Tutorial - How to make your own printer's tray

I've had a few emails since I posted yesterday's hat-themed printer's tray, asking where I bought it from. The truth is, I made it myself! I took photos throughout the process, so here's a quick tutorial to show how I did it :)

I started out with a bunch of small boxes - the smallest ones I bought at a pound shop, 3 for 49p, the large ones came from Michaels in the US, I forget how much they were but I'm thinking around 50 cents each. I used the lids from 2 large and 6 small for this project. Obviously you can use any size of box, in any arrangement you like.

I used my ATG gun to stick the lids together. Notice that the bottom box was too large so I took a 1/2 inch slice out of it. It doesn't matter if the join is a bit raggy, it won't be seen once it's covered with patterned cardstock.

The small lids were slightly shallower than the large ones, so I added 2 strips of chipboard on the back to even out the height. I then completely covered the back with another sheet of chipboard to make the tray more sturdy.
Notice that I've added a length of wire to hang it on the wall (string would work too if you don't have any wire).

The wire was twisted on the inside and is unseen once the compartments have been lined with patterned cardstock.

Finally, each compartment was lined with patterned cardstock and edged with tissue tape. It's all ready now to be filled with whatever goodies you choose! :) It's also a LOT cheaper than one you'd buy in the shops (I'm sounding like a Blue Peter presenter now LOL) I hope this was useful for some of you - see you tomorrow! :)

Alice Through the Iron Gates

Another oldie today - I could have sworn that I've blogged this before, but after a thorough search, it appears not!

I used layers of chipboard to form a compartment, which I gilded with metal leaf on the inside. It contained some Alice-themed playing cards and a mini-book with part of the story and some of Tenniel's classic illustrations.

Chipboard doors were added with metal hinges and fastenings.

Click on an image if you want to see a larger version. ! :o)

[Edited to add - Google is telling me I blogged this in Oct '07, but I can't find the post! I can only think I deleted it at some point, but for what reason I can't imagine! Ah well, here it is again, lol]

Photo-Organiser-type-thingy

Does anyone else out there in blogland watch the shows from TVWeekly? I joined their site a while back and I get an email from them everytime there's a new episode - some I watch, some I don't. Tonight I actually tried one of their projects for the first time, and it won't be the last!

They have a great system, you watch the show, then you download the step by step instructions and follow them. It made the whole thing really easy to do, and (if I say so myself) it came out just as nice as the one in the show! How often can we say that about instructions we've followed? Oh, just in case you want to try this one yourself, the file tabs on each section were cut from one of my freebie files from a few weeks ago, they're not part of the original project.

BTW... this was the first project I've made with my new ATG gun - it's my new favourite toy! :)

Anyway, here are the pics. (It's a gift for a friend that did me a favour recently, I hope she likes it!)

[EDIT] A few people have asked me what an ATG gun is. It's an adhesive tape dispenser made by 3m. I have the ATG 700 which takes 1/2 inch tape, but you can also get an adaptor for it that lets it take 1/4 inch tape. The tape has a very strong bond, so is great for minibooks or projects like this one. It's under £2 for 44m of tape, which works out VERY cheap when compared to the small tape runners you can buy in craft/scrapbook stores. The gun itself is a big outlay initially (£13 on Amazon UK, a lot more expensive in the USA, oddly!), but pays for itself in a matter of weeks if you use a lot of those tape runners.

Covers for a book and another tag

I've decided to collect some of the tags I've made lately into a book with the Bind-it-all, so I've made some chipboard covers for it today. Yes, yes, I realise I've already made a tag very similar to those covers, but I enjoyed making it so much I wanted to do it again, LOL Plus, I'll leave that tag out of the book, seeing as how you're making such a big fuss about it! LOL

The tag uses a Stampers Anonymous stamp that isn't new, but IS new to me, and some fontwerks clear botanical stamps. The man is by PaperArtsy.

I hope you like em, click on any image to enlarge it. :o)

Maya Road boxed ATC cards and new look for my blog!

I picked up a couple of these chipboard boxes from Maya Road a little while back. Each one contains 8 chipboard ATCs joined by a chain, and are all ready to be attacked with inks/stamps/paints, you name it!

I thought I might have to cover them in white paper first, but they take ink really well, and the colours don't suffer too much from the grey/brown background. Hopefully will pick up a couple more in the next few days, as I think they make great gifts once they're decorated! Oh, and this is called April in Canada cos I made it in Canada, in April. But you knew that all the time, didn't ya? :)

I hope you like, click on any image to enlarge it :o)

Regular readers will notice that I decided it was time for a face-lift of my blog. Let me know what you think, after all, it's YOU that reads it! :o)

Stamped Chipboard Flowers

These flowers are part of the new chipboard range by the Artistic Stamper. They're white on one side and grey on the other. The white sides were inked and stamped, and the grey sides were painted with acrylic dabbers and stamped.

