Line Up! Stencil. Repeat.

Line Up and Repeat.

It sounds like an order when you say it aloud.

Heard you try it. LOL

At StencilGirl® we only want to give you insight into what you can do with stencils. (Never orders.)

That said, when "line up" is applied to a batch of stencils rather than a crowd, you can transform a blank paper into something wonderful!

The rolling pin, spatula, and whisk will have you stenciling in nothing flat! This Baking Utensil Repeat Stencil is by June Pfaff Daley. Need baking implements? June has you covered.

These stencils next few stencils were designed to line up perfectly horizontally and vertically.

Quilt your own garden on paper with the pretty adjoining blossoms of the Quilted Flower Garden Stencil by Cecilia Swatton.

Diamonds may indeed be a girl's best friend but it is increasingly expensive to make art with jewels.
Try Mary Beth Shaw's darling Leaf Diamond Stencil instead!

TIP: The easiest way to line up the stencil perfectly is to match the edge row of the stencil over the pattern row you have already painted.

What if you could make raindrops splash just the way you wanted? Andrew Borloz achieves just that with his Bent Drops Small Stencil. It pairs nicely with the single design, Bent Drops Mini Flower.

We "tote" you stenciling was fun!

The hand-drawn tile pattern of  Kristie Taylor's Diamond Bell Square Stencil is ready for you to block out this pattern across the pages of your art journal and so much more.

Here it is shown with Crystal 12 pt. Mandala.

And now we come to the elegant Medieval Leaf Motif Stencil by Jessica Sporn.
Wouldn't it be lovely stenciled on the edge of a skirt?

It can also be used to make a flower as in the blue and gold pattern below.

Nifty as a background too.

This hand-drawn beauty, Curliecue Allover, by Janet Joehlin is not an exact match with regard to the earlier tip, but it would also make a pretty repeat pattern at the edge of a shirt or skirt.

Here, Janet has used Curliecue Allover in her art journal.

This stencil by Carol Wiebe is repeatable, but note the little extra space between the middle and right row. It gives the eye a place to rest and wonder. Joy! Use the Diamond Facets #1 Stencil to create a larger repeating pattern. Maybe on fabric?! Check out 3 more diamond facets by Carol.

You'll need to turn Mary Beth Shaw's Ribbon Weave Stencil to repeat it:

The Star Quilt Stencil by Mary Beth Shaw in small or mini sizes is fun for lining up side by side by side by side by...

Quit #1Small or Mini, also by Mary Beth, allows you to create a twirled pattern you can use with alternating colors.

Quilt it on paper or fabric.

Your mission, we hope you'll choose to accept it, is as the card at the top stated, to "bake the world a better place" by going forth and making art :)

A Painted and Stenciled Tribute to Tennyson by Linda Edkins Wyatt

Hi, Linda here with a journal spread that I hope makes you think of warm days and the smell of blooming blossoms! On reading "The Flower," a work from Victorian poet Alfred Lord Tennyson, I pictured roses in full bloom, spilling over a garden wall, their scent filling the summer air and their petals falling softly to the ground. I had just purchased a new Dylusions square art journal, and I thought a beautiful, painterly spread would be the perfect way to christen it.

A Loft shopping bag inspired my journal spread.

For the design and colors, I was inspired by--of all things--a shopping bag! I had purchased some gifts for my daughter at our local Loft store and saved the gorgeous paper bag. (Naturally, I filled the bag with art supplies and unfinished projects!) The bag had pink flowers on a background that changed from dark brown in the front and back to white on the sides. It really spoke to my inner textile designer. I decided to try and capture that idea in my journal spread.

The brand-new journal, with a cover using a Kristie Taylor's Tapestry stencil.

I started by penciling off the areas that would be dark and light. I also penciled in an area where I wanted to have the Tennyson poem on a tag. I taped the line separating the brown from the white with removable blue painter's tape.

First, I painted the brown background. It was pretty boring and streaky so I added an Aboriginal stencil over it and sponged on dark purple paint.

