How Does Your Girl Grow?

Mary, Mary, quite contrary
How does your garden grow?
With silver bells and cockleshells
and pretty maids all in a row



Happy Monday, People!  Another start to another crazy week ahead in my little corner of the world!  It just amazes me how much STUFF can get crammed onto the calendar for just one week, LOL!  Ahhhh!  The joys of having kids who are involved in so many different activities!

I did manage to sneak  some "just for fun" crafting in on Sunday. Ok.....maybe not "sneak".  More like blatant "I'm ignoring the dishes, the laundry, the weeds and the fact that I need to help youngest kiddo get his science fair presentation board done!"  I NEEDED to have some fun, hehe!

ANYHOOS!  As I was saying, I managed to get in some play time this weekend.  I have been looking at the demo tag sitting on my desk that I made (but never used) for Part III of the E-Team's Distressed series.  It was just yelling "weathered fence to me".  Then I started talking to The Toad about Wendy Vecchi's Clearly for Art Modeling film.  And all of this led to THIS



A recap on the makings of the tag:  I first painted the tag with some acrylic paint (not worrying about covering the entire tag).  I then used Distress Stains in Antique Linen and Weathered wood randomly on the tag, wiping the excess off between colors.  I believe I swiped some Distress Ink in Brushed Corduroy directly onto the tag (hey!  It's been a whole week!! Surely you jest in expecting me to remember what I did a week ago!!) 

I then dug out a flourish from an old package of idea-ology grungeboard plain elements.  I was able to quickly add color with the Distress Stains in Peeled Paint and Forest Moss.  Yes, these stains just might become one of my favorite color mediums!  Because I am impatient when Mojo starts working, I used my heat gun to quickly dry the flourish and adhered it to the tag with a bit of Glossy Accents.

The flowers are a total experiment using Wendy's Clearly for Art Modeling film.  I started with the white film.  First I tried to ink the film with Distress Mustard seed ink.  While the white film FEELS like a thick paper, it has some type of coating on it that does not hold the Distress Ink color.  I then pulled out my alcohol inks (butterscotch and rust) and applied it randomly on both sides of the film.  After it had dried, I die cut the flowers with the two smallest Spellbinder dies Daisy Head.  I sniped the petals to the center so that I could bend them to my liking when I heated the film.  Note:  I will admit that I had a difficult time holding onto the flowers, heating the film and trying to get the bend I wanted without burning my fingers to smithereens.  NOT that I think this film is difficult to work with.  I just think that I have gotten use to working with the flexibility of metal that I will require a BIT more practice on using this film.  AND I intend to use it again.  OFTEN.  This stuff is too cool!! I glued the flowers together with E600 glue.  The fumes might kill me, but that stuff STICKS! LOL!  The leaves (from the Daisy Head set) were die cut out of TenSecond Studios Poison Ivy metal.  Some large 1/2 pearls were colored with copics and adhered with some more Glossy Accents in the center of the flowers.

To finish off the tag, I pulled out Crafty Secrets creative scraps Farm Fresh.  Cut the image out, added a bit of Fired Brick sponging along the edges and mounted to the tag with dimensionals.  For once, I had some perfect gingham red ribbon to finish off the tag.  Though for the life of me, I can never get the tag ribbons to look decent in photos.  Maybe I need to use a bit of tape to make it "stand" up! haha

I must say I am rather pleased at how this turned out as it was an experiment!  I look forward to exploring more  possibilities with the modeling film!

I hope you all have a wonderful week!  'Till then..................explore something new!!

Exploring and a Winner!!

This weekend has been one of EXPLORING!  This morning was spent hiking in the conservatory right below our house.  We started the morning at my in-laws with a HUGE pancake/french toast breakfast (which was why the hike was needed! LOL!) with family friends and then we loaded up all the dogs (3!), kids (3!) and adults (9!) and spent the next couple of hours tromping.  I have to say that this is another reason that I live in Southern California!! It was absolutely GORGEOUS out!!  Temperature was 65 degrees and I was wishing I had worn shorts vs. jeans and a short sleeve t-shirt vs my light weight long sleeve one!!  Here is a little peek at one view that one of the boys took:

Things are kinda brown right now as we haven't had any rain.  If we ever get some, these hills will be GREEN!! 

