What a hoot it was to complete a journal project using three Stencil Girl stencils in a journal spread! Have you heard that I love to art journal? What I love about working in a
book is the non-preciousness and freedom to just have fun making marks and playing with color. There are no mistakes. I’m a big fan of inspiring words, so those
will often find their way into my pages, giving me much needed reminders when I
page through the book at a later time.
I’m so
thrilled to create this journal spread for you, using 3 of Stencil Girl’s
wonderful stencils:
L301 Circles Circles by Traci Bautista
L091 Dots and Dashes by Jessica Sporn
S400 Military Stars by June Daley
Okay….let’s
get started…..
I started my
pages with some gesso, haphazardly scraped across the pages with a credit
card. I purposefully left some parts of
the page uncovered. When the gesso
dried, I spritzed Adirondack color wash in Butterscotch all over the spread,
and quickly watered it down with a soaking brush, moving the ink all over the
surface. I blotted the surface with
paper towels, leaving a lovely variegated pattern behind. Next, I scribbled with a Stabilo All pencil,
happily and randomly moving my hand around.
I love making marks!
Next, I
brushed matte varnish over the lines I had drawn, causing them to activate and
smear a little bit. I do this for two
reasons. One, I just love the way the
lines look when they smear and blur.
Two, the matte varnish acts as a fixative for the pencil lines, keeping
them in place, so they don’t muddy up future layers on the page.
While the
pencil lines dried, I turned my attention to the first stencil, Dots and
Dashes. I sponged a dark turquoise onto
some deli paper. I LOVE deli paper,
don’t you? Its transparency when I use
it as collage material is a blast!
When the
pencil lines dried, I started filling in shapes with color. I am not a purist when it comes to
paint. I love it all! From Golden to craft paint, I use it all! When painting in my shapes, I am again being
haphazard. I love how some of the pencil
lines are obscured when I go over them with the paint, but others remain strong
dark marks when I avoid the lines. It’s
up to you how careful or carefree you want to be with this step.
After laying
down some color, I pulled out my Circles Circles stencil and decided to add
some texture to a few areas with a reductive technique. I painted a light turquoise over the
dark. When that paint was almost dry, I
placed the stencil right on top of the paint, and rubbed through the stencil with
a damp baby wipe. This left a really
cool “ghostly” effect to that area.
I did some
more scribbling with Neocolor pastels, and added more texture to the page by
pressing tissue and paper towel into wet paint.
With my
Stabilo All pencil, I scribbled through the Military Stars stencil randomly
throughout the page, and then added some paper collage elements. I decided on a quote a friend shared with
me….a lyric from a song she loves. It
seemed the perfect sentiment for the light spot on the page.
And here is
the completed spread! A crazy, scribbly,
patchwork-y burst of happy thoughts….from me to you!
Thanks so
much for joining me today, I hope you had fun!
Big thanks to MaryBeth Shaw and the gang at StencilGirl for this fun
challenge!