I didn't spend too much time on them, because there is such a small amount of petal space available for stamping, that there was no point in doing anything too complicated, it just wouldn't be seen. The brown one is stamped and embossed in gold, which, as always, doesn't show up too well when scanned!

I hope you like them, click on an image to enlarge it. :o)

Tagstravaganza - Day 2

Another day, another tag!

Nothing fancy to say about this one that you haven't already read in yesterdays post, dear reader. Another of the Artistic Stamper's chipboard tags, decorated with their stamps and using the painted mask and batik techniques.

I hope you like it, click on any image to enlarge it :o)

Tagstravaganza - Day 1 - The Painted Mask Technique

This is my first blog post in AGES so I'll dive straight in. I've been busy working with some of the new chipboard shapes from Artistic Stamper. On this large sized tag, I thought I'd have a go with a new technique I've dreamed up for colouring stamped images (at least it's new to me, if someone has claimed this before, I apologise!) I've called it the painted mask technique, and it's been used here on the pocket watches and the gothic arch. Basically it involved stamping your image, then painting it with acrylic paint (either white as I have done here, or in whatever colours suit your image). After painting, you stamp again in the same place, giving a masked effect but with coloured areas that match the stamp exactly (depending on how accurate you are with your stamp position).

The red side - text was stamped and embossed with clear powder. Tag then was coloured with fired brick and aged mahogany distress inks applied with cut'n'dry foam. Brown paper was placed over the tag and it was ironed with a hot dry iron to remove the embossing powder (Tim Holtz's batik technique). Text was stamped again with brushed corduroy distress ink. Arch was stamped with black versafine and dried with heat gun. It was then overpainted with white acrylic paint, dried and restamped. Finally the word Architecture was stamped with black versafine. I added two of natures "free" stamps (the most personal and individual of all!) and I was done.

Mustard side - painted with butterscotch acrylic dabber and edges distressed with brushed cordury pad (doesn't show up well in this scan). Watches and keys stamped with black versafine. Watch over-painted with white acrylic paint then restamped.

I hope you like them! Click on any image to enlarge it.

Bits Mini-book

I've called this a mini-book, but perhaps it should really be called a micro-book, as it's only 2 inches square! It was intended as a kind of sampler, no set theme, just an attempt to incorporate a range of images and techniques on a small scale into one coherent whole.

As there are 18 sides plus covers in this, I'm not going to write about each one. Suffice it to say that the book incorporates stamping, masking, embossing, batik, dabbers and alcohol inks. That might sound a lot, but as the pages are so small, it didn't take to long to make. I hope you like it!

Click on any image to enlarge it.

Garden Jigsaw Frame

Sorry about the camera flash glare on this one, I'm certainly no David Bailey! LOL

Pound shop blank jigsaw and art shop shallow wooden box, enrichened by some great stamps and a chipboard flower from the Artistic Stamper.

Jigsaw stamped in stazon and coloured using distress inks and a water brush. The flower in the top left corner was subsequently masked out and the background was coloured then stamped with a text mat.

The inside of the frame was tinted with brushed corduroy distress ink, and the outside painted with old paper crackle paint and stamped with another text mat in brushed corduroy.

The flower was coloured with mustard seed distress ink and mounted with 3d foam onto the frame.

I hope you like it! Click on the image to enlarge it.

Crackle Frame Shadow Box

I thought I'd try something a bit different today - a shadow box. I bought a few of these frames a while back and have been waiting for an excuse to have a go at one! All stamps used in this project were from the Artistic Stamper, as were the watch parts.

The inside of the frame was painted with espresso paint dabber, and the front and outer edges with frayed burlap crackle paint. When the crackle paint had dried, I applied walnut stain distress ink to it to accentuate the cracks in it. The "Time is..." phrase was stamped with black Staz-on. The crackles don't show up that well in this photo, but they're there, believe me!

The background card inside the frame was tinted with walnut stain distress ink applied with Cut'n'Dry foam and then flicked with water to produce lighter spots on it. I then crumpled it up, flattened it slightly, then rubbed it lightly more walnut ink to highlight the crumple folds. I then turned it over, spritzed it with a little water and ironed it flat (yes, yes... I know.... enough already! Those of you that know me find it hard to imagine me with an iron in my hand, but you have to believe me, it's true! Would I lie to you, dear reader?) For some reason that I have not yet fathomed, this produced light blue/grey marks where the crumples had been. I'm not complaining, I think it looks great, I just wish I knew how it had happened!

The card was then stamped with a calligraphic mat and tape measure stamp in brushed corduroy distress ink, and glued into the frame.

The watches were created as follows (going from right to left):

• stamped in walnut stain distress ink
• stamped and embossed with gold embossing powder then tinted with walnut ink
• stamped with black Staz-on onto acetate, run through a Xyron sticker-maker to make the back sticky, then gold leaf was applied to the back. It was then scrubbed with a rough brush to distress it slightly.
  

The watches were layered with 3d foam pads.

