Mario Painting

Here is the painting I'm doing to go in the basement (AKA Hubby's man cave) at my house. I do not own the rights to it because it is based off Grand Star by Lawrence Yang. I used acrylic paint on canvas. The best part was flicking white paint onto the canvas to make a starry sky; my dog just couldn't stay away and now has white freckles all over her back. I am painting 3 other paintings to go with this one. I plan to make Princess Peach, Goomba, and Lakitu themed paintings.

Use a large sponge brush to paint background. Dry. Thin out the background color paint with a little water. Use brush to make some drops of thin paint on the canvas and blow it hard through a straw to make the long splatter marks.

Between these next 2 pics I screwed up. I should have first spattered the entire canvas with white paint. Dry. Paint the rock-like astroid. Instead I painted the rock, then splattered white paint, then touched up the rock.

Use thinned white paint and blow through straw to make long splatter marks. Repeat with thinned brown paint. Add little brown skyscrapers to your rock.

Use thinned yellow paint to make splatters where you want the star to go. Paint the star. 

Add detail to the star. Paint Mario. Voila!

Update: I finished the other paintings. Latiku painting here. Princess Peach and Venus Fire Trap paintings here.

Vinyl Wall Lettering Using Cricut

I’ve officially been living in my first house for one year… I’m only just starting to get stuff up on the walls. Poop. Oh well, at least I’ve had a chance to get the Cricut out.

Materials:
Scrap paper

Vinyl sheets

Cricut machine

Masking tape

Level

Directions:

Using your level and masking tape, make a line across the wall where you will want your phrase. This will ensure that your phrase isn’t forever lopsided. Place one extra piece of tape exactly where you want your phrase to be centered. Using scrap paper, cut out the words or pictures that you want on the wall. Use masking tape to fix your design on the wall. Remove and re-stick your design if it’s not centered on your line. Step back and see if you like what you have. If you want to adjust size or change the entire thing, re-cut from scrap paper using the Cricut. Once you have a design you love, I’d recommend writing down you sizes and leaving it up for a couple of days. After the “let’s not be drastic” waiting period, if you still love the design, use the Cricut to cut the same design out of vinyl this time. Take one paper piece off, wipe that part of the wall clean with a damp rag, dry the wall very well, and place one vinyl piece in place of the paper one. Continue until your entire phrase is on the wall. Whenever you have outgrown your unique design, a hairdryer will take it right off. Voila!

My favorite creative technique today is using lowercase letters as uppercase letters. Simply choose a bigger size font for the letters you want "capitalized". i love crafting with my cricut!