Using wood for UPA

The new Unruly PaperArts blogozine is published today and it is all about using wood in your crafting projects. There are the usual Reader’s Art Quests (RAQs) and columnist articles over the month. But sadly this will be the last month for UPA as Shar the creator and editor can no longer find the time to keep it going. It is such a shame.

This is my RAQ sample using a flat wooden birdhouse and a couple of wooden embellishments.

These birdhouses can be picked up quite cheaply and I got mine from the Range in the UK.

I had seen a video made by Leandra at PaperArtsy and decided to use her techniques to colour up and get some texture going. You can find the video tutorial HERE, where the process is described in detail and is very easy to follow.

I also painted the back using Fresco Finish paints and a piece of foam.

I gathered some wooden embellishments together, not sure which ones I was going to use at the time and I painted them all with white acrylic paint.

I decided to use the large bird and small dragonfly and painted them again with FF paints, then over-stamped the bird with a Tim Holtz stamp.

Using a small piece of twig also painted up I glued in a perch..

You can see the textures and layers of paint here.

Have fun working with wooden pieces this month and please enter your projects into the two RAQs which are 1. To use wooden accents and 2. Make a 3D wooden project. I think I have covered both with my birdhouse lol.

Thanks for joining me today, have fun.

hugs {brenda} x0x

Layers

It is my turn to choose the challenge at Country View Crafts’ Challenges and I chose ‘Layers’ so that whatever your style you get a chance to play along.

I have seen so many of those fabulous pop-up cards on the blogs over the past few months and thought it would be good to do one, but as I don’t have a die to help me out I knew I was going to have to start from scratch and design my own. When I was a teacher in the classroom my children always made topic books and putting pop-ups in them was great for them to apply some art and technology skills and they were really good at them, but I have kept to basic rectangles on which I have added images and ephemera.

Let’s start with the front cover though.

I have used Tim’s French Industrial paper stash and added a frame (cut for me by my friend Lucy), part of a tag from a TH purse, a stamped ticket and a crown and Fleur de Lys die-cuts. The frame was painted with distress paints, black acrylic paint and pewter treasure gold added (you wouldn’t believe it started off as a piece of white card would you?) The picture came from the paper stash.

The die cuts were black card and I coated them with distress embossing powder. For the fleur de lys I covered it in black soot and then sprayed it with a shiny varnish and put some pewter TG on it, but it faded into the background so I alcohol inked it with pitch black.

For the inside I cut a piece of the paper stash to size and turned to the back drawing in the lines I wanted to cut and to fold.

I pushed the pop-ups inwards folding in the appropriate places and then set about adding layers of card, images, ephemera, washi tape and words until I was happy with the effects.

So a very simple pop-up design but I think it looks ok

Looking forward to seeing you join in with the challenge this month. Please pop over and take a look at the inspiration from the DT and the winner and Top 3 from July will be joining us over the weeks too.

Have a creative week.

Thanks for reading.

hugs {brenda} x0x

Finding Mr Mojo–Tag 4 and Tim Holtz workshops

This tag was inspired by Tim's May tag 2012 (check out his blog for the full details of his tag), but I changed mine as I went along -  as you do!! It is a sample for Crafty Individuals who have new stamp sets just released and of course I love lighthouses so had to use this set asap. Please check out Jean’s blog to see the stamps and see the other DTs amazing inspiration.

I started with a tag that had been prepared from left over inks and stains from another project and stamped the numbers from the CI – 397 plate using cobalt archival ink.

I glued scrunched up blue tissue paper over the top and stamped the lighthouse and painted in using distress markers. The picket fence is perfect for colouring up the lighthouse itself.

The seagull was stamped separately on inked card, cut out and edged with walnut stain DI.

I added two wooden shapes both painted with white acrylic and this one stamped over with some of the names of the 31 areas used in the BBC shipping forecasts, as was the border that can be seen a couple of photos above.

Thought  would just add a few photos from the retail day and consumer workshops that Tim did this week. Firstly though I have to say it was just an amazing experience both from having Tim take the sessions and having him teach us about the products and how they work but also because I got to meet up with quite a few blogging buddies too, which was wonderful. So to Jennie (Buttons), Rita, Annie, Sue C, Jennie Boxall, Alison (Butterfly) thank you for an incredible time meeting up with you all and having so much fun. In fact Wednesday night we laughed till we cried.

