My Artsy Fartsy Friday - Whisper Phones

Hey there! I'm here to link up with Sew Much Music and Miss Law's Kinders for Artsy Fartsy Friday! 

This summer I have been doing a lot of prep for next year (who hasn't), but my six week summer is even shorter due to the fact that I will be teaching Summer Reading the last three weeks of my summer…yikes! 

I LOVE teaching Guided Reading, so teaching summer reading is the perfect time to try out a few new tricks! 

I have read a lot about whisper phones and can think of a million ways to use them in my classroom. However, they are expensive and they don't come in fun colors. So, I am created my own! 

(if you follow me on Instagram most of these photos will look familiar)

To start…stuck to my trusty Rust-oleum flat white primer! 

Side one...

Side two…I waited about 30 minutes before flipping them over. 

Once they were primed I was super excited to use these Neon Rust-oleum colors I had found…sadly they ended up cracking, running and dripping all over. Here was what it looked like (I didn't want to take a close up of the horror).

The only color that worked was the Purple. When I went back to look at the cans I noticed that the purple can was what I needed for the rest of them. 

So, I headed back to the store to get the correct paint. 

I had learned a very important lesson...

These cans/ colors do not work when painting plastic.

These are the correct cans/colors to always use when covering plastic. 

So, I returned to have my lovely Fiancé step in and help me re-cover my mess. I really hit the jackpot with this guy! He stepped away from the Heat and Spurs game to help me! What a guy! 

We got them covered and ended up having to change some of the colors! Thank goodness it worked! (I think I like the blue better)

It took a couple of coats, but it ended up working! YAY! There are still some drips and things when you look SUPER close, but I can live with it. 

Finally, I was able to seal them just to protect them from drops and rubbing off on my kiddos hands. 

Again, I used the trusty Rust-oleum brand that I have relied on to save my tookus throughout this project. 

Sadly, the sealant made some of the purple whisper phone pieces do this...

I'm not sure why this happened, because I waited well over 45 minutes for the paint to dry. The weird thing is that it only did this so SOME of the purple pieces and it would take the paint of all the way down to the primer! It wasn't a pretty sight. Needless to say, I will be short a few purple pieces…oh well. 

Once I sealed both sides of my spiffy little pieces I was faced with a very serious question…

HOW DO I PUT THESE TOGETHER?!

Now, I know how to "put them together", but I didn't know in which manner…mix and match, random or monochormaitc?

So, I did what anyone would do and I posted this picture to Instagram to find out what all of my InstaFriends thought! 

I just couldn't decide! They looked good anyway I put them together, but I had to make a decision (mainly because I needed to pull my car in the garage). Thanks to your help…I reached a final decision! 

Drumroll, please…

…

…

…

TA-DA!!

So, here are some of the color combinations I will have! I put these 5 together without sanding down the edges, which made it a little difficult (you can probably see some scuff marks from where my hand slipped..whoops!). So I will be spending my Friday sanding down edges and sticking the rest of these bad boys together!

I love these little things even after the few hiccups I ran into! I hope you have learned from my mistakes and will contact me if you ever want to make your own! 

Well, there ya have it! My Artsy Fartsy slightly chaotic project for the week! I can't wait to use these guys in my classroom! If you want to see how ALL of the other turned out, be sure to follow my Instagram account! I hope you enjoyed your stay!

Thanks for stoppin' by!