Sweet Carollers - Stand in Face Photo Board for Kitchen Smidgen Bakery, St Marys, ON

Take a peek at how I spent most of November. Cindy Taylor of Kitchen Smidgen Bakery, located  right here in St Marys, commissioned me to design and paint a board
advertising her business for the holiday season. 

A Stand in Face Board, the type one sees at a carnival.

Cindy suggested Victorian Christmas Carollers to coordinate with St Marys' Victorian downtown and its heritage district. I thought it was perfect as inspiration comes easily when the Victorians are involved. The visual richness of that time lends itself perfectly with the holiday season. But of course, Cindy's amazing baked creations were also wonderfully inspiring.

As I'm not a carpenter, Cindy took care of having the board made for me to paint on.

Below were the plans and materials required for her carpenter to use as guidelines.

Here is the built board she and husband Scott delivered to me. Terrific!

Even the edges were nicely framed.

Here it is primed and ready for colour.

The base coat. Many more to come.

Many patterns and details representing baked goods and confectionaries adorned the clothes of the carollers/elves.

Cakes, cupcakes and madeleines...

Cranberries, sprinkles on whipped cream and cherry chocolate cake hat amongst many other

yummy desserts.

I could not resist placing a dark chocolate pug puppy in the pocket. Note the chocolate chip cookie buttons, the scones, cinnamon buns and doughnuts.

I used exterior house paint purchased in sample size cans. To create numerous new colours I mixed in my own artist acrylics to the house paints. The board was positioned horizontally to cut out the ovals for the faces and to varnish it.

Brian did the cutting as I was too nervous, afraid I would ruin it. Note that I wanted the cut to be angled so it would be more comfortable for people's faces.

Done! What a relief.

It seamed only natural to paint a big red heart at the back.

I used marine varnish for extra protection as this board will be exposed to our Canadian winters. 

In some areas, I added sparkles in the varnish.

In other areas, spot varnishing complimented the designs.

Kitchen Smidgen Bakery's Sweet Carollers.

Fa La La La La La La La La La

 Voila! 

Come back soon to see the faces I painted on the cut out pieces.