I also did some exploring (ok....maybe it is more experimenting!) with a small canvas that I had picked up at Michael's one day.  I actually had a different idea in mind when I purchased the canvas, but didn't feel like dragging out my paints so I went a different path.

                                   

I first stamped the Brushed Wildflower silhouette from Just For Fun Stamps in versamark in one corner and used clear embossing powder to emboss ( I kinda missed  the top inner portion of my image.  Not sure if I didn't get powder on it, or didn't get the image stamped well in the versamark there.  Stamping on the canvas requires a bit more pressure I learned!!)  I wanted to kick my self that I didn't use my ever trusty stampamajig to make sure the image went to the bottom of the canvas, but OH WELL!!  I then layed down one of T!m Holtz's mini masks in the upper corner of the canvas.  I took distress inks in Spiced Marmalade, Mustard Seed and Fired Brick and rubbed them directly onto my non-stick craft sheet.  Gave them a misting until ink beads formed and layed my canvas down into the inks (like the first steps for the wrinkle free distress technique).  Now since the canvas has larger "pores" than paper does, the ink in spots just beaded versus soaked in.  So I grabbed a large 1" stipple brush and "pounced" the ink into the canvas.  I repeated that step one more time then moved the masked to the bottom corner and brushed some inks around to give me a more subtle image of the flourish (I'll explain why you can't really tell the difference of the two corners in just a moment).  I grabbed a piece of copy paper, layed it over the flowers and using my iron set on the highest setting, I melted the embossing powder off the canvas, giving a "faux bleach" look.  I pulled out some plain Mixed Minis grunge paper pieces from T!m Holtz's idea-ology line and painted them black with Folk Art's Metallic Sequin black acrylic paint.  While those were drying I went to work on the butterflies.  I wanted to use the large and small butterflies from Just For Fun Stamps (A3378, C3373....I couldn't get a direct link for these, but if you MUST have them, I'm sure that the folks at Just For Fun would be willing to help you out!! (wink)).  First I tried stamping with different colors on white paper.  Just didn't have the look I was going for~too stark or something that made me shudder!   So I stamped the images onto a transparency sheet with black stazon (I use write on transparencies from Office Depot) that I had altered with some Alcohol inks.  STILL not quite the pop that was needed, so I took a couple of Copic markers in a bright red and orange (YR07 and R27) and went over the "clear" section again to add more color.

Now here is the part that explains the almost disappearing flourishes.  If you haven't noticed lately, I've been LOVING Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist.  So, I thought that a beautiful shimmer in Pearl would just add that little "extra" to my canvas.  Spritzed on the Glimmer mist and MY DISTRESS INKS STARTED TO BLEED OFF!!  Now, when I've used the Glimmer Mists on paper, it DOES change the color a bit if it is applied over the inks.  But on the canvas, it made the distress inks bead up again as when I mist them with water on my craft sheet!  I don't know if the inks hadn't dried on the larger pores of the canvas yet or if the canvas material just makes the distress inks react differently (this will require some more experiementing another time).   Trying  not to panic, I grabbed the stencil brush that was still on my table and pounced the ink back into the canvas.  But OBVIOUSLY the inks had bled so it softened the edges of the top flourish and almost completely faded the bottom flourish (that already had a softer look by the technique applied in that area).  I carefully placed the masked back over the bottom flourish and added a bit more distress ink to try and bring it back somewhat.

Deciding that I had better quit before I messed things up beyond repair, I lined up my "explore" lettering and adhered using some Glossy Accents.  I then carefully cut out my transparency butterflies and rolled small glue dots to adhere only their bodies to the canvas so that their wings could provide more dimension. Some clear gems that I had already colored with Copics for other project (but never used) were applied to make a "flight path" for the larger butterfly. 

Over all I'm pretty pleased with how this turned out.  Not exactly what I had in mind, but I think that this will be a stepping stone for some other projects in the near future!!

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FINALLY!! What you all are waiting for!!  The winner of the blog candy!!  I really enjoyed reading what your goals for creating this year are.  They gave me some "that would be a good idea!" moments!!  I also got some very good suggestions for this blog and I think I will explore more than one or two of them!!   So without further ado:  (insert drum roll here____________________________)

Random.DH (random kid was not available) picked comment number 1 out of the brown paper bag!! (for full accountability, I cut equal sized pieces of paper, numbered them for the total comments, folded each the same way and then placed all the pieces in a brown bag, shook it up good and RandomDH picked one out)
terriavidreader is the lucky winner for my one year blog candy!!  Congratualations Terri!! If you'd contact me with your addy I'll get your goodies in the mail this week!! (offroadtoad@msn.com, please put "blog candy" in the subject line so I won't "trash" your addy!!)

