The border has stayed put with this homemade, flour based wallpaper glue/paste for over 3 years now - amazing !I am busy doing some re decorating in the house at the moment. (Or, let’s be honest here – I am supervising Nelson, the painter who is doing all the hard work for me !) My daughter has had a “Peter Rabbit” theme in her bedroom since she was a newborn baby, and I thought is was time to upgrade it a little, seeing as she is now (as she keeps pointing out to me) a “big girl who goes to school without crying”. When I was in South Africa earlier this year, I brought a whole lot of décor items for her room back home with me, as we can’t get stuff like that here easily. You know the sort of thing – linen, curtains, bedcovers, loose rugs, pictures and ornaments. We’ve (the “big girl” & I) decided on a pink and lilac theme of butterflies and fairies. (*Update - you can see photo's of the new room here)
So all I needed to get here, was pink and lilac coloured paint. (Not as easy as it sounds.) This week when in town, I went to one of the local hardware stores to look at their (limited) selection of tinted (coloured) paints. After dodging the beggars outside the shop (it’s in a bad part of town), and vegetable “mama’s” balancing baskets of onions on their heads and harassing me to by a few, I side stepped a man who spat on the pavement (sidewalk) – a common trait of people here – and entered the dimly lit shop (they were in the middle of a power failure), narrowly missing tripping over the display of cheap Chinese generators “Spesial ofer this week only” – which I must say, made me wonder WHY they weren’t, infact, using one during the current power outage).
I finally made it to the service counter, explained what it was I wanted, and was handed a well used booklet of grubby paint swatches to choose from (slightly tricky to see the exact shades with no overhead lighting). Once I chose my colours, my order was shouted through to a back room where a man in a white coat & glasses (thankfully, sans stethoscope) mixed it up for me (once again, slightly tricky with no overhead lighting).
From previous experience, I know that this is usually “hit or miss”. I know that the colour on the swatch will NOT match the colour in the tin exactly. I know that I’d better order enough (and a little bit extra, just in case) because if I return say, one week later, to order some more paint in the exact same colour, I will get a similar ‘version’ of the original shade which won’t match 100%. I know that the colours in the tin are usually a shade or two darker than the swatch sample. So I have learnt, through trial and error, to always order a few shades lighter to get the shade I actually want.
I came home with the paint and Nelson will be starting on my daughter’s room next week, as this week he has been busy re-painting our bedroom and bathroom and part of the veranda.
Anyway, now on to what I was originally going to post about …. wallpaper glue. Wallpaper is not as commonly used in Africa as it is, say, in the UK where most homes you go into have it. Growing up in Zimbabwe, wallpaper was something completely foreign to me ? Living in Tanzania, wallpaper is non existent. So when I came back from the UK in 2003 with a “Peter Rabbit & Friends” wallpaper border for my (then unknown) child’s bedroom in 2003, I was flummoxed as to how I was going to stick it on to the actual wall.
I had a quick look around the local hardware stores and the best I could come up with was “Simba Glue” (“Lion Glue”) which smelt awful and goodness only knows what it contained – did I really want my newborn baby breathing in those toxic fumes ? No. So I set about searching for a homemade wallpaper glue (wallpaper paste) recipe with ingredients I could easily come by, and this ‘recipe’ below is what I found – and it worked a TREAT. The wallpaper border has been stuck firmly to the wall (no lifting, tearing, mould or the like) for over 3 years now. So I highly recommend it. Now the only problem is how to get the jolly stuff OFF the wall for the new “butterflies & fairies” theme. (I’ll let you know !) *Update - it came off perfectly by simply using a sponge and some boiling water, you cannot even see that there was once wallpaper there !*
Non Toxic Homemade Wallpaper (Paste) Glue Recipe:
1 ½ cups white Flour
½ cup Sugar
1 tbsp Alum (a spice I couldn’t find here, so I left it out & it still worked fine)
1 cup cold Water
2 cups boiling Water
Combine the flour & sugar. Slowly add the cold water & mix until there are no lumps. Place mixture in a saucepan over a low heat. Add the boiling water, stirring constantly. Bring the mixture to the boil. When the mixture is stiff, remove it from the heat and add the Alum (I left it out). Store in an air tight container – it keeps for several weeks. If the paste hardens, just soften it by mixing small amounts of warm water into it.
