Project: Baby Name Canvas

      Last weekend we visited Nashville, where John's sis is soon to have a baby boy - the first cousin for my girls.  We are so excited to welcome him into the world, and I asked if they would like for me to make something decorative for the nursery.  They wanted a painted canvas with his name on it and sent me a pictures of the nursery and bedding to match it to.  Here is what I came up with.



I painted the canvas all over in cream and shaded the corners with a little bit of blue.  I use Gesso, which I get at Hobby Lobby, to give a little texture to my acrylic painted canvases.  It helps show where the brush strokes are and give it more dimension.  You can mix any color into it, and it won't change the color.  They had a vinyl tree decal on the wall behind the crib in chocolate brown, and I wanted to bring that into it.  I used leaves from my back yard and painted them brown and essentially stamped them onto the canvas. I would just repaint it and restamp it in different places to get the look I was going for.



After I had my lines of leaves, I shaded in a little green around where the name was going to be.  I printed out letters for this (font: Didot), cut them out, and stuck them directly onto the wet paint.



Once that had dried, I painted the blue over it, and outlined them in a darker blue.  Which left me with the final product.  Hope this gives you some fun ideas!