Now here's a staircase that speaks to us. We've been interested in stair transformations ever since contemplating painted stair runners, but here's an idea that's easier to do and can be changed at your whim.

We saw this inviting blue staircase with red stenciled letters via a blog we love to stop in and read, the haystack needle. For this photo, Jen from the haystack needle worked with the photo stylist to mask off and stencil words on random risers (details on how they did it here).

Another stencil idea that we like for stairs is here, although for us we'd do words instead of numbers:

Unlike painted stair runners, we like that updating this looks relatively easy. It could be painted over or words changed without affecting the whole staircase. We have two staircases in our home and both could use some attention- this would be a great idea for our back stairs. "Welcome Home" is what we'd write.

Image 1: the haystack needle, 2: Pottery Barn, via Apartment Therapy