A Whole Lotta Green!

***FYI: I've been getting horrible Anonymous Spam Comments so I've had to enable the dreaded "Enter What You See Here" thingamajig, at least for a while.  I'm so sorry for the inconvenience, and if you don't want to leave a comment, no biggie, I understand. 

Hi crafty peeps! Thank you for all the emails, tweets, facebook messages, and even texts from those of you wishing me a get well. It's not been a good few months for my immune system. ;0) Even the doctor chewed me out and said I can't venture out in public until I get boosted up and get healthier, which means lots more sleep. Easier said than done. Just started my third round of new antibiotics today. If this doesn't work I will have to become a real hermit!

Anyway, back to this post. A whole lotta green don't mean money money money, unfortunately, but instead means color! It's almost St. Patrick's Day, and it's a day we celebrate here at our house, so I've made a few things.

The current Making Art Challenge at the Everything Wendy Vecchi Yahoo Group is "Shadowbox". HUH? This was definitely a challenge for me, as I didn't want to use a premade box, and I already had my tag planned out and I was not going to budge on the main design of it, which was using a very traditional love/friendship/loyalty symbol of Ireland, the Claddagh, although this one is a little non traditional looking.  So I tried many things, but ultimately came up with making a teeny tiny shadowbox inside the heart of this Claddagh, a treasure of sorts. I hope that counts!
I am also submitting this tag to Hels Sunday Stamper for "Use Some New Stash",  and to the Artistic Stamper Creative Team Blog challenge for "Tags".

I tried out many Maya Road crowns, this one did not make the cut, but Wendy's Parts did. I did bend the fingers a bit to mimic holding the heart. These Parts can take a beating. I cut a rectangle bubble from some packaging from Tim's Idea-ology Keyholes.

I found some shamrock paper from literally 15 years ago, gave it some of Dyan's Dylusions, and adhered it to the package bubbles, now shadowboxes. I adhered these to the hearts, and then covered them with Wendy's Gold Embossing Paste that I just spackled on. I should have added some other stuff in there, like gold coins or something, but hind sight you know!

The hands were painted with Victorian Velvet Distress Paint, and her nails were manicured with Distress Markers. A little ribbon and a gold hightlighted puffy silk shirt made from Prima Flowers, and they were ready to go.

The crown was painted with Ranger's Silver Paint Dabber and then covered with Rock Candy Distress Crackle Paint. After it was dried, I misted it with Butterscotch Color Wash to seep into all the cracks. I wiped the rest off. I added emerald green rhinestones, gold cord, and a green rose from my stash to finish it off.

More 15 year old paper was adhered to a piece of corrugated paper...to the front side to give extra strength after I mutilated it.

I turned it over to the back portion, and used all the greens from Tim's Distress Paints and just painted some stripes on in each color. I left brown areas from the base on purpose.

I used the two background images from Wendy's new Heirloom Art and Sunshine In Art from Stamper's Anonymous, and hand stamped them in Jet Black Archival so only portions of them showed up and I didn't crush the ridges of the base underneath with my major stamping muscles when I use a block.

I tore portions of all that hard work away, revealing the corrugated ridges underneath. The distressed look is very cool I think. I was able to cut this piece into two #10 jumbo sized tags and two #5 small tags (I just traced around them and cut out with scissors.).

Carolyn from The Crafty Scrapper wanted me to try out Tsukineko's Goosebumps Texture Spray, I have never used it before. I thought it would be perfect to add a little more texture here and to protect parts of the brown corrugated paper from being colored. I wanted portions of it to remain as it was. I was worried of course, but BINGO...it worked, gave it shine, gave it texture, and even darkened parts of the brown areas where I sprayed it a little more heavy. I love this stuff! My wheels are turning on how to use it next. It reminds me of the starch I used to cook on the stove, spray on my jeans, and then have to iron them of course for the crispest pair of pants you ever wore. They stood by themselves. Those days are over!!!! Boy was I dumb!

Next, I took a Wendy Diamond Stencil and Bottle Paint Dabber and added it here and there. Love!

And the last thing I did to finish this background off was spray it up with some Dylusions in Lemon Zest, Squeezed Lime, and Fresh Cut Grass. The Distress Paints, Acrylic Paint, and Goosebumps all acted like resists, so only the untouched base brown areas were colored! LOVE!!!! I could totally have a wall look like this...even in green! I love this background!

A little Citrus Alcohol Ink and these Idea-ology Plaquettes were perfectly Irish. ;0) I added everything on, and found some more trims perfect for this, like Maya Road's Zippered Ribbon in the perfect shade of green, and I even found some beads that I am sure someone forced me to wear one St. Pat's!

