How to Create a Secret Message For When it Rains

This is my favorite project ever.  Probably because I love rain so much, and it is the middle of summer, and there is no rain in the forecast at all.

It was actually really easy, and pretty fun!  And the results were exactly as cool as I expected!

Here’s a quick little rundown with instructions so you can do this yourself!

First pick what you want the message to say.  I wanted to use a quotation about rain – that celebrated rain.  I also wanted it short enough that it would fit well on my front porch, and wouldn’t be too labor intensive to make the template.  I picked “Let the rain kiss you,” the opening line of a Langston Hughes poem, “April Rain Song.”

Let the rain kiss you
Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops
Let the rain sing you a lullaby
The rain makes still pools on the sidewalk
The rain makes running pools in the gutter
The rain plays a little sleep song on our roof at night
And I love the rain.

Exactly how I feel about rain.  Perfect.

Next, I found an old cardboard box, opened it up, and drew the letters on.  I used a ruler to make sure all the letters were the same height, but just did it freehand.  If you wanted to have it more precise, you could certainly print out your quote and copy it onto your cardboard.

Next, I used an x-acto knife and a cutting mat to cut out the letters. We found the Rust-Oleum NeverWet at our local hardware store.  It is kind of spendy, but we found it on sale.  I think it was about $15.  Considering it was the entire cost of this project, it wasn’t that bad.The directions say to clean your surface of dirt and debris.  We took it a step further, and Jesse pressure washed the whole front walk.  The cleaner the surface, the better, I figure!

I used painter’s tape to tape the template onto our front porch landing.  I also used the tape to fill in the letters R, A, and O.  There were a couple places where the cardboard was lifting up a little, so I made little tape bubbles and pressed everything down nice and firm. The directions also say that it holds up better if it doesn’t get much foot traffic, so I placed the template to the left of the landing, since people tend to hug the right hand side as they go up the steps.  I don’t think it will get a whole lot of foot traffic where I placed it. Next, I just followed the directions that came with the NeverWet.  There is a base coat of which I did two coats.  Then I did four super light coats of the top coat.

It says that it can leave a light white, frosted appearance, and you can kind of see that.  You really have to be looking for it, though.  The photo below shows what it looks like when it’s dry.  What do you think?  Can you tell where the letters are?  Maybe a little, but not enough to bother me!You are supposed to let it cure for 12 hours, but I waited almost a whole day.  Since there is no rain coming anytime soon, I had to manufacture it.  I just poured some water on it to see what it did.  It was pretty amazing!  The water just rolled right off the letters!  And the letters feel totally dry.  Super fun! I love it!  I want to do this all over the place!  I will be sure to post updates during the winter months when it will surely be wet all the time.  Here’s hoping it holds up!  Let me know if you do this yourself!  I’d love to see more of these!