Guest post from Sarah Robinson
Do you have a whole bunch of the same looking keys on your key ring like I do? It takes me about 5 minutes to find the right door key to get into my front door! Frustrating! Until recently . . .
My husband installed a new exterior door going out the side of the house and that meant we were also going to replace the door handle. Ugh. Another key to keep track of. We already have separate ones for the front door and the back door, now we add one to the side of the house?! And each of the door keys look almost exactly the same. I can’t keep them straight. I realize they sell these special color coded keys at WalMart where we get our keys made, but I’m always too cheap to spend the money to get my key chain straight.
Instead, I found another alternative! Recently, I saw a pin on Pinterest where they had actually painted the top part of their keys with fingernail polish. Brilliant!
I decided to give it a try. And yep, it works like a charm. Here’s my finished product:
I will never question if I got the right key now!
Some tips to think about:
- Have several different colors available for each different key.
- Use paper under the key while you’re painting it so you can give it a really good coat without getting paint on anything.
- Paint it on both sides of they key, letting it dry between sides.
- Keep a color coded chart that you can check to see which key is which, in the case you forget.
What do you think? Is this something you’d try? Or would you rather just buy the special keys at the key counter?
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I would get them re-keyed so they are all the same. I don’t remember it costing a lot. We did it to our front door/deadbolt :).
Such a simple idea. I am SO DOING THIS for my husband’s front door key….sometimes he tries 3 or 4 keys before he gets the right one! Thanks for the tip!
What a great idea! My husband and I own a rental property and always have a ton of keys. This will be an awesome way to organize them.