Concrete Staining

     After spending so much time on the patio since we built the house a couple of years ago, we kept looking at the plain concrete...surely there's something we can do to liven it up a little!  We came up with an easy solution.   First, we dug through all of the leftover paint and supplies we had and I found two gallons of concrete stain (different colors).  We used a couple of handheld lawn and garden sprayers.  We had enough stain to do the porch also. 

So here's what we did:

 Put one gallon of one color stain in one sprayer. (We used a dark brown)

 Put the other gallon of colored stain in the other.  (This one was reddish in color)

 You will also need a large piece of cardboard to put against the wall of the house, not to get stain on it.

  I held the cardboard against the bricks of the house while my husband sprayed a random pattern  of stain on the entire patio.  It doesn't have to be perfect!

 Wait 5-10 minutes then get the other sprayer and repeat the above process.  Walk carefully not to leave footprints. 

 Wait 24 hrs. to walk on it, and that's it!

Now, I would recommend that you do this BEFORE putting the bricks and posts on the house, if you happen to be building a new one! 

This project has made the patio so much easier to clean too!


Before:

 

 

 

 

After:



 

 



 

 

The picture above is the front porch.  I had extra stain, so I just touched up around the post with a brush the next day to blend it in with the rest of the stain.  

 

One thing we always try to do is use what we already have, so look around your house and think about what you can use all of those leftover items for!