For today I prepared video with two large wooden hearts, decorated with napkin and rice paper, as well as glitter paste.
First, I apply 2 coats of white acrylic paint using sponges. If you are using brush you might need one more coat to cover wood properly.
Now we can start preparing images. Most of the time I tear rice paper with fingers for better blending. This way edges are fluffy and tend to blend better saving us time with less coats of varnish later on.
I always apply glue under rice paper just to make sure paper soaks well with it, then I place image in the middle and smooth it with another layer of glue from the top. Believe me I already learned hard way what happens when you don’t glue your paper the way you supposed to. After I finished my work everything was fine for few weeks and then air bubbles started appearing under it. My whole work ended up in rubbish bin. So don’t make the same mistake I did.
Just to make sure, I use my finger to smooth it one more time.
One heart is drying so I can work on the other one. This one is going to be more difficult as we are gluing napkin which is extremely thin. First I remove two bottom layers and use only top coloured one for my heart. You need to use water and thin brush to tear around images.
When everything is ready we can start gluing. There are several ways of gluing napkins starting from: wetting the paper, applying glue under it, ironing your napkins and so on. If I use small images as those here I place my picture on the heart and then I apply generous amount of glue from the top with wide synthetic brush starting from the middle smoothing paper towards edges. If your brush is to dry it will tear the paper. Try to be quite quick so paper doesn’t get chance to expand creating wrinkles. On flat hearts like mine you could also use “iron” method.
When everything is dry I take sand paper and remove both napkin and rice paper around edges. Try to sand sideways or top to bottom as the other way around might tear your paper. Then I apply dark grey paint by sponge creating frame around my heart. You mustn’t take too much paint on your sponge, just a tiny beat wiping excess on kitchen towel.
Now it’s time to repeat the process on the other side of my hearts.
Next step would be blending background around birds on heart with napkin. I use grey and white paint and some water. I tried this recently and water makes it really easy to match colours and even if you make mistake you can easily wipe it off. I take little beat of grey and white paint on my sponge and dip it in water then I start applying it around images. Use another sponge to dry your work if needed.
I also add grey paint on edges to create frame to match the other heart.
To blend everything even better I splash white dots all over my hearts with fan brush to create tiny snowflakes on my work. You have to add water to your paint to thin it.
When we are happy about the finish we can start varnishing. I apply several layers of gloss water based varnish and then I use fine sand paper to smooth my surface with another varnishing to follow. Heart with rice paper will probably need more layers than the one with napkins because paper is slightly thicker. I usually apply about 40 layers all together until I’m happy with the finish. In between every few layers of varnish you will need to do sanding to smooth and even the surface.
Next step is applying glitter paste. You can use glitter pen to create ornaments or you can use paste and stencil. My hand is always shaky so for me paste is much better. I spray my stencil with temporary glue and wait few seconds for spray to dry and becomes sticky. Then I stick it to my heart and I apply sliver glitter paste with spatula. Temporary glue keeps my stencil in place and prevents paste from licking under it. This paste when wet is milky white with sliver bits of glitter in it but it becomes transparent and shiny when dry.
I like using stencils because everyone can do it. You don’t need any special skills to work with it. They are reusable but need to be cleaned strait after using and they will last long time. You can use paint over them as well as any structure paste.
My hearts are finished and ready to be hanged on our Christmas tree. I hope you like this video and see you shortly with another Christmas project.