Tando Tin

Hi everyone!

Bit of a quiet summer for me this year...spending some precious relaxing time with family before the school year begins in September! - I will be back in the Autumn full of fresh ideas, but for now - here is something I made a while ago....

 If any of you follow my wonderful dear friend and OCC team mate Julia you will see where I got my inspiration from! (if you are not following her - why not?!!)

I am, and always have been, an avid follower of her blog and am always looking to learn any little creative trick that she shares....

While I am way off being as talented as Julia is, I do love to use her blog posts for inspiration and her recent teapot post was one of these. I had to have a go.....

I got the tin and gave it a coat of Decoart Gesso - I had never used this product before and I LOVE it! It worked so much better than any other Gesso I have ever used. 

Then I stuck some Tando swirls to the tin lid and covered with another coat of Gesso

 

Then I began to paint inspired by one of Julia's favourite colours - Decoart Media Fluid Acrylic Paint in Green Gold. I have to agree with her - the colour is gorgeous!

I then covered the lid with Decoart Crackle glaze and when dry I covered it with Decoart Carbon Black Antiquing Cream. I left this to dry before wiping away with a baby wipe.

I then dry brushed the lid with a tiny amount of Gold Decoart Media Fluid Acrylic Paint.

I painted some die cuts flowers with a mix of Green Gold, Primary Yellow and Titanium White Decoart Media Fluid Acrylic Paint. The flowers had been embossed and were coated with a coat of Decoart Carbon Black Antiquing Cream which was wiped away when dry with a baby wipe.  I finished the flower off with a light coat of Gold paint and a gold button.

 I used four smaller die cut flowers and painted these with Decoart Media Fluid Acrylic Paint in Gold I dry-brushed the edges with Caron Black and painted a brad with the Carbon Black paint too.

 I glued on some music serviettes to the side of the tin with matte medium and then covered with several coats of Decoart Ultra-Matte Varnish mixed with Green Gold paint. This was also then coated with Carbon Black Antiquing cream before being wiped away...

 Here is the completed altered tin.....

 I do hope you like it

Happy Crafting!

Laura 

xxx

A Tudor Lady

Hi everyone! 

     I bring you a piece of history today...remember last year and the mob caps and aprons? 

Well, this year my daughter got cast as a lady in a Shakespeare play and she requested a French Hood as part of her costume....Yes I know...we could discuss 'correct' fashions - but it seems the French Hood was popular for many years after the Tudors...

......and it looks so pretty....
......and my daughter wanted one....
......and I wanted to see if I could make one.......
......end of discussion!

     Sorry but I won't be writing in detail here how I made it....because I don't want to discuss blood in front of everyone - my hands felt like pincushions after three days of yelling "OOOooowwwwww" every five minutes! Blood, sweat and tears doesn't even cover the description of the pain (am I being too dramatic?) 

    I was close to swearing after I dropped the string of pearls for the fifth time and sent them scattering all over the floor! Several times I had to re-sew the crescent onto the hood because I was hopeless at sewing with a curved needle and I turned the air blue when I realised that after patiently waiting for the material to arrive for four days, the order never actually went through and had to be redone....oh disaster after disaster....

     Do you know what made it worth it? When my wonderful daughter tried it on and said "Mummy that is just so perfect"!

    I really don't need to tell how it was made here because I got all the details from this amazing website and you should check it out if you want to know how I made this gorgeous headress....Here are a few close ups

Had to be all lined too...!

     Well....it isn't too bad for a first attempt (though I really don't think there is much chance of doing a second!)

         Thanks so much for being here to see my Tudor Lady...

         Happy Crafting!

         Laura 

        xxxx

 

 

 

 

Eye See Everything

Hi everyone!

      It is a summer challenge over at Sandee and amelies Steampunk Challenge and we are doing-

Steampunk Tic Tac Toe

You all know how to do a Tic Tac Toe challenge - just pick a line horizontal, vertical or diagonal and make something with those items. 

You are, of course, allowed to add some more ingredients from the grid to your three from your chosen line - 

Please point out which line you have chosen when you write up your blog posts for this challenge!


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Isn't this a gorgeous Tic Tac Toe Challenge? I struggled to decide which line to choose because they were all so appealing....

In the end I opted for Words, Metal and Fabric and here is what I made....

I decided to use the techniques that my wonderful friend Claudia had shown me when she visited in May....I loved the techniques she showed me and I was then on the lookout to make more items like that one...(all will be revealed in a future blog post!)

I made the frame (as always!) I made a simple balsa wood frame and covered it with the German script paper she gave me. I covered it with Mod Podge glue to seal the paper and then covered it with watered down Decoart Transparent Yellow Iron Oxide Media Fluid Acrylic . I then watered down some Decoart Transparent Red iron Oxide Media Fluid Acrylic and dabbed this on too. I then splattered the paint onto the frame to give some added texture splatter.

 I then dabbed some Decoart Raw Umber Media Fluid Acrylic paint along the inner edges of the frame.

