Colour theme at Tando -

It's a colour theme this week and here is the gorgeous palette. Winter is definitely heading our way.

I've created a canvas board and the process steps and more photos are over on the Tando blog today.

The canvas board background went through a couple of transformations and although started off quite 'pretty' my muse decided to take me off in a different direction when I came to finish it off.

I used an acrylic media board shape for the focal element ......

and stamped and painted it to get to this almost night sky look.

An embossed star and a hand made grungy word band ........

 and I was ready to assemble.

So if you'd like to see how the background got transformed and how this came together please pop over to the Tando blog for more information.

Thanks for stopping by.

hugs Brenda xxx

Craft Stamper Christmas projects

I have a new project, well actually two samples, in the current Craft Stamper magazine which gives a step by step on creating that faux encaustic technique I have been loving using and there's also a follow up post on the Craft Stamper blog to create the simple background and an easel to attach so your project can stand on display. I love using easels on special canvas board cards.

Here are the sneak peeks .....

and the magazine pages .....

If you are reading this in November 18 you have a chance of winning some DecoArt fluid acrylic paints and a pot of the fantastic clear modeling paste being promoted in the magazine and on face book. As you know the DecoArt media range are my go to products and this is a prize well worth winning.

Thanks Trish Latimer and Craft Stamper, I always feel so proud and excited when a piece of my work has been published. 

And to you my fabulous readers -

xxx

How can you resist at AVJ - Bloom and Grow

Today our lovely Teamie Amanda takes the chair hosting the new challenge at A Vintage Journey. How can you resist it?  A couple of times a year I am asked to do a craft session with a group of lovely ladies and this last time we made a canvas board using DecoArt Media paints and mediums. The focal image is an old wood mounted stamp.

Take the canvas board and a piece of sponge and blend gesso over the board until it is smooth and covered.

Repeat with the small greyboard piece.

Add a tiny dot of sap green, 2 drops of titan buff and three dots of titanium white to your foil palette.

Take a piece of sponge and a babywipe and blend the colours over the canvas board until you get a light mottled effect background – waft it to dry. Scrape decoupage randomly over with plastic card, not too thickly and put one side to dry.

Stamp the flower with embossing ink on the small panel and clear heat emboss. 

When cool rub quin magenta with finger over the flower head and around the edge and sap green on the leaves and around them just to give a strong colour to the outline. Leave it to fully dry. It looks very messy at this point - but don't panic.

Rub the colours off of the flower with baby wipe and dry kitchen towel.

Take a piece of sponge and blend over sap green, cerulean blue, titan buff and titanium white creating darker layers to the outside and a lighter layer in the middle. Sponge up to the outside of the embossed image. If you need to create some shadow around the flower use distress inks and a small brush with water to blend around it. Finish by using titan buff on the scrubby side of the sponge to get light splatter effect. This is the panel I demoed at the workshop.

Add the sentiment.

Take a piece of sponge and a babywipe and blend the green and blue colours over the canvas board until you get a darker effect on the background, keep wiping back and adding more until you are happy with the darker contrast over the light. Leave to dry then splatter with some vintage mixed pink (quin magenta, white and burnt umber) and almost immediately lightly lay a dry piece of kitchen roll over the top to take out some of the colour.

Stamp second generation text with watering can archival ink.

Distress and ink the edges lightly. Glue the panel to the board, add the words and adhere the flowers.

The spray is made up of all shop bought flowers (sorry Jennie) and the different sizes are all easy to come buy. I always buy when I see them so I have a variety in a tub ready to use.

Add a Tim Holtz easel to the back.

I had a group of 10 ladies at the workshop and only one uses acrylic paint at home. They all made one of these in 2 hours, I had gessoed all the boards and stamped and embossed the flowers for them but they did all the rest. Just wish I had been able to get some photos.

This is my sample of how I have used a resist technique but if you have a minute pop over to the blog post at a Vintage Journey to see all the wonderful and inspirational samples and ideas for using resist from the team.

Follow your HeArt.

Entomology board for Country View Crafts

You love them or you hate them, all those bugs in the garden but they're totally safe when stamped on a project. I have an easel board over on the CVC project blog today created with the Entomology set of stamps by Tim Holtz and my faux encaustic technique.

If you can spare a moment to pop over and see how it all came together I would love to see you there.

Thanks for stopping by here.

Updated from CVC

I got the bug for this set of stamps - please excuse the pun lol, but the little creatures called to me to use them in a project so here is an easel board and yes my faux encaustic technique again.

Cut a piece of thin greyboard and adhere a piece of designer paper - mine is from the Tim Holtz Correspondence set - using the decoupage glue and seal the top with it too. When dry mix watery media fluid acrylics in three colours and dip, drip and dry random pools of colour and heat dry between each layer so the colours don't mix and produce mud.

Next mix some watery gesso and repeat the technique again.

Stamp three of the bugs - I used Tim's stamp platform and so glad I did as I was able to give it a second stamping to get very clear and sharp images.