 

I also made a card for a friend as well, using basically the same supplies, but I tweaked an image of Wendy's from her new Heirloom Art set that I thought was perfect for St. Pat's!

I used watercolor paper for a card base, and sprayed it with water. Then I added Salty Ocean, Bundled Sage, and Peeled Paint Distress Paints and blended it all up with the water again. FUN! It's matte and strong. I stamped Wendy's Flower Image in Jet Black Archival three times.

I stamped this background image over it in Olive Archival Ink, covering up some of the areas I didn't want stamped with sticky notes. I drew in more leaves with a black Sharpie so that they now look more like shamrocks.

Using Distress Markers, I just started coloring in the leaves and flowers. I also used a White Uniball Signo Pen to help, and added a little doodling with the Sharpie.

A Pearl Paint Dabber made clouds, and Stickles added shine to the leaves. I found some pearl string and added more flowers. I added the sentiment From Crafty Secrets, and Butterfly Pins from Maya Road.

Supplies:  The Crafty Scrapper

Corrugated Cardboard

Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Paint In Mowed Lawn

Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Paint In Peeled Paint

Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Paint In Bundled Sage

Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Paint In Forest Moss

Stamper’s Anonymous Wendy Vecchi Sunshine and Art Stamp Set

Stamper’s Anonymous Wendy Vecchi Heirloom Art Stamp Set

Ranger Archival Ink In Jet Black

Tsukineko Goose Bumps Clear Texture Spray

Wendy Vecchi Stencils For Art Diamonds Are A Girls Best Friend

Ranger Adirondack Acrylic Paint Dabber In Bottle

Ranger Dyan Reaveley Dylusions Ink Sprays In Lemon Zest

Ranger Dyan Reaveley Dylusions Ink Sprays In Squeezed Lime

Ranger Dyan Reaveley Dylusions Ink Spray In Fresh Cut Grass

Wendy Vecchi Art Part In Dress Forms and More

Maya Road Large Chipboard Crown

Dreamweaver Wendy Vecchi Embossing Paste In Gold

Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Paint In Victorian Velvet

Ranger Adirondack Acrylic Paint Dabber In Silver

Ranger Tim Holtz Crackle Paint In Rock Candy

Ranger Adirondack Color Wash In Butterscotch

Prima Craftable Flowers

Ranger Adirondack Acrylic Paint Dabber In Gold

Maya Road Zipper Ribbon In Green

Tim Holtz Idea-ology Number Plaquettes

Ranger Adirondack Alcohol Ink In Citrus

Tim Holtz Distress Paint In Salty Ocean

Tim Holtz Distress Markers
Uniball Signo White Pen

Ranger Stickles In Orange Peel

Ranger Stickles In Firefly

Ranger Stickles In Mystic Green

Ranger Adirondack Acrylic Paint Dabber In Pearl

Crafty Secrets Card Sentiments Stamp Set

Ranger Archival Ink In Olive

Specialty Stamping Paper 8.5 x11

Tim Holtz Distress Ink In Black Soot

Ranger Inkssentials Ink Blending Tool

Prima Green Mini Roses

Maya Road Trinket Pins In Vintage Butterfly

I hope your hands get creatively dirty soon!

A Chic Yet Shabby Kind Of Love!

It's Monday! Yawn no more, because it's time for a new challenge at Simon Says Stamp & Show. From lace, roses, and doilies,  to adding a bit of a shabby touch with some brown ink around the edges, to adding bits of pearls to that vintage creation, this week we’re thinking "Shabby Chic". Now, if this style is normally too feminine or frilly for you, we challenge you to take just one element that is often considered shabby chic and try to incorporate that. You’re also welcome to focus on the ‘chic’ or just the ‘shabby’ part in this challenge too. From brown inks to soft trims and vintage findings, we hope you’ll join in and create something with us this week.

I love to incorporate scrapbooking with my home decor, and what better way to do so than with a little 'chic'. When I think Shabby Chic, I think about gathering up great vintage finds and combining those with others that are complimentary, but it must have pearls, lace, and roses, and be vintage with a little French something or another thrown in. That's what I tried to do here in this 8x10 inch frame, that I am currently teaching to a group of people, which explains the lack of photos here. I did show you the base however.

The base of this project is an old broken frame that has been semi repaired, distressed,  painted, and filled with a painted and papered chipboard backing. The quadrants are Art Parts painted and papered as well. The rest of this project is just comprised of mounds of embellishment and photos.

