I’m extremely proud my 7-year old daughter’s ability to draw and paint freely! Art is one of her strongest passions, and there’s no stopping her from getting better and better at it as she grows and learns more. But sometimes, even the best artists need a break too. There are days when my kid just seems uninspired and not really into making something creative out of scratch.
You know, the occasional days when you want to do something but just don’t know where to start? Like adults, kids like my daughter can feel that way too, and I don’t want her to feel unproductive during her “eager but idle” moments because it would likely go downhill from there. I figured that perhaps stencil art can save the day during such instances.
Luckily, we got a hold of Suteki Stencils to perk up my daughter’s creativity without the pressure of starting from zero. We have the Cute Food Theme Pack which features two art designs, each with four different stencils that are meant to be layered to produce that complete design. These two designs are animated food characters: a blushing pear with an apron, and a happy cupcake! The set also includes four bottled acrylic paints, four card sheets to make the stencil art on, and an illustrated instruction sheet that is easy to follow.
My daughter was very pleased to learn about the concept of stencil art. It provided her guided patterns for her to paint on, yet it still gave her an exciting challenge to layer the stencils correctly, and the freedom to choose her colors. And we both loved the cute designs! It was like she was making a cartoon or comic artwork. Her creative juices did not stop from flowing just because of the ready-made stencils though, because she wanted to use them for designing her plain t-shirts! She liked them so much that she even asked me to get more new designs for her.
Interestingly, the Suteki Stencils set reminded me of Andy Warhol’s pop art since you can always paint with the same stencils again but with a lot of different color combinations. I also love the mess-free advantage of painting with stencils. My daughter’s finished product was so neat that it looked like digital art at first glance!
Aside from giving little artists a break from freehand drawing, I realized that stencil art is also a friendly tool for non-artists, and for kids to explore other ways of painting. That makes Suteki Stencils a perfect gift because “suteki”, in Japanese, means “awesome”! I would love to just draw and paint with these to de-stress but still feel productive and artsy.
Suteki Stencils is suitable for children aged 7-12, and for younger kids aged 5-6 with adult supervision. The Suteki Stencils Theme Packs (Cute Food, Fantasy Friends) can be used with the Suteki Stencil Station, which includes more stencil designs and card sheets, acrylic paints, a stencil station tray, star stamper, paint mixing palette, and picture frames where the finish artworks can be framed for display! That’s just awesome indeed!