I used these to paint kittens on the walls of our kitten nursery after I finished painting the walls. I let the wall paint dry well, and used the same wall paint (different color) for the stencils. I followed the directions exactly, using a barely-loaded foam brush, but still had trouble with the paint getting under the stencil and making the design a little messy. Not sure what else I could have done to make it come out neater.