So all I needed to get here, was pink and lilac coloured paint. (Not as easy as it sounds.) This week when in town, I went to one of the local hardware stores to look at their (limited) selection of tinted (coloured) paints. After dodging the beggars outside the shop (it’s in a bad part of town), and vegetable “mama’s” balancing baskets of onions on their heads and harassing me to by a few, I side stepped a man who spat on the pavement (sidewalk) – a common trait of people here – and entered the dimly lit shop (they were in the middle of a power failure), narrowly missing tripping over the display of cheap Chinese generators “Spesial ofer this week only” – which I must say, made me wonder WHY they weren’t, infact, using one during the current power outage).
I finally made it to the service counter, explained what it was I wanted, and was handed a well used booklet of grubby paint swatches to choose from (slightly tricky to see the exact shades with no overhead lighting). Once I chose my colours, my order was shouted through to a back room where a man in a white coat & glasses (thankfully, sans stethoscope) mixed it up for me (once again, slightly tricky with no overhead lighting).
From previous experience, I know that this is usually “hit or miss”. I know that the colour on the swatch will NOT match the colour in the tin exactly. I know that I’d better order enough (and a little bit extra, just in case) because if I return say, one week later, to order some more paint in the exact same colour, I will get a similar ‘version’ of the original shade which won’t match 100%. I know that the colours in the tin are usually a shade or two darker than the swatch sample. So I have learnt, through trial and error, to always order a few shades lighter to get the shade I actually want.
I came home with the paint and Nelson will be starting on my daughter’s room next week, as this week he has been busy re-painting our bedroom and bathroom and part of the veranda.
Anyway, now on to what I was originally going to post about …. wallpaper glue. Wallpaper is not as commonly used in Africa as it is, say, in the UK where most homes you go into have it. Growing up in Zimbabwe, wallpaper was something completely foreign to me ? Living in Tanzania, wallpaper is non existent. So when I came back from the UK in 2003 with a “Peter Rabbit & Friends” wallpaper border for my (then unknown) child’s bedroom in 2003, I was flummoxed as to how I was going to stick it on to the actual wall.
I had a quick look around the local hardware stores and the best I could come up with was “Simba Glue” (“Lion Glue”) which smelt awful and goodness only knows what it contained – did I really want my newborn baby breathing in those toxic fumes ? No. So I set about searching for a homemade wallpaper glue (wallpaper paste) recipe with ingredients I could easily come by, and this ‘recipe’ below is what I found – and it worked a TREAT. The wallpaper border has been stuck firmly to the wall (no lifting, tearing, mould or the like) for over 3 years now. So I highly recommend it. Now the only problem is how to get the jolly stuff OFF the wall for the new “butterflies & fairies” theme. (I’ll let you know !) *Update - it came off perfectly by simply using a sponge and some boiling water, you cannot even see that there was once wallpaper there !*
Non Toxic Homemade Wallpaper (Paste) Glue Recipe:
1 ½ cups white Flour
½ cup Sugar
1 tbsp Alum (a spice I couldn’t find here, so I left it out & it still worked fine)
1 cup cold Water
2 cups boiling Water
Combine the flour & sugar. Slowly add the cold water & mix until there are no lumps. Place mixture in a saucepan over a low heat. Add the boiling water, stirring constantly. Bring the mixture to the boil. When the mixture is stiff, remove it from the heat and add the Alum (I left it out). Store in an air tight container – it keeps for several weeks. If the paste hardens, just soften it by mixing small amounts of warm water into it.
