I have a new tutorial available today over on the StencilGirl blog! I'm sharing one of the ways I like to art journal on top of layers of paint and images left over from cleaning off my stamps and paint brushes on the blank pages of my journal.

If you'd like to see more on how this page came together, make sure to head over to StencilGirl Talk to see my step-by-step photo tutorial.

And you know what that means... time to save some money!

There are two Cyber Monday sales happening that I wanted to share... first is the big sale over at StencilGirl where you can get all of my stencils on sale for 25% off starting now and going through 11:59p.m. CST, December 3, 2019.

To get the discount, you need to use this coupon code when you check out: cheers25

And... not only do you get 25% off, but if you buy 6 of the same size stencils, StencilGirl’s everyday 10% discount is automatically applied to those stencils.
 
But wait, there's more! You can also earn freebies when you spend over a certain amount!*

• $100+ a free exclusive large stencil made only for this sale
  
• $300+ a free StencilGirl Studio class
  
• $500+ an original piece of art made by StencilGirl Founder, Mary Beth Shaw
  

*Please note: Freebies are calculated after the discounts are applied.

Now for Cyber Monday sale number two... the one in my shop! If you missed the announcement in my newsletter last week, never fear - you can still save 20% off your entire purchase (including lots of already marked down sale items) through midnight eastern time tomorrow night (December 2nd.)

Make sure to use the coupon BlackCyber19 at checkout to get the discount. Don't forget, this applies to my new rubber stamps from PaperArtsy, all of my Boho Blends embossing powders and Boho Bits embellishments from Emerald Creek, and all of my stencils as well as lots of other goodies (original artwork and jewelry are excluded.)

Happy Cyber Monday shopping - I hope you enjoy the deals!

I have a new tutorial up today on the StencilGirl blog - in this post I'm sharing one of my favorite ways to use Posca paint pens with stencils to create layered art journal pages with bright, colorful "painted" focal images.

I'm excited to share that by popular demand, the 9" x 12" Chinese Garden - Buddha stencil from my June 2019 release with StencilGirl is now available in small and mini sizes!

The new 4" x 4" mini stencil is the perfect size for tags, cards, and mini art journal pages like the one here from a recent 2-1/2" square mini art journal.

The small version worked perfectly on this 6" x 6" accordion art journal page:

I deliberately designed these so that you could either color them in completely, leave it as a simple line drawing, or stencil over top of a more complex background and use color and shading to leave some or all of it showing through the face.

Here you can see more examples of how I used most or part of the face on a heavily patterned background and faded out the color so the background would come through... some leave very little showing, some allow a lot to remain visible. I love the variety of the looks you can get using the same stencils, products, and techniques in slightly different ways.

Both of these new baby Buddha stencils are available in my shop, along with the original 9" x 12" large version.

Hi all, it's time for my quarterly column on StencilGirl Talk - I have a new mixed media project and tutorial available showing how I complete this piece, "Butterfly Medallion," from start to finish:

You can head on over to see the whole thing, including close-ups of the finished piece. It's also linked from my Tutorials page.

For those who might be interested, the original is also now available for sale in my shop.

I'm excited to share that I have five new stencil designs available today from StencilGirl! I've added three new stencils to my Chinese Garden series as well as two new Collage Textures & Patterns options.

These new designs all feature imagery that I love and use in my own work and as always, they're heavily influenced by my travels.

The Chinese Garden - Buddha, Lotus, and Koi stencils were inspired by my visits to various gardens and temples throughout Asia. The Buddha was directly taken from a pastel portrait in one of my art journals and the design of the Lotus stencil was inspired by a woodblock I found in India. Although the Koi are reminiscent of many places I've been fortunate enough to visit, my main inspiration came from a gorgeous and peaceful garden that appeared as the unexpected finish to a very long, hot, and unbelievably crowded hike through Xiang Jia Jie National Park in China. It was an incredible oasis in the midst of one of the most amazing settings I've ever seen.

​Here you can see a few of the ways that I've been using the new designs:

In this piece, I've used the Lotus stencil as a pattern to create a highly layered and textured piece with a lot of fabric and a bit of embroidery.

The Collage Textures and Patterns - Medieval Cyrillic stencil was partially inspired by several semesters of Russian language study in grad school, but more particularly by a once-in-a-lifetime journey through Russia on the Trans Siberian Railroad. We stopped nearly every day to go into various cities where I was fortunate enough to visit many Orthodox churches and cathedrals as well as a few museums - all full of the most gorgeous art, especially icons. Many of the icons feature writing and much of it is ornate and beautifully ornamental.

The characters in this stencil are mainly comprised of combinations of different Cyrillic letters and, although it doesn't really say anything, I love using it for texture and pattern in my backgrounds. You can see this stencil sprinkled through the mini accordion art journal shared below along with the Collage Textures and Patterns - Leaves stencil which was inspired by wallpaper and upholstery in one of my favorite buildings near where I used to live in Utah.

​Click on any of the images to see the whole thing or to see it larger.

I hope you enjoy the new stencils as much as I do. You can find all of my stencils, including the new designs, now available in my shop.

Hi all! It's been a while... in the last two months I've started a new job, done a little traveling, and moved from Utah back home to Northern Virginia. It's been a bit crazy, but I did manage to squeeze in the time to work on a new project for my quarterly Paint & Texture column on the StencilGirl blog.

This month's project includes a step-by-step tutorial that shows how I made this layered and textured mixed media piece using paint and stencils, collage with a bit of frottage, and embossing powder using both Baked Texture and my new Boho Blends from Emerald Creek.

Make sure you head over to the StencilGirl blog to see the tutorial as well as close-ups of the finished artwork.

(Sold - thank you!)

Hi all, I just wanted to pop in and let you know that I have a new post up today on StencilGirl Talk - it's my quarterly column on Paint and Texture with your stencils. This month I'm sharing a tutorial for this collaged and highly textured "Art Card."

Make sure to head over to the StencilGirl blog to see the whole post with a step-by-step tutorial. As always, an index of all of my mixed media tutorials is also available here on my website as a reference.