the way I had it re-matted to fit the scheme of whatever kitchen it was in. When we moved here I just hung it up, but it never really fit in.

Sorry about the glare... annoying. 

And its really "bugged" me because it looked really washed out AND there was a gross little dead bug stuck in between the glass and the print.

I'd seen here that you can actually just spray paint mats to update a picture... brilliant. Well I didn't have any spray paint in the right color but I did have more of the bright green latex I'd used on the inside of my kitchen cabinets and I figured it was worth a shot. Worst case scenario I'd just have to have the thing professionally re-matted.

I actually added a tiny bit of brown/sienna acrylic paint to tone down the green (did you know you can tint latex with basic acrylic paint?... AWESOME) and TRIED to tape off the second matt to retain the white edge and some definition in color. Well the taping DID NOT WORK so I just used a foam roller to paint over the whole thing. Then I left the house and ran some errands. When I got home I was pleasantly surprised. Not only did the green dry to 2 completely different yet complimentary shades on the 2 different mats, but the suede look of the larger matt seemed to re-appear as well.

I also spray painted the silver frame black. 

Check out the 2 colors!

So for about 30 mins of effort and ZERO dollars, I totally perked up the look of my bargain print and made it match THIS kitchen.

I'm linking up here today (where the inspiration came from!)