Day 18 of the 24 Days of Christmas Crafting!
The goal for these 24 days is to give you ideas for hand-crafted Christmas decorations for your tree and home. Come back each day to try the next craft. 24 Days of Christmas Crafting!
Here it is, day 18 and I haven’t done a stenciling project yet! I love stenciling and having a Cricut to cut my stencils for me makes it even easier. In keeping with this holiday theme, I took inspiration from a project I did a few months back where I stenciled the word HOME on separate 10-inch canvas panels (and the “O” was a cow face). I also used vinyl that I get for free because these were single-use stencils.
For this project, I am stenciling the word NOEL on four separate 3-inch canvas panels and attaching those panels to a 10-inch panel (because who wants to pound all those nails in their wall).
Materials and Supplies
- 4 three-inch canvas panels
- 1 ten-inch canvas panel
- Pattern from my Resource Library
- White Paint
- Red Paint
- Green Paint
- Silver Paint
- Gold Paint
- Stencil brushes
- Paint brush
- Ribbon
- Stencil material (I used vinyl and cut it on my Cricut but you can use any stencil film)
- Water-based Glue
- Hot Glue
Cutting the Stencil
As with most of my projects, you do not have to use a craft machine to cut the design. I provide the pattern in my Resource Library in a PDF that you can cut by hand.
Upload the .SVG file to your craft machine to cut the stencils. Weed the vinyl and apply the transfer film.
Note: If you want to learn how to acquire vinyl for free when you need vinyl for a stencil (that you will just throw away anyway), you can read my post about how to talk to a sign shop to acquire their vinyl scraps. They throw away scraps that are larger than your cutting mat.
Surface Preparation
Most of your craft-store quality stretched canvas comes with gesso already applied. Gesso is your primer on the canvas. Apply a coat of white craft acrylic paint to the four 3-in panels. Apply red craft acrylic paint to the 10-inch canvas panel. You may need more than one coat, depending on your specific paint.
TIP: If you want to move the paint-drying portion of the project along faster, you can use a blow dryer to help speed things. Use the warm (not hot) setting and keep the blow dryer nozzle no closer than six inches from the panels. move the blow dryer around, don’t keep it in one place. These precautions are to prevent distortions in your canvas.
Apply the Stencil
TIP: Applying vinyl stencils to square/rectangular objects. Cut the corners off of the vinyl. You can now see the corners of the work surface and can align the vinyl stencils to the edges of the work surface.
Apply the stencils to each of the four 3-inch canvas panels. If you are using a large stencil brush, mask the corners so you do not accidentally stencil those areas.
Stenciling
For any of you who have read any of my previous posts, you know I use the pouncing technique of stenciling. This is the traditional method and the method I used in my stenciling certification projects (you can read more on the About Me page).
Vinyl does not make a strong bond with canvas, so using a swirling or stroking motion with your stenciling will cause paint to bleed under the stencil. You will have better success with a pouncing technique.
Like many of these posts, make it the way you want, use the colors that suit your style. I will continue to describe the project the way I made it.
- Stencil the “N” and the “L” with red paint
- Stencil the “E” with green paint
- Stencil the “O” (Ornament) with the gold and silver paints
You will likely need more than one coat of paint in the stenciling.
This short video shows me stenciling one of the panels (at 3x speed). I have detailed information on how to use the pouncing technique of stenciling in a previous post where I stencil a tote bag.
Remove the stencils.
Assemble
Add the Ribbon
Turn the 10-inch canvas panel so the front side of the panel is on your work surface. Mark the center of each side with a pencil.
Wrap the ribbon around so that it starts on the back of one of the sides, wraps around the front, then ends on the back side of the opposite side. Hot glue in place.
Turn the panel 90-degrees and repeat.
Add the Panels
Turn the 10-inch panel so the front surface is now facing you.
Using the water-based paint, glue the NOEL panels into the sections created by the ribbon. You can use hot glue if you can work fast enough. I prefer to use something that sets-up slower than hot glue so I can adjust the position of the little panels.
Using the same ribbon, create a bow and hot glue it to the top of the 10-inch canvas panel.
Time to Decorate!
Your NOEL panel is now ready to decorate your home this holiday season and for many seasons to come.
Come back each day for a new project in the 24 Days of Christmas Crafting!
You can get the patterns to all my DIY and craft projects in my Resource Library by signing up for my weekly newsletter.
Remember to pin this to your favorite holiday crafting board on Pinterest!
Other Posts About Cutting Vinyl
If you are new to cutting vinyl or just want to try some new projects, then you can click these links to try some of the things I have blogged about that use vinyl somewhere in the project such as using vinyl for a stencil or an etching mask.
- How to get Vinyl for Free (my most popular!)
- Love Your Home! …with These Easy to Make Stenciled HOME Panels
- Royally Etched and Painted Crown Bottles
- Stenciled Tudor Rose Box
- DIY “Create” Sign for Craft Room
- Stenciled NOEL Canvas Holiday Panels
- Believe! – Christmas Plaque
- Kitchen Canister Labels: Organize Your Kitchen
- Shadow Box Heart Art – You Make My Heart Soar!
- Clean and Dirty Dishwasher Magnet
- Gift Poem for the New Mom and Dad
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