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Thanks for stopping by again today!!  It's been a great past year of blogging and I'm looking forward to another year!!

Peaceful Thoughts

Here is the last tag that I plan on completing for the 12 Tags of Christmas on T!m Holtz's blog.  I've been having a BLAST with all the different techniques but I've got to get some other things done around here!! LOL! I usually have Christmas Eve dinner at my house and let's just say that I am NO where ready for that to happen and I have to work all this next week!! YIKES!!

Enough of my blabber (not to be confused with my blubber....that is another topic entirely!! hehe).  This tag was inspired by Day 11 on T!m's blog. 

I just realized that the way I place the reindeer near the flourish,  it looks like he is sticking out his tongue at the snowflakes!! BWHHAAAA!!! Maybe he is trying to catch the flakes on his tongue!!

The background was created by smearing Distress Inks in Peeled Paint and Pine Needles onto my craft sheet and misting with water then laying the tag into the droplets.  I repeated this several times and could not get  a look I liked, so I misted with Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist in Old Olive (I'm tellin' ya....I just love the soft shimmer this gives to projects!!).  After heat setting, I stamped the Classic Accents flourish from Tattered Angels with Aged Mahagony.  The snowflakes came from SU's Christmas Punch set and were stamped with Distress Pine Needles.  I then stamped the reindeer from Rubbernecker onto grunge paper using versamark and then embossed with black ep.  I cut out the image and inked it with Distress Fired Brick (since I'm all about disclosure, let me say that this is the SECOND reindeer.  The first reindeer had a serious mishap with too much Pearl glimmer mist, then Apple red glimmer mist.  Let's just say that it IS possible to have to much shimmer!! snort).  I found some glitter snowflake that I believe I picked up at Michael's after last Christmas season and attached using glue dots.  The reindeer is on dimensionals. 

I REALLY wanted to use a rub on that said "peaceful wishes" to fill in that blank spot by the reindeers chest.  I had cut it out the other day for consideration to use on a previous tag.  For the life of me, I CAN'T FIND THE STINKIN' LITTLE BUGGER anywhere now!!  So, the spot remains blank.  I'm hoping that the rub on will turn up.  But if not, oh well!!! That is just how it is going to have to be!!

I have most of my Christmas shopping done, but need to bake some goodies for my oldest DS's extra teachers (he has his main teacher, but has a different teacher for computer, math and of course, band and handbells).  And probably I should attempt to start cleaning my house for Christmas Eve!! 

Thanks for dropping by again!!  I'll be back later this week!! (seriously!! hehe....I have a CUTE idea for name cards for my table setting!! I don't usually use them (as everyone knows each other in the family, hehe) but I got this idea brewin' and I think I need to try it!!)

And the Tags March On

Hello Peoples!!  I'm on a roll with the 12 Tags of Christmas that         T!m Holtz gave inspiration for!!  I'm really not following the tags in order.  I'm going with what ideas strike with what supplies I have to make my own version.  My first tag is inspired by T!m's Day 7 Tag.  So without further ado: here is my tag number 7:

Don't you just LOVE this image?  The girls at work gave me a gift certificate to Michael's for my birthday and as I was walking up to the cashier to make my purchace, I saw this stamp by Inkadinkado on one of center aisle displays!!  And wouldn't you know it~~it jumped right into my cart!!

