Playing with Stencils

Not many things that make me happier than someone being inspired by something they see here.  

Roseanne also had a snow day (their first significant storm believe it or not)....and she did this little watercolor inspired by yesterday's post.  I love it! 

And just today....she and I had a texting conversation about stencils.

I own several....and they are well used and very handy for gelli printing.  But more recently I have embraced cutting my own...or using leaves and grasses for printing.  But every once in a while one catches my attention and I give in.

A few weeks ago I purchased a couple of stencils/masks by Raie Missigman from Stencil Girl...and today....for the first time I played with this eucalyptus stencil using watercolor. My little project landed in my book....along with a little corner quote prompt from the hand lettering class.  As I look at this....I think I need to take more time on the lettering....I'm not all that happy with it.  I think I did it too quickly....and I just go back to my default old handwriting.  Hand lettering....takes time!

It took me a while to get these straight....but a stencil fills in the image...and a mask fills in the negative space around the image. The ones on the left is are stencils (that's what I used)....and the pieces on the right are the masks.  I played a little bit with one of the masks today too....but I'll report on that in the days to come.

For this one....I lightly dappled  watercolor in the stencil using a brush.  I worked on it outside the book...then stitched it in when I was done.

I lightly outlined with a pencil and added some little white dots.....just to give the leaves some definition and highlights.

I wanted to fill in the blank spaces on the opposite page using these coordinating prefused fabrics.  

There was no way I could maneuver the book to sew them in....but I wanted the look of stitching. So I stitched around the edge ahead of time...then fused them in.....and it worked just fine. I'm tucking that tip in my toolbox.

FYI....I printed that JOY on the fabric with my printer a while back. I'm going to write about that sometime soon....because I need a little more "JOY" to fuse. 😉

That's more of Lynne's collaged deli paper on the right....it's works perfectly with this spread! I'm going to keep playing with these eucalyptus stencils and masks...so stay tuned.