Big & Small DIY: Painted Spoons

Images and text by Gina Vide for Design Mom.

Don’t you just love the look of dipped or striped wooden utensils? Today’s Big & Small project is an activity that is pretty, functional and something grownups and kids can make side-by-side. You’ll stripe, while your little one dips! How fun is that?

Afterwards, when you are entertaining dinner guests, or simply tossing a salad on an any-old-Tuesday, these colorful utensils will brighten your day.

If you’re anything like me, you’re going to want to make extras. They’re so much fun to make that both children and adults will want to try variation after variation. Plus, you can use all the extras for gifts!

Supplies:
– Craft Paint, I used non-toxic Soy paint
– Masking Tape
– Paint Brushes
– Scissors
– Wooden spoons or wooden utensils — new or old
– Optional: Wood Safe Sealant or Shellac Coat

Prepare a work surface for painting with a protective layer of paper to catch drips and smudges. Also, prepare your work area by arranging your paints, paintbrushes, water, masking tape, scissors and wooden utensils for painting.

First up, STRIPES for the grownups.

Choose the paint color you want to start with and tape as many stripes as you’d like up and down the wooden utensil’s handle. Press the edges of the tape firmly so that paint can’t slip under the tape. Do your best to make the taped sections parallel.

Now, it’s time to paint. Paint the exposed wood in your first color, then place the utensil, with the painted handle up, in a cup to dry.

Once the utensil has dried, carefully, carefully pull back the tape.

Then add more tape where you want to make more stripes for color number 2. Once again, let it dry and carefully remove the tape.

Keep repeating this process until you’ve added all the colored stripes you’d like. Easy peasy!

Optional: If you’d like to protect those carefully made stripes, you can coat them with a wood safe sealant or a shellac.

Once dry, your stripe-y spoons are now ready to use. (Or gift to a lucky friend!)

Next, DIPPED utensils for the kids.

This is actually a faux “dipping” approach. Begin by asking your child how much of the handle they want to paint and wrapping a piece of masking tape around the handle wherever they choose. Just like above, press the edges of the tape well to ensure that paint doesn’t slip underneath it. Repeat on any wooden utensils your child will paint.

Now, it’s time to paint. Carefully dip your paint brush and begin painting the handle making sure that the paint isn’t too thick. Give a little extra attention to make sure your eager painter stops when they reach the masking tape!

Just like above, place the utensil in a cup, with the painted handle up, and let it dry completely. Once the utensil has dried, remove it from the cup and carefully, carefully pull back the tape, and you are done!

By the way, when you remove the tape, if you have any uneven edges, no stress. Simply tape again (above and below the area you’d like to change) and re-paint.

Time for play!

I hope you enjoy making these as much as we did. If you give it a try, we’d love to hear about the fun you’ve had together!

P.S. — Find all the posts in the Big & Small series here.

14 thoughts on “Big & Small DIY: Painted Spoons”

  1. Such a great idea! I’m looking forward to giving my ordinary wooden spoons an extraordinary makeover! Think I will go with some springy pastels. Thanks for the post!

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  3. I’m wondering if you noticed the Swedish Butter Knives while you were in Sweden? (As our daughter said this morning, they just spread butter perfectly) As this Big/Small project is unveiled, we started the day by christening the morning by buttering our toast with our color-a-day Swedish wooden butter knifes (we just couldn’t stop dipping, striping, dipping!…they’re really fun!) Happy Weekend! Your photo is divinely beautiful – it reminds me of both an etching and a Norman Rockwell! I wish you some of both this weekend!

    PS. Three cheers for Ben finding Swedish Advertising! There really aren’t international board patrols anymore, are there?! (And I promise you that the Norwegian cruise you’ll do this Summer will be a whole different type of glitter! These Baltic cruises are very… disco-balled. to say the least; in comparison to the gliding, glittering Norwegian coasts cruises! — they’re definitely: BYO-disco ball type! … just beautiful.

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