Such a Silly

Mixed media is a major focus at my local scrapbook store and some of the ladies who've gotten into the techniques are wanting ways to incorporate them into their layouts. We've done a few other themes, but this one is using masks to create the title. 

For the background I paintedFaber-Castell gelatoes through a Prima stencil and let it dry. Then I adhered my Hazel & Ruby alphabet masks and placed a The Crafter's Workshop stencil over the letters. I smeared modeling paste over the stencil/masks and let it dry, then dripped a whole bunch of green Studio Calico mist over the title block. I used modeling paste and the same green on the corrugated cardstock on the left side of the page. 

In the bottom right, I built up layers of embellishments to highlight the silly photo of Vance when he was two. 

Beautiful Place Canvas

Remember how I've talked about how into mixed media techniques my local scrapbook store is? Well, I tried my hand at another canvas for them. The only things Dala asked me to use were some Bo Bunny embellishments and the new(ish) Mod Podge molds, the rest was up to me. 

There's lots of tissue and modeling paste. I don't know what those gem things are but I got them for super cheap when Archivers was going out of business.

Here you can read the sentiment a little better, it's from a Donna Downey Unity Stamp. And check out that little pink frame! That's one of those Mod Podge molded shapes, I just painted over it. 

The creamy colored border here is another of the Mod Podge shapes in the original color. I love that the texture is so rich with these things! If you have no idea what I'm talking about - Mod Podge released a series of silicon molds that you use with their special glue sticks. You use a high temp glue gun and squeeze the glue into the mold. I've read about people using regular glue sticks with so so success (I'd definitely want to paint them if I did that!). This was my first time using them though so I didn't play around at that level, plus the molds were ones I'd borrowed from the store. Now that I have my own...

Reimagine

It's time for a new challenge at Paper Girls Challenge Blog, this time Charity has asked us to do something with pine cones - a little "pine cone pizzazz" if you will. I wasn't having much luck finding pine cones on my papers so I went a different route and cut a apart a pine cone to use on this little wall hanging. 

While I'm not technically participating in Ali Edward's one word program, I do find the idea of having a focus word for the year to be inspirational and chose "reimagine" to guide me through the year. To reinforce the concept I wanted something that I'd get to see everyday to remind me to find new ways to look at things/situations and decided to have a little mixed media fun. Everything here has been "reimagined" in some way - some examples: the canvas itself held David's advent calendar, dried up paint was thinned and given new life, the last bits of various glitter glues put to use, ribbon that has sat unused for ages, last pieces of gems, rubber bands, paper clips, and of course the pine cones that I dismantled and reassembled into flowers. 

There was a point very early in this process where I nearly through it away. I'd primed it and painted the entire thing yellow (the paint is old and I had more of it than any other color). Awful, even with the bits of gesso and book pages showing through. I plopped some pinks in the corners and added these numeral Thickers (again, last of their packs) and it started to hold promise. So many layers later, I'm glad I stuck with it. 

That red thing is the sack from clementines and the dotted tape is drywall joint tape that an instructor at my LSS didn't want to take home.

A few rubber bands, some disjointed gems (they were those designed kind and I'd removed some for various projects), with lots of glitter glue melding it all together.

Just a fun and funky title, it is actually the only newish stuff - an unused clipboard from a class, new wood veneer alphas, modeling paste, glitter, and a new to me stencil from Dylusions.

Here's those pine cones I promised. Now what are you gonna make with yours?

Authentique Seasons Calendar

My friends, I am so beyond excited about today's post! Scrapbooksteals sent me some of the most delicious Authentique papers for my design team post today - it was mostly from the Seasons Petite Collections, and oh was it fun to come up with a use for all that goodness. There's so much paper in today's steal that even after my project (which used a lot) I have plenty of leftover paper and stickers to hoard for some cards and layouts.

The biggest quandary I faced was how to use the paper to feature all four seasons at the same time. Teaching my five year old about months and seasons must have gotten to me because I decided on a calendar. You'll see that I used this as an excuse to play with a friend's WRMK Cinch (still on my wishlist because Santa apparently didn't like me that much this year) and used the calendar pages from Graphic 45 Place in Time to complement my layouts.

It's photo heavy today, go grab a coffee and plan to sit a spell because I really want you to see how much fun there is to be had with this kit!

January - in addition to the Winter Petite Collection I used some buttons from KI Memories, flowers from Prima, and twine from MME.

As a Midwesterner, I don't perceive seasons as a fixed point. There's an ebb and flow with hints of the previous and future season and I wanted to bring that into my calendar, very few months have only one season represented.

February - uses both Winter and bits of Sweetness (for that touch of Valentine's pink). I also added some MME twine, Prima flowers, and used a WRMK Lucky 8 punch.

March - features Sweetness with a touch of Winter. There's also ribbon from Paper Studio and American Crafts, KI Memories buttons, Stazon Ink, and a MME transparency.

April - more of Sweetness with a touch of Winter. There's a custom rosette from fussy cutting the ice cream parlor banner from one of the pages with a random button on top, an American Crafts rosette and some stashed ribbon paired with modeling paste, a TCW stencil, and Mister Huey's pulled in some of the blues from other pages but kept it springy.

May - Sweetness paired with Summer papers and embellishments. I also used some stickers from Authentique's Original. In addition, I pulled in a Pink Paislee Artisan Element, Lawn Fawn flower bobby pin, and stash ribbon. The shiny word bracket was cut out of packaging from those Prima flowers I used on winter pages, I used a Tim Holtz die and then covered it with Glossy Accents. The background was customized with a TCW stencil, modeling paste and then Peacock Feathers and Worn Lipstick Distress Inks.

June - my first Summer layout, you'll notice I pulled in a bit of Sweetness. There's also another Lawn Fawn bobby pin, and more MME twine. The wooden sun is a MME veneer that was misted with Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist.

July - Summer and Autumn with a few pieces of Glory and Original because I couldn't stay away from the 4th of July idea. 

August - Summer and Autumn again, but to evoke the haziness of a Missouri August I used my hand to apply modeling paste in one corner and as it dried misted October Afternoon Sprinklers across the page. 

September - Autumn, Summer, and Winter. There's also more of those KI Memories button and a Graphic 45 Staples flower.

October - Autumn with some fussy cutting out of a sheet of Enchanting to make the page "spookier." I also worked some MME twine into a spider's web and accented the page with Girl's Paperie Toil and Trouble charms. 

November - Autumn papers. I added in some torn papers, leaf die cuts, KI Memories buttons, and MME twine. 

December - Winter with a few touches of Autumn reds and Festive stickers. To make the banners I used a Glitz Design stamp and fussy cut and sewed them together. The other embellishments on the page are Pink Paislee Luxe stars, Prima flower, and stash buttons. 

As you can see I used a lot of paper on each page, this kit is loaded! I'm so glad that Steals sent this particular kit to me, now I get to hang this little beauty in my kitchen. *happy dance* Now to decide which photos to put into the layouts. 

January card club

Remember that shaker card I made for Paper Girls in December? Well, it started something at Soul Sentiments (my LSS), we're now hosting a monthly card class. Each month gets a different technique. Participants get paper, get to experiment with supplies, and if they come back the next month bring cards to trade that feature their style. 

These two cards are from papers from Pink Paislee and are the inspiration for the January Card Club.

The paper we are going to use is the Luxe line, if you are unfamiliar with it let me tell you that the paper is white with foil in gold/silver or copper/black packs. My cards are not white! Our technique this month is using mixed media style products. For these cards I used Distress Ink pads and just kept wiping the pad across the paper. And wiped the ink off of the foil.

 

This card features a MME Chalk Studio tag, Glitz Designs alphas, Graphic 45 Staples flowers, Paper Studio feathers, and stash brads. The ink is Ranger Distress Dusty Concord. 

This card features a scrap of stash cardstock, Paper Studio feathers, Little Yellow Bicycle canvas tags, Stazon ink (sentiment), Hero Arts stamp (sentiment), My Mind's Eye twine. The ink is Ranger Distress Faded Jeans.

The front of the packaging had all these great little samples that I cut out to test which medium worked best/I wanted to use for my card samples. From left to right in a circle here's the techniques I used: Mister Huey's Mist, Ranger Distress Ink pad, Faber-Castell Gelato, Art Anthology spray, Creative Inspirations paint pot, Stazon Ink pad. I was really disappointed at how the paper took in the Mister Huey's, while it certainly is a look that could work it was less than impressive to me. I just plain did a bad job of painting on the CI paint but was glad to see that it worked fairly well. The ink pads both had similar coverage. 

This class will be on Sunday, January 12. Call the store to find out more!

Beautiful wall hanging

Not one who deals with last minute, under the wire, pull it out of my tush sort of stress very well I will confess to having packed my crafty supplies for the Scrapbooksteals Retreat/crop four days early. Four. Now, what in the world was I thinking?  I found myself without the ability to simply adhere two pieces of paper for something as basic as a card. Oops. 

I quickly realized that I could still craft, as long as I was willing to get a bit messy. So I set my mixed media skills to work on this little wooden plaque that I'd picked up at the thrift store. 

It was a lot of fun to make, some of the products I used include gesso, Creative Inspirations paint pots, plastic packaging, scraps of paper, fine point PITT pens, Maya Road banners, Recollections flower, MME wood veneer butterfly and gems, cheap acrylic craft paint, TCW stencils, modeling paste, Unity Stamp Co. Donna Downey stamp.