Dollar Tree Trays and Chalk Board Paint

I know you've all seen this project on Pinterest.

Buy serving trays from the Dollar Tree, paint them with chalkboard paint and then VOILA! Put these out at your next wine tasting and write what type of cheese you're pairing, or hang them and use them for your shopping list. I've seen lots of my friends repin this project so I picked it as my first. I must add that when I clicked on the pin to go to the instructions link it didn't work. I'm not sure if it's just my pin but I couldn't locate it anywhere else. Therefore I was just going by the pic and the pin detail to try this one out.

Ok, so first off I went to Dollar Tree and they were completely sold out of the trays. I guess a lot of my fellow pinners in Seattle are trying this one out as well. After three trips to three separate Dollar Trees I finally found them and I have to admit, I was pretty darn shocked at how small the trays at the Dollar Trees in Washington are!

To the left is the size of the tray in comparison to my hand. (They might be bigger at the Dollar Tree near you.) I bought two different trays ,this one and a round one, and spent about $2.25 on them. Next I went to Wal-Mart to for the chalkboard paint. I found it in the craft section and bought the Folk Art brand for $3.67.

Next, it was time for the first coat, which I must say left me pretty un-optimistic about how this was going to turn out. There was just nothing for the paint to cling to and I started wondering if maybe I was supposed to sand the tray down before painting.

After four coats, the tray still wasn't looking like the picture from Pinterest. I don't know if you can tell from the pics, but it was very streaky and didn't hold the chalk well.  I decided I'd head back to Wal-mart to get the heavy duty chalkboard paint from the home improvement section of the store. the same kind from the picture on Pinterest. It cost me $9.67 for the Rust-oleum brand. At this point I was getting really PO-ed at this supposed simple and cheap project. But, between searching all over the city for the trays, to the time spent waiting for each coat to dry, to driving 20 minutes back to Wal-mart, I'd invested WAAAAAAY to much time into this and refused to give up!

I popped open the paint can, stirred it up and applied another coat to the previous four from the day before. I decided to take the other tray and try out the Rust-oleum brand on it and this is what I got.  UGH!



this is before it dried



this is the dried

 So, to sum it all up...
Driving  to three different Dollar Tree's to get trays that may,and that's a big may, hold  a block of cheese ='s 3hours and $2.25
A trip to Wal-Mart for paint ='s 45 minutes and about $4.00
Applying 4 coats of paint and waiting for it to dry over and over again ='s 5 hours
Another trip back to Wal-Mart for a different paint ='s about $10.00 and an hour because of traffic!
Then another 2 hours applying and waiting for the finished product
That's $16.25 not including all the Gas money looking for the darn things and like 12 hours out of my life and this is what I got!!

This teeny-tiny tray that is full of bubbles and is un-usable. I didn't even bother finishing the second tray.
Now I fully admit that there may have been other steps I missed because the link to the actual project was broken. But just simply painting a tray with chalkboard paint??? NOPE.. Don't even bother. I could have bought the cheap, faux glass serving tray that was 3 times bigger for a buck and been done with it.. But then I wouldn't have anything to blog about now would I?? haha..

Stay tuned for next week's Pinterest project where I take Glass plates from the Dollar Tree and make them pop with scrapbook paper!