I used the same colour paints I had in front of me to mix blends to paint the bugs and I adhered a plate name for each of them. (See my freebies page located just under the blog header to download for you to use).

I applied a thin coat of DecoArt clear modeling paste and left it overnight to dry.

I took some white gesso and transparent yellow iron oxide media fluid acrylic and blended them together to get a very light yellow colour and with blending foam I stenciled using one of Tim's mini stencils. This began to create some depth and interest. I also added a little text stamping using the gorgeous text from the Etymology set.
I also made a watery wash with raw umber fluid acrylic and dribbled and dried some round the sides and I distressed the edges and painted them with the left overs.I splattered a white gesso/raw umber mix covering the insects to begin with so they got barely any on them. I got so involved in the process I forgot to take a photo here.
I finished with a thicker layer of the clear modeling paste.

You can see how the layers are creating some depth.

To help bring the bugs nearer to the surface again and be more prominent I drew round them and added a little of the detail with a permanent black pen and added some asemic writing in white a also a white remnant rub. To encapsulate it all and seal it I gave it another thin layer of the clear modeling paste.

To create the simple background on the canvas board I simply took phthalo green blue, transparent yellow iron oxide, titan buff, titanium white and burnt umber and blended over with a baby wipe. As areas dried off I kept adding more colour and rubbing some away with the babywipe until I had a mottled effect.

Next with a small brayer I rolled on a little of the titanium white around the edges (remember the panel will sit over the centre). You could also add some very light text stamping if you wished, but I didn't want to detract from the central panel being the main focal point.

Create a 'dirty' wash (I use different colours according to how I want it to look) I used burnt umber, raw umber and titan buff to keep it light in colour - I didn't want a really dark one. I also just finger painted and added some darker areas on a few of the edges. If the brown comes out too dark you can always rub it back with a wet wipe even after it has dried for a while.

Finish by adding an easel to the back .....

... and you're ready to send it to someone special either as a gift or add a sentiment as a special easel card.

Grungy canvas board for Andy Skinner

I love using making easel boards and sometimes use the canvas boards so that they create that lovely textured look in the background. Today I've teamed it with Tando greyboard shapes, Andy's stamps and stencils and DecoArt media line paints and mediums. I think this has a shabby appeal to it with the neutral colours - what do you think?
This is my contribution the Andy's Creative Team schedule and also over on his blog today.

Drip a few drops of  Dark Grey Value 3, Titan Buff, Burnt Umber and Titanium White Media Acrylic paints on a flat palette and with a sponge take time to rub and dab them blending them together to get a lightish mottled background on your canvas board. It dries quickly so you can almost immediately scrape some decou-page sealer over the surface randomly and leave it to fully dry.

Take the small panel, stamp the bird with embossing ink and heat emboss with black EP. When cool rub over the crow with phthalo blue, raw umber, burnt umber and then some titan buff over the beak and feet. Take the colours over the edge of the embossing to give a strong coloured outline in most places - you will see some of it showing through the next layers of paint you are about to put on.

Take a piece of sponge and a babywipe and blend the brown and grey colours over the canvas board until you get a darker effect on the background, rub with your fingers and and keep wiping back, adding more etc until you are happy with the darker colours over the light and you should also have a darker edge keeping the centre lighter. Leave to dry.

Rub the colours off the bird with a babywipe and piece of kitchen towel. With the sponge and a babywipe mix and blend lighter shades of the browns and grey with titan buff and titanium white (like above) layering them so that again you keep the lighter colours in the centre and end up with darker ones on the outside. Paint the edges of the board. Finish by using carbon black and raw umber on the scrubby side of the sponge and lightly dab to get a random splatter effect.

Give it a coat of clear modeling paste using a palette knife to drag it across the surface. Leaving ridges and texture in the surface is good.

I had added a little black pen to the design as I had some white splattery spots appear, the pen was supposed to be permanent but looked what happened. I think it totally adds to the effects. 

Take a round chipboard piece triple emboss it with stampendous ancient silver embossing enamel and stamp with the number wheel from the Curiosity set of stamps using cobalt archival ink.

Use texture sand paste and the browns and black paints to get this rusty effect on the sun wings.

Come back to the canvas board and use stamps, stencils and black gesso to grunge it up a bit.

Now assemble to create your finished design.

You'll see that during the assembling process I added part of a Tando clock to the design, once put together I felt the composition was a little unbalanced.

The blue medallion is raised quite a bit off of the background and stands out beautifully.

I finished with an easel on the back so this can stand on a shelf.

Thanks for stopping by.

Products

Greyboard shapes, clock

Stamps - Stampendous - Curiosity, Handle With Care, Skuldoggery, Birds and Bones

Aged Silver Embossing Enamel

Stencil - Usual Suspects

Kit - Industrial Wings

Media fluid acrylic paints - Dark Grey Value 3, Titan Buff, Burnt Umber, Titanium White, Phthalo Blue, Raw Umber, Carbon Black

Mediums - Clear Modeling Paste. Decou-page Sealer, Texture Sand Paste