Now this stamp made it very easy to make this tag...all the "extras" are pretty much on the stamp already!! I first stamped the image using Jet Black Archival Ink onto the tag.  I had thought about using my ever trusty stampamajig to make sure I aligned the stamp straight. You'll notice I talked myself out of that much needed step as I managed to stamp the image slightly crooked!  PLEASE!!  What was I thinking?!!  I can't write my name straight without lines, did I really expect to be able to stamp this straight?!!  BUT!!  I got lazy and decided that it will only bother me and DH ('cause he makes it his purpose in life to notice my off layers, stamping and such!!).  I then made a mask around the face/lettering  so that I would not cover them when I did the stamping of the flourish (Tattered Angels Regal Classic Accents Clear Stamp...another new "birthday" gift I picked up with the LSS gift certificate that DH gave me!!).  I used some Folk Art acrylic paint in Spring white, brushing it on my clear stamp (I just made sure I washed the stamp in warm water immediately after stamping).  I did not heat set the paint as it dried while I was washing out my brush/stamp.  I then inked the image, avoiding the center of Santa's face with Distress Inks in Antique Linen, Fired Brick, Aged Mahogany, Peeled Paint and Pine Needles.    I took a damp cloth and wiped off the inks over the painted swirls and then misted the entire tag with Tattered AngelsGlimmer Mist in Pearl.  After heat setting the mist, I applied distress sticles in Fired Brick and Peeled Paint to the holly on Santa's hat.  Let's just say that I need to work on some fine motor skills when it comes to applying stickles!! GEESH!! I got that stuff globbed on!! I finally got wise and let the stickles dry over night (after smearing them and having to apply even MORE stickles to cover up my mistake!) and attached the ribbon and the foilage embellishment in the corner. 

Bonus time again for you!!  I actually made a tag that was inspired by Day 8. 

I do not have the lamp image that T!m used (tho, I have seriously considered it several times....one of these days I'm expecting it to make it into my cart!).  BUT!! I do have the Christmas Lantern by Just for Fun Stamps (sorry, I cannot link directly to the stamp...my wonderful computer (HATE this thing!!) REFUSES to go past the home page.  The number for the stamp is D2747).  But this stamp is only the top of the lamp....it does not have the post.  So I stamped the image on scratch paper drew out a simple post (ok....I'll admit that I drew out a more elaborate post but it did not fit the clean lines of the stamp image.  Sooooo, I modified to a more simple version)  and cut out the entire paper image.  I then stamped the top of the lamp onto grunge paper using versamark ink and embossed using black EP.  I then placed my paper image over the lamp and traced the lamp post using my versamarker and then heat embossed.  Finally, I added a few defining details with the marker and embossed those as well.  The "fine" tip of the versamarker was still wider than I wanted the lines for the post to be, so when I cut out the image from the grunge paper, I just trimmed off some of the embossing. I then cut off the holly leaves off my paper lamp and used it as a mask so that I could ink the grunge holly with Distress Peeled Paint and Pine Needles.  I applied the Distress Stickes in Fired Brick to the berries and then carefully sponged the lamp using a q-tip and Distress Black Soot (you'd think I'd learn to leave such things as stickles for LAST!!).  I colored the flame using my SU markers and applied a thick layer of Ranger Glossy Accents to the "window" to give it that glass appearance. 

I inked up my tag with Antique Linen and Frayed Burlap and made the water drops like T!m shows.  I stamped the flourish from Tattered Angels Classic Accents with Aged Mahogany (love this color combo btw!!).  The music score is by Stampendous and was stamped onto vellum using Archival Jet Black ink.  I then sponged the vellum with Antique Linen and heat set (***Just a note:  this will cause the paper to smoke some as the ink is heat set into the vellum).  I tore the now brittle vellum and sponged with Antique Photo.  Curled the edges and applied to the tag using vellum tape.  The lampost was attched using dimensional tape.  I then sponged antique linen and frayed burlap onto a small tag, stamped the sentiment from SU's Christmas Punch using Aged Mahagany and had to cut out the oval by hand as it would seem I have neglected to add this punch to my tools!!

Well, I hope you are enjoying my takes on T!m's wonderful creativity!! I have one more tag that I HAVE to do so I'm off to work on that now!!

Don't Mess With Dad

Today's Wacky Wednesday challenge on the Rubbernecker Blog was to create a Father's Day card. Of course, being more like Erma Bombeck vs Martha Stewart, I have not even started on ANY of the cards that I need to make for this upcoming holiday. I decided to combine this with the sketch challenge on SCS and get a double bang for my buck.

This is a funky card. Originally, I had the 5x5 piece of creamy caramel as my base. Got everything laid out and something just didn't mesh. By chance, I plopped down the base on a scrap piece of Really Rust! AHHHHH!!! It needed that extra pop. Sooooo, since the DP was already adhered to the base, I just cut a piece of Really Rust 1/4" larger than my base and adhered THAT to the creamy caramel. Makes taking decent photos rather challenging...but IRL it's ok! hehe...(that would be Erma being too cheap to cut another piece of DP to do the card "correctly").

