Window Painting Like a Pro
I’ve written before about my affinity for painting car windows, especially when celebrating wedding anniversaries. As you can see in the video at the bottom of this post, I’ve gotten pretty fast at it. That’s what several decades of window painting practice will do for you!
It’s a skill that has come in handy more often than you might expect. The big twelve- and fifteen-passenger vans our family drives provides a perfect canvas. We’ve used it for everything from school field trips…
… to ultimate Frisbee tournaments. Our vehicles have transported lots of sports teams over the years, and the window paint ensures they all ride in style.
When our boys’ basketball team won the State Championship a few years ago…
… window paint (in the team colors) helped us broadcast their victory to everyone else on the road.
The trick to getting professional-looking results is to ditch the applicator sponge. Just pry it off the tube and toss it in the trash. Once you give this method a try, you’ll never go back.
Use a paint brush to do your lettering instead. I use a 1″ flat brush for larger lettering and a smaller, pointed brush for fine lines and accent colors.
If you cannot find paint specifically formulated for car windows, don’t worry. Cheap acrylic paints (not enamel) work equally as well. I use acrylics whenever I need to mix paints to match team colors. Brushes clean up easily with water, as does the window writing while it’s still wet (good to remember for mistakes or misspellings).
Once the paint is dry, it can easily be removed with a clean, nick-free razor blade or window scraper. Just hold it flat against the window and take smooth, broad strokes from bottom to top, wiping blade with a clean, dry cloth between passes.
A friend of ours hosted a backyard wedding a couple of months ago and asked if they could borrow our van (and one of our sons to drive it) to help shuttle guests from off-site parking to the wedding.
My son asked me to paint the windows of our van for the occasion, so guests would climb aboard without his having to shout instructions out the window. I thought that was a smart idea, and decided to video the actual painting. Here it is:
This minute-long tape has been slightly sped up. The actual painting took closer to three minutes for the back window and five for each side. Still, it’s not too shabby for fifteen minutes worth of work, is it?
If you, like me, enjoy do-it-yourself projects, be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel, as we plan to post more of these “You Can Do It Too-torials” in the near future.
And if you’re looking for creative ways to express love to your husband, How Do I Love Thee, my devotional journal for wives, will help you brainstorm. Check it out through the link below:
