Canvas Cutouts

Hello and Happy Friday Eve!

I have a bare space on the wall above my bed and happened to have 3 canvas panels along with some scrapbook paper stacks that were catching dust. I decided to put my 3 favorite things on the panels: my dog Royce, the guitar, and something to incorporate my love of writing (I'm debating on this one, maybe a typewriter or some sort of quote). Anyways, I came up with these:

It is so easy! Here's what you'll need:

Canvas panel

Paintbrush

Acrylic paint or oil paint

Scissors

Paper

Pencil

Modgepodge

and an idea...in this case we'll do the guitar.

First, go ahead and paint your canvas panel. For the Pomeranian, I used oil paint, which does give it a cool look but I had to wait an entire weekend for it to dry. 

Tip: I use the top of a shoe box to paint on because you can dump your paint into the lid and set the painting on top so that the paint never gets on anything. 

While that's drying, grab your pencil and paper. My little brother gave me this pencil and I'm in love with it :)

There are two ways you can get your cutout. You want to look for a vector image online, for instance, I got the pomeranian image by googling pomeranian vector and selecting the black and white option. Once you find it, size it how you like and you can either print or if you're poor like me. zoom in on your screen and put your piece of paper on top then trace it! (you really just need to trace the outline)

If you're going to trace, I suggest trimming your piece of paper down to the size of the canvas panel, mine was 8x10 so it made it easier to know how big it was actually going to be.

Now you need to decide what kind of paper you'll be using as the pattern. I chose the yellow floral pattern out of this big book of patterns from Joann's for 9 bucks. Yep, and I believe the sale is still going on! Place the paper behind your traced image and cut it out.

Once the paint is try we can add the image on top. Mine was dry by the time I cut out the guitar so it worked out perfectly. You'll need Modgepodge and a clean brush. You want to apply the adhesive to the back of the guitar first, then lay it out on your canvas and apply a thin coat over the guitar. Let it dry and you are done!

Tips: 
1. You can do this to the entire canvas and it will be very glossy, I only did it over the guitar area and it gave a more weathered look. Up to you!
2. You may run into air bubbles forming under the guitar as it dries. Just take a push pin or a needle and gently poke a tiny hole in the bubble, then apply pressure to get the air out.

Have a great weekend!!