The center panel (the brown with the silver brads) is actually grunge paper that I painted with Vintage Photo crackle paint. I then sponged some chocolate chip ink and vintage photo ink over it to highlight the cracks more. In real life, it looks like old, cracked leather (and smells like it too!! The grunge paper has a "leather" scent!! PERFECT!! hehe). It is adhered with dimensionals so that the brads lie flat.

The image is from Stamp Oasis and is stamped with chocolate chip craft ink and clear embossed. Thank goodness for SU paper snips to cut around it. I did direct to paper with my ink pad in really rust on the rust panels. Added the brads from the SU silver hardware kit.

This is going to be my FIL's card for father's day. He loves things western (do you think that has anything to do with being born/raised in Nebraska? Running a feed lot?!! LOL!).

Thanks for stopping by again today!!

Altering Dreams

The end of the school year is just around the corner and since I was such the flake for Teacher Appreciation Day (*I did send a plant....just no card....no tag.....nothing handmade. Is that allowed when you paper craft?!) I decided to alter some clipboards that I have sitting around. I wanted something that was a bit different than the usual altered clipboards that I have seen. Then inspiration struck (yes, it about knocked me over).

I went to Staples and bought some cork on a roll vs tiles (since this was just an idea, I needed to give myself plenty of material to experiment with!). I made a template to go around the clip and cut the cork. I used a mixture of acrylic paints in two/three different shades of brown (I put a bunch on a paper plate and dabbed my brush here and there in the paints). I tried using mod podge to adhere the cork board, but that wasn't working so I ended up using 1/2" red sticky tape along the cork board edges (between the two, it's sticking good!!). I then covered the bottom half of the clipboard with My Mind's Eye "Backyard "Just be You" Paisley/Teal designer paper. Used1/4" red sticky liner along the edge of the cork board to place the ribbon border. Using the patterned side, I made a "frame" for a photo that the ribbons can hold in place. I am still playing around with the grunge look that Tim Holtz does so well (actually, I believe he calls this "wrinkle free distress". Sherry Cheever just did a tutorial for this on SCS this week also. So, I decided to use this technique to alter some small, plain notepads that I had bought in bulk. I took some whisper white card stock, cut it to make a "cover" for the notepad. Using distress inks in Peeled Paint and Faded Jeans, I spritz them then placed my cover in the wet ink. Dried using my heat gun and repeated. I then stamped my French Script using the Faded Jeans and off stamped it before stamping over the cover. The hummingbird is from Tim's set Flight of Fancy (it was still out on my desk from the last project. Sometimes it works out not to clean up in between creations! hehe). I then used the "spray" from SU's Garden Silhouettes and stamped using Encore copper and embossed with copper EP. Stamped the sentiment (and yes, it is slightly crooked!! grrrrrr!! Hate when I do that!! That is what happens when I don't use my stampamajig!) Here is a close up of the note pad/photo area:I used a small scrap of the dp to make the RSVP pen look "purdy" and matchy. The ribbon to hold the pen is looped with glue dots and adhered. The final touches were using a large flower from the Pretties Kit and dying it with the distress ink (I swiped the ink on my craft sheet, spritzed with water and laid my flower down in it and "smooshed" until it was covered). I used one of the "diamond" brads for the center and added a couple of ribbon leaves. All were adhered using Glue Dots Super Strength dots. I thought that the cork board needed a little sprucing up so I found a couple of swirls from my grunge board collection and covered them with distress stickles in Peeled Paint and after finally letting them dry completely, I adhered those with glossy accents. Supplies: Paper, MME, Whisper White, Chocolate Chip. Inks: Ranger Distress Inks in Peeled Paint, Faded Jeans, Vintage Photo, Encore copper. Accessories: Copper EP, Pretties Kit, Grunge board accent elements, Distress Stickles in Peeled Paint, ribbon, glue dots, red sticky tape, heat gun.

I have another one of these to make. I'm trying to decide if I take the "easy" way out and just CASE everything I've already done or pull out all the papers and go for round two in a different pattern. Guess you'll know what I decided if I post another one or not!! hehe

Thanks for stopping by!! Hope that you all are having some free time this long weekend for some creativity!!