Wednesday photos – beware you might need a cuppa to get through these lol.

Meeting Tim was fab.

and Mario ...

and Dyan.

Tables laid out ready for the day.

Tim teaching.

One of the 15 tags we made, this one just started and using remnant rubs,

Dyan teaching us how to use the Dylusions sprays.

Thursday's photos

Rita and Annie came down Wednesday....

Thursday's workshop - Sue, Jennie and me with Mario.

Tim teaching.

Jennie getting inky...

and Sue,

My work station. with tags in progress.

Our table (photo taken by Tim)

Us three getting stuck in (photo taken by Tim)

me getting bits ready to embellish the tag book (photo taken by Tim)

Just an incredible two days.

So today I am off to Swindon for the weekend where I will be with Alison again and more crafting friends joining in a 2 day workshop with Anna Dabrowska also known as Finnabair. (Photos to come next week). How lucky am I?????

Enjoy your weekend whatever you have got planned.

hugs {brenda} x0x

Workshop card – Quirky Birds

A quick post today to show you the Quirky Birds card I made for my Crafty Individuals class last week and repeated again this week. Lots of lovely ladies attended and I got to meet a blogging friend, Jane of Jane's Journal, who lives in Surrey and quite near to where I used to live many years ago.

This card focuses on texture using heat embossing, embossing folders, the rusted enamel technique and adding embellishments including the hand made nest and embossed eggs.

We blended distress inks on the background of the stamped image and hand painted the birds.

These little eggs were a great hit. Again blended with distress inks, heat embossed in clear and stamped into while still hot. When cool they were blended over with walnut stain ink.

The ruler is a Tim Holtz embossing folder, the feathers from the Art of Craft (very cheap!), the sentiment is computer generated and the little pennants lift the TH postage stamp frame to reveal a hidden greeting. (Sorry forgot the photo of that bit!!).

I did take pictures of everyone's card, but sorry girls I have just run out of time to load them all. I will have to do a group photo in the future and get everyone on together.

If you are reading this today, Wednesday, I will be in Coventry with the master himself making lots of tags that I can use to inspire me in running my own workshops and tomorrow (Thursday) I will be attending his workshop making a tag book. When I get back I will post some photos of the sessions and my makes.

See you soon.

hugs {brenda} x0x

Tim’s Tag for August

You know I definitely work better under pressure of time limits which is why I am often on the line for getting projects made. Of course that’s difficult when you have workshop samples to get done. But for today I am showing you my take on the Tim Holtz tag for August and all his instructions and inspiration can be found on his blog HERE.

I have used his techniques for masking and stamping but rather than a tag I have made a tag book. I used a giant size 12 tag and stamped both sides so that both the outside and inside of the covers were decorated.

The colours of distress paints I used for the background are – salty ocean, victorian velvet, walnut stain, picket fence and antique linen. And for the background stamping I used both distress inks and distress markers in aged mahogany, weathered wood, pumice stone and frayed burlap and also used coffee archival for the main images. At first I thought this background was far too busy, but once I had got used to it I really quite like it.

These show how the tag forms the front and back covers and I used tissue tape coloured with distress satins and distress inks to tie the little book up. The pages were sewn in using the sewing machine.

I dipped some of the pages in DI and added some little butterfly stamps and some tissue tape.

Hope you like my variation of Tim’s tag. Now having got back into masking again I can see me using it a lot again in the future.

Today Tim is due to land in England. ready for the two days he has booked at PI. Welcome to the UK Tim and Mario. Wednesday is the retail day training and Thursday is the workshop day. I am so looking forward to meeting up with Jenny – Pushing the Right Buttons -  again, we are doing the Thursday morning workshop together, but I will also get to meet Rita – RMG Creations, Annie – Curious and Crafty Treasures  and Alison – Words and Pictures - in person which will be a real treat. I think Sue – Stamping Sue Style -is also doing the morning session. Anyone else out there I know going to be at either days?

I hope you have had a good bank holiday weekend in the UK, enjoy the rest of it today.

Thanks as always for your visits and your comments, it is amazing how we can make such lovely on-line friends and then to meet some in person is one of life’s treasures.

Take care.

hugs {brenda} x0x