 

 

Do you love Shabby Chic style? If so, create your work of Art and enter it into our challenge. You just might be the lucky winner of a $50 voucher to Simon Says Stamp. You can also be named as one of the "Top Three Picks" for this challenge. Good luck, and please visit the other DT member's blogs to check out their super shabbily chic projects this week. Talk about eye candy!

 

Supplies:


I hope your hands get creatively dirty soon!

February ATC's Received!

Happy mail came last week, I've just not been able to get these ATC's from the All Things Tim Yahoo Group up from our February swap up on the blog until now. Gorgeous makes traders! Thank you!!!!

From Kathleen Spitz (What a heavy metal beauty! Love the rustic embossed background, and all these metal embellies are too fun! Great heart and wings, and love the abc's on the bottlecap! Fabulous make!)

From Kavi Coulson (The gold is just stunning on the background and edged on the hearts! Beautiful crackled hearts as well! Just a striking piece!)

From Julie Case (By still my rusted and textural heart...yummy! Love the pin right through it! The crackled gold embossing in the background is subtle but gorgeous! Love the X and O...brilliant!)

From Claudine Criner (Tattered Floral challenge piece a little early...lol! GORGEOUS! Metal madness! Love the heart, gears, and edges! Oh the flower...perfection!)

And...here is mine again.

I hope your hands get creatively dirty soon!

It's All A Number's Game!

Happy Monday Crafters! It's that time again...a new Simon Says Stamp & Show Challenge! Design team member Dan thought, "Why not a challenge about Numbers?" You can challenge yourself to use a specific number of items, use number stamps, stencils or paper with numbers on it. You can create a layout with a top five list or journal your top ten favorite things. You could use a ticket stamp, a color-by-number item with some Copic or Distress markers. The list could go on and on. So keep numbers in mind this week, and come join in our challenge!

I love numbers and always have. Numbers are perfect and make sense to me, and there is only ever one right answer (Even though I often get it wrong!)...no gray areas! Although, I do like gray areas, especially in Art, it's nice to have definitives in life. 1+1 will always be 2...um, right???

I also love games, probably because most involve numbers. Poker, Gin, Rummy, Yahtzee, Dominoes...love them! And although I am horrible at it, I am ashamed to say I am mesmerized by Roulette! I wish I was smart enough to remember all the probability involved to pick the right number and color combination, but the spinning of the wheel is very therapeutic for me anyway. What can I say...I'm a cheap date!

Anyway...off tangent...I've made this box to house the many decks of cards we have because my husband can't bare to have the decks of cards be thrown away at his local men's club after they use them like twice, so he brings them home. So we will be able to store many decks and score pads in this to use in our own card games and it will look fab sitting on the coffee table. I really love how it came out.

El cheapo wooden box from the dollar store.

I crackled it with some spray paints, and got it all ready to be decoupaged on.

Soooo many Stamper's Anonymous stamps...new and soooo old were stamped. A few I had never even used yet if you can believe it. I stamped in three different colors of Archival (Jet Black, Vermillion, Pale Ochre) first onto Specialty Stamping Paper to make two ATC's to fit into the framed holes making a collage of the images. I did this on one side of the box, and on the other I did a smaller collaged image to use as the body for the game ladies seen below.

I stamped all the images onto plain tissue paper in Vermillion and Jet Black. I cut these out and used Glue N Seal to adhere to the box.

Here you can see the smaller image used for the body of the Game Ladies. After I decoupaged the images, I colored them in using Distress Markers and permanent markers. I finished the box by adding lose game pieces to adorn it, making handles and feet as well.

 

Do you love numbers? Do you collect things with numbers on them? Do you love to create things with numbers?  If so, create your work of Art and enter it into our challenge. You just might be the lucky winner of a $50 voucher to Simon Says Stamp. You can also be named as one of the "Top Three Picks" for this challenge. Good luck, and please visit the other DT member's blogs. There are numerous fabulous projects from this week. No one scored a zero!

 

Supplies:


I hope your hands get creatively dirty soon!

A Yard Stick Album???

The current challenge at the Everything Wendy Vecchi Yahoo Group Making Art Challenge, is #4 "Using Fabric". Luckily, I have just finished a project for The Crafty Scrapper that I will be teaching that will qualify for this challenge. There is no step out though since this is a class, but I've shown you a few photos, which includes lots of Wendy Embossing Paste, Stencils, and Stamps! Love her!

Maybe if you are in the area you can join in on the fun! 

 

 

I am also submitting this to Hels Sunday Stamper Challenge of "Texture". 
I hope your hands get creatively dirty soon!