The brown background has an added layer of purple using the medium-sized Aboriginal June 2019 StencilClub design by June Pfaff Daley.

I removed the blue tape, then placed it over about an inch to the left to work on the right side of the page. On the white section, I used Nested Squares Full by Carol Wiebe and sponged on light tan paint. (I mixed it using white with a dab of the same brown that I had used on the left.)

I removed the blue tape and had a nice clean line separating the dark and light sides. For the flowers, I wanted an impressionistic, painterly style. On my Teflon mat, I squeezed out blobs of magenta and white acrylic and mixed several shades of pink.

I started by painting light pink flowers on white watercolor paper and had an idea of cutting the flowers and gluing them to the journal. But...I was having so much fun painting that I threw caution to the wind and painted right on top of the stenciled backgrounds. It was one of those scary/exciting moments because I wasn't sure how the flowers would turn out...I was channeling my inner Monet...and fortunately, my painting found the balance between loosely relaxed and sloppy! If I had painted the flowers and cut them out, the overall look wouldn't have been as free and impressionistic.

The flowers needed a center, so I used a dab of Golden Green Gold and Golden Quinacridone/Nickel Azo Gold fluid acrylics through a circular area of the medium Aboriginal stencil. It gave the flowers just the punch they needed.

  

 

For the leaves, I used two Art Foamies leaf stamps with Liquitex Basics Brilliant Yellow Green acrylic paint. I also put some dots of green and pink here and there to add movement and color and make it feel like there were petals falling.

I sponged white acrylic paint on with a cosmetic wedge.

 

Next, I worked on the tag. It was cream-colored, so I again used the Nested Squares Full stencil, but this time with white acrylic. When it was dry, I painted some loose pink flowers in the same style as the journal spread and added a couple sponged leaves.

I wanted the poem on the tag, so I measured the "live area" of the tag to be sure the words wouldn't bump the edges. On my computer, I used Microsoft Publisher to create some textboxes that would be tag-sized, then flowed the poem into the space. I made one rectangle in small print with the whole poem, and one in a fancier font with the first three stanzas. 

Next, I printed the words out on an Avery clear mailing label. I carefully trimmed the sections, peeled away the backing, and applied it to the tag, then pressed it carefully so it would "melt" into the background. The fancy font poetry went on the painted side of the tag, and the small, full poem on the back.

 

I decided to have the tag attached with a sheer ribbon and pink brad at the top of the page. My original idea was to make a pocket on the left side, but I didn't want to cover up the pretty flower that I had painted on the left. By having the tag attached with ribbon and a brad, it makes all the flowers visible and allows the tag to float on the page. There is enough ribbon attached to the tag that I can use it in the future as a bookmark or placeholder for other journal pages.

Here's the whole poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson that inspired my journal spread:

Once in a golden hour
I cast to earth a seed.
Up there came a flower,
The people said, a weed.
To and fro they went
Thro' my garden bower,
And muttering discontent
Cursed me and my flower.
Then it grew so tall
It wore a crown of light,
But thieves from o'er the wall
Stole the seed by night.
Sow'd it far and wide
By every town and tower,
Till all the people cried,
'Splendid is the flower! '
Read my little fable:
He that runs may read.
Most can raise the flowers now,
For all have got the seed.
And some are pretty enough,
And some are poor indeed;
And now again the people
Call it but a weed.

4 Jubilant Journals and a Marvelous Mixed Media Piece

Welcome! So glad you've taken a moment out of your days to check out our Throwback Thursday art treats!

Junk Journal for Spring ~ Cindy Gilstrap

Hop over to Cindy’s blog and find out to create this fun Junk Journal with Stenciled Ribbon.

Daniella Woolf's Succulent stencil is featured on the lovely ribbon:

S224 Succulents

Challenge the World by Tina Walker

 

Butterfly Journal

Delve into Tina's mind, stencils used, and processes for these projects over on her blog.