The watch face and glass were layered in the lower left corner with a spiral paper clip, tinted with gold Krylon pen.

The key in the top right corner was a real one I had lying around the house, which was suspended from jute twine and held in place with 2 drawing pins coloured with a copper Krylon pen.

The chipboard key was from Maya Rd. It was coloured with gold Krylon, sanded to distress the edges and gently edged with walnut distress ink. It doesn't show up well in this photo, but the word ORIGINAL was then stamped onto the key using black Staz-on ink.

And that's about it! It took a fair while to make, but I'm really pleased with it. I hope you like it too! :o)

Making No Sense

As I said in my post yesterday, I felt the need to have a break from making Christmassy things for lists and swaps, and to make something just for myself.

The words in this tag book are taken from the song "They Shoot Horses, Don't They?" by Racing Cars. The song was inspired by the Jane Fonda movie of the same name (for all you trivia buffs out there! :o), and I've wanted to use it in a project for a while now. I took the opportunity to try out some of the stamps I've acquired recently and, of course, to use the Bind-it-all again.

While we're talking about tag books (we were, pay attention, there's a quiz later) I want your opinion on something. Although the pages in this book are made from stationery tags, and I've put eyelets in each one, I opted NOT to put ribbon through them. Anyone that knows me knows that I have so much ribbon it is almost coming out of my ears - I don't seem to be able to stop buying it. Much as I love ribbon, (to an extent that is, quite frankly, embarrassing for a middle-aged man), I've had a bit of a change of heart in the last few days.

Looking back at my projects and those of others online, I've been feeling lately that when I see tag books with ribbons sticking out the side from each page (as all MINE do) the book can sometimes look like it's suffering death by a thousand ribbons. Ribbon is lovely, but so much in one project perhaps seems a bit desperate and could almost be yelling "I'm pretty - love me, darn it, LOVE ME!!" Anyway, that's how I've been feeling lately. Rant over. I'd be interested in hearing your opinions! :o)

Click on the cover image below to see the "flipbook" version that allows you to turn the pages and to see the two-page spreads together, as they were intended to be viewed. If you're unable to view it, I have included a slide show below, so hopefully that will work for you!

Enjoy! :o)

P.S. If it doesn't work for you, your browser may not have the latest version of the bit it needs to see the book. You can get it by following this link:

Click here to update your Flash player

Click on the slide show images below to see a gallery of the pages in this project!

Flipbook - Trying Something a Bit Different

For quite some time now I've been dissatisfied with the way I've been displaying my work on this blog. Most of the things I make are books of one kind or another, and separating the pages and displaying them as individual images seems to me to take away a lot of their fundamental bookiness (I know that's not a real word, but as far as I'm concerned, it is now!). The main point of making a book and binding it is so that the person who looks at it does so by turning it's pages one after another, and that page-turning process is at the core of how we as readers interact with books.

So, I sat down at the computer (you all knew that I'm a rubber stamp geek, but did you know I'm a computer nerd too? lol), and MUCH tearing out of hair later (yes, yes, I didn't have any hair to begin with, I know. Still, it's a bit mean of you to point it out, shame on you!) I've created another version of my "I Know" book that I put up here in my previous post. It should (if it works correctly) allow you to "turn" the pages, and to zoom in and out of any page that you want to get a better view of.

This is how it works



This is the kind of view you will see while you browse through the book. Click your main mouse button on the bottom corner of any page, and holding it down, drag your mouse to turn the page. Letting go of the mouse button will release the page. You can do this to go forwards or backwards through the book. You can also click the other mouse button to zoom in or out.

I'd really value any feedback on this that you care to give! Should I display my past and future books like this too, rather than as regular images? There was quite a bit of effort involved in getting this to work, although now that I've done it, hopefully future examples can be made much quicker. All the same, if most of you don't like looking at the book this way, I'd prefer not to waste my time! LOL

Click here to see the "I Know" Flippable Book

P.S. If it doesn't work for you, your browser may not have the latest version of the bit it needs to see the book. You can get it by following this link:

Update your Flash Player

I Know

Challenged by a friend to make something using scrapbook papers (something I don't do often), this is what I came up with. The song I Know What You're Doing by Dionne Farris is a favourite on my ipod right now, and as I was listening to it when I started this, I used some of the lyrics as the text.

It's a Maya Road chipboard book, and was covered with Sage and Sky Butcher's Block papers. I've had those for a long time and always liked them, so it's nice to have finally used them on something. I also used some of the new Tim Holtz unmounted stamps, which I'm loving! While on holiday in the USA in the summer I bought some snaps that look like phillips screw heads, and I've used those for the first time here. Am loving those too!

This turned out a lot grungier than I had originally planned, I guess it was just the mood I was in! Oh, and just to say, if I'd actually counted and realised there were 20 sides of chipboard to be worked on, I may never have started it!! LOL

As ever, click on an image if you want to see a larger version. Enjoy :o)