When dry I applied some crackle glaze....my preferred method of application with this now is to dab it on with a finger. I just dab a finger into the glaze and then pat it along the surface. I find it crackles really well and I am able to get more of a random crackle effect...using a brush seems to 'neat' to me now and I find myself tempted to over-brush it.

 When the glaze was dry and crackled I brushed on some Decoart Carbon Black Antiquing cream and left it to dry before wiping back with a damp cloth. I then sealed it with some Decoart Media Ultra Matt Varnish before applying some patina Green Antiquing Cream and wiping that away too - leaving behind only some tinges of patina effect.

 For the inside of the frame I glued in some very thin silk material using Matt Medium. I pressed and twisted the silk so it was in folds. I applied the glue very heavily so that the material was saturated with it. When it was dry I dropped some alcohol inks onto the material. I chose Lettuce, Ginger, Espresso and Stream. I then squirted a small amount of blending solution onto the material and began to smoosh it around with my finger until the colours were blended.

I used a brass embellishment as the centrepiece for the decoration with a brass pendant that had some text paper stuck into the centre. A plastic eye was lightly brushed with a very watered down coat of Raw Umber paint to take the brightness away.

I added some watch gears around the pendant 

....and I added the words 'embrace imperfection' from Chit Chat stickers that had been dabbed with Vintage Photo and Evergreen Bough DI.

Around the edges of the frame I applied some Cogs and Gears tissue tape 

 And there is my finished creation - very different to my usual Steampunk creations, but I had a lot of fun making it! Sometimes it is good to try something different...

    

Even if Steampunk isn't your usual style why not give it a go?
 You might just have a lot of fun doing it!

Come and join us at Sandee and amelies Steampunk Challenge....

Happy Crafting
Laura
xxx

Mexico Moods

Hi Everyone!

Welcome to Summer here at Our Creative Corner!

Between 1st July and 28th August we will be running ONE challenge -

 This is our Summer Holiday Challenge and we would love it if you joined us...

There is no challenge host for this challenge...For the first time we are running this as a team!

And what do you have to do to take part of all this Summer Fun.....? Take a peek at this summery challenge...

Mexico Moods

We want you to grab any inspiration you like from these wonderfully exotic photographs...

Go for colours, shapes, textures, objects or style...or the whole lot!!!
There is certainly plenty of inspiration to choose from here in this selection of glorious, vivid, colourful photographs.

Join us and get in the summer holiday mood....!!!

 I was so inspired by the amazing colours in these photographs...so I knew that I was going to be grabbing the Decoart Media Fluid Arcylic paints- they were perfect for this!

But what to make? - My son had been saying he wanted a decoration for his bedroom door. He had a photograph already there - one that he treasures...a photo of him holding a tortoise at school. Perhaps it could do with a frame? LOL....I never get tired of making them! ;o)

 I had seen pictures on Pinterest of random shape frames, made out of recycled materials and the shapes were intriguing and far more interesting than an ordinary frame.

    I had a large piece of thick balsa wood and so I got to work on decorating card to form the frame.

This isn't made of separate blocks of wood...what I did instead was to get several sheets of white card measuring 4"x 6" and I began to decorate them. I grabbed several stencils that were inspired by patterns in the mood board. I applied paint through them onto the card. Leaving them to dry, I then dabbed contrasting Distress inks over the top. I tried to get a wide range of combinations of colours.

Then I cut them up in random sized squares and rectangles before just dabbing the edges with Walnut Stain DI to hide any white cut edges.

I marked out the size of the photo in the center of the frame and after cutting this out I had a large frame 'blank'...

I painted it in a base coat of Burnt Umber Decoart Paint. Then I began to attach the various sized squares and rectangles to the frame, before dry brushing it with Burnt Umber Acrylic Paint to add a rustic look

I added some script stamping in Potting Soil Archival ink

A cut out heart was added to one of the squares

The word Love was added from diecut letters.



I added a light coat of Ultra Matt Varnish to seal the frame

And there is my Mexico Moods inspired frame....Thanks so much for being here to see it!

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Why not get into the Mexico mood and join us for some summer inspired creativity?

Whatever the mood board inspires you to make, we would LOVE to see it at Our Creative Corner!

From modern bright creations to rustic weathered patina - there is so much that can be inspired by this mood board...


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So much happening this summer...!!!

During this challenge we will be having TWO Guest Designers visit...on 11th July and 11th August - You won't want to miss their amazing creativity and inspiration!

Our Sponsors for July and August are -

There will be three Spotlights - make sure you don't miss them!

These wonderful sponsors will be providing prizes for TWO randomly drawn winners at the end of this challenge and the winners will be announced on 4th September - you could be the one picked to receive some wonderful goodies here!!!

And of course we will have our OCC Summertime winner...who will be selected by vote by the entire team...and that winner will be invited to be our Top Talent at Our Creative Corner!

This is such a mega challenge for us - so much going on and we would love to see you have fun with Mexican Moods and join in!

Hope to see you there!

Happy crafting 

Laura

 xxxxx