Inside Happy with Tammy Tutterow

Hello! Tammy Tutterow checking in. Earlier this month I shared a tutorial featuring my Happy Moments Journal that I created for the StencilGirl and Canvas Corp Match Up.  I wanted to revisit it today to share a quick look inside.

When I make mini books and journals, I like to follow a formula for my pages that I use over and over through out the book.  I think it makes creating a book easier and allows me to put the focus on my words and photos.  I also like to try to integrate elements from my cover on the inside pages.

For this journal, I carried the polka dot theme from the cover to the inside by using the same Mini Dots Stencil.  I also brought the polka dots and ticking theme inside with pattern paper.  I introduced a few other favorite stencils that are repeated on the other inside pages: S002 Journal Notes 6 and S054 Your Thoughts 6.

Not Blank Anymore Journal - Carol Baxter

Hello! Carol chiming in now. 

What to do with an entirely blank small journal? I started out with Canvas Corp's Naked Journal from 7 Gypsies.

I spritzed all the pages of the journal quite randomly with:

L179 Hands stencil

I stenciled in a bunch of hands using Jessica Sporn's stencil, then I looked for the eldest released stencil in my stash.

This is the 4th mini stencil StencilGirl ever produced. Mini Downward Stairs.

For some reason it struck me as dice, not lucky 7s but snake eyes... and as there is ever a song in my head... Do you hear good ol' Mr. Jagger singing, "You got to roll me and call me tumbin' dice"?

My art journal is the result of an afternoon's stenciling. I am sure I will continue to embellish it, but right now, I am going to let it rest.

A couple of newer stencils found their way into the journal too, including Mary Beth Shaw's Random Lace and the Winter Solstice Mini from StencilClub, Roxanne Evans Stout's Ocean Glider, Daniella Woolf's small Guitars and Dancing Lights, Carol Wiebe's Lunar Symbols, and Gwen Lafleur's Ornamental Compass Mask.

"Striving."

"Shining soul, drop on head."

"When the magic begins."

"Sometimes it happens out of sync." (above)

"Cacophony with applause."

"Gamble." (here it is, in the works)

"Everyone's a critic."

Am I my own worst one? That sweet little fish might be upside down. Thank goodness there are no stencil police!

Tip: If you have yet to layer once stencil over another, I highly recommend that you try it! I doubt Mary Beth thought her Random Lace would be used as scales, but I bet she'd be the first to tell you that the use of a stencil is in the eye of the beholder.

"Big laughs."

The Lunar Symbols stencil reminds me of a heart. It also looks like... oh! I can't tell you because now I want to see if I can make it into what I just saw as I am writing this post.

Do you save fortunes you break out of cookies? Apparently Mary Nasser does too. Check out her gorgeous journal cover and appropriate fortune here.

"Art friends share paint." (back cover)

This concludes our Throwback Thursday projects, but wait!

There is still time to enter for a chance to win a prize!

Now, of course, what would a matchup be without a fun giveaway? Here’s your chance to get your hands on a products from both ​StencilGirl Products and Canvas Corp Brands!

To enter the giveaway, all you need to do is:

• leave a comment here on any or all of the Match-up Posts during the month of April with StencilGirl Products and CCB. You can leave one on each post for more chances to win. Don’t forget to include the hashtag #SGPCCBmatchup so we can find you!!!

• and/or leave a comment on the CCB Facebook page or StencilGirl Products Facebook page. Don’t forget to include #SGPCCBmatchup so we can find you!!!

• and/or leave a comment on any of the CCB Instagram posts or StencilGirl Products Instagram posts where you see any of the projects from the CCB team or the SGP team. Don’t forget to include #SGPCCBmatchup so we can find you!!!

• You can follow along by searching #SGPCCBmatchup. If you love what you see and would like to join the Facebook group CCBCollective – ask to join today.

• You can find all StencilGirl Products in our shop – www.stencilgirlproducts.com

• Shop Canvas Corp Brands at https://shop.canvascorpbrands.com

• We will be sharing projects the entire month of April – learn new techniques, see how new products are used and be inspired with great ideas from members of the SGP and CCB creative teams.