Monday, April 8, 2013

Three Happy Birds

Happy Monday and a fabulous new Simon Says Stamp and Show challenge. The theme for this week is 'Fly', which is such a super fun theme to me. I love everything with birds, wings, butterflies, and flying. I am looking forward to seeing everyone's interpretations of this theme, and don't miss the gorgeous projects by my design team mates.

I really love birds and am always on the lookout for birds and trying to catch them on photos. I decided to make three happy little birds that will fly around in my study.
 
To make these, I used the fabulous Sizzix Bird die by Eileen Hull. I did a tutorial with this die some time ago, making three different birds, you can find it here. One bird is steampunky, one is a text bird with pretty blue wings and the third one is a funky Dylusions bird.

The bird and the wings were die cut from mat board (chipboard or grungeboard would work great to) and foil tape. The die both cuts and scores the mat board, making assembly easy. I also cut a pair of wings from metallic mesh. The foil was embossed with the Diamond Plate folder and then adhered to the mat board. Don't place it on the wings where they will be attached to the body, since that will make it harder to attach them.
 
The bird was coloured with alcohol inks, also using some Snow Cap mixative, which makes the inks opaque. I wanted to create a patina look.

When dry, it was burnished with steel wool and then I rubbed some black paint here and there to distress it a bit more.

I stapled the wings to the bodies to make sure they were stuck and the two bird bodies were glued together. For a hanger, I simply used a Tim Holtz Hinge Clip and tied a piece of twine to it. It makes it very easy to get the right balance for the bird, since it is easy to move the clip around until the bird hangs the way you want it to.

 Since this is a steampunk bird, a mini gear with a screw brad was perfect for its eyes.

I used little strips of 7Gypsies tissue paper for some words on the wings.
 
A hole was made with a Crop-a-dile and a Tim Holtz Swivel Clasp is hanging from it. I embossed a Vintaj circle in the Steampunk Parts DecoEmboss folder and burnished it a bit. It was attached to the clasp with a jump ring together with a little key and another mini gear.
 
 Here's the other side of the Vintaj circle.

I coloured a piece of Tim Holtz kraft glassine paper with alcohol inks (Gold, Stream, Denim), letting it dry in between and adding more layers until I was happy with the result. The paper was crumpled up and inked a bit with Denim distress ink.

Three wings for each side were die cut from the kraft glassine. I covered a piece of mat board back and front with 7Gypsies Life Collage tissue paper, using multi-medium as my adhesive and die cut the body of the bird from that. The tail feathers were made by cutting quite a lot of layers of just the tail part of the bird. Since the tissue paper is thin, you can cut many at a time. 

The body of the bird was whitewashed with Distress Paint Picket Fence, wiping much off it off.

The tail feathers were misted lightly with water and scrunched up a bit. The feathers were stapled to the body.

A Word Stick hang from the bird.

The bird has pearl eyes. I love the words and quotes on this tissue paper and liked the 'life' on the head of the bird.

The wings have a really nice blue golden colour and were layered together and stapled to the body. ChitChat stickers were used on the wings.

To make the last bird, I first die cut two bodies and two wings from mat board. Molding paste was applied to them with a palette knife through two different stencils (Mini Cherry Blossoms for the bodies and Mini Cursive Alpha for the wings).

After the paste dried, I misted the pieces with Goosebumps spray to create more texture and let that dry. They were then misted with London Blue and Pure Sunshine Dylusions mist.

The wings were stapled to the bodies and the bodies were glued together.

 The hinge clip was painted with yellow Patina ink.

For the eyes, I used two Vintaj stars and embossed them with an 'a' and a 'k' (for my name). They were burnished and glued to the bird.

The wings were stamped underneath with an Artistic Outpost music stamp and I also used two pen nibs.

The finished bird, carrying a little bottle full of bird song.

The corked vial was filled with mica flakes. I glued the cord with Glossy Accents and screwed a screw eye into it. It is hanging on a jump ring together with a little key, and hangs from a mini paper clip. The word comes from the 7Gypsies tissue paper.

Join us this week and you could be the one to win a $50 gift voucher from our sponsor Simon Says Stamp. The winner of the gift voucher is drawn randomly every week.


Thank you for stopping by!

Anna-Karin

Supplies:
Dies: Sizzix: Bird Scoreboards Bigz
Embossing folder: Sizzix Diamond Plate & Riveted Metal; Sizzix Vintaj DecoEmboss: Lowercase Typewriter, Steampunk Parts
Stamps: Artistic Outpost Ephemera Backgrounds
Ink: Distress Ink Broken China
Patina ink: Ranger Vintaj Retro Highway
Alcohol ink: Adirondack: Sailboat Blue, Juniper, Denim, Stream, Pool, Gold, Snow Cap, Lettuce, Ginger
Mist: Dylusions London Blue, Pure Sunshine; Tsukineko Goosebumps spray
Paint: Distress Paint Picket Fence, Antique Linen; Adirondack Pitch Black
Surfaces: Tim Holtz Idea-ology Kraft Glassine; Sizzix Little Sizzles mat board 6x13; Ranger Metal Foil Sheets7Gypsies Life Collage Tissue; metallic mesh
Stencils: The Crafter's Workshop: Mini Cherry Blossoms, Mini Cursive Alpha
Embellishments: Tim Holtz Idea-ology: Corked Vials, ChitChat Stickers, Hinge Clips, Mini Gears, Mini FastenersJump Rings, Word Sticks, Wire Pins, Swivel Clasps, Mini Paper Clips, Pen Nibs, Screw Eyes; Vintaj: Small Blank Circle, Tiny Artisan Stars; Stampendous Pearlized Mica Fragments; Hero Arts Black Metallic Deco


 

15 comments:

  1. How amazing are these! Love the ideas for each bird - thanks for the detailed recipes and how to's. Hugs, Jenny x

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  2. Anna-Karin...your three very different birds all from one die cut are so cool. I love how different you've made each of them; giving them their own personalities. I love all of the elements you added to them as well. Very creative and fun! <3 Candy

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  3. love visiting - you make such amazing and pretty things.
    Sandra ltb

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  4. Hi Anna-Karin, love your three dimensional flying birds. Love the patina colours and the texture you added to each. Love how you used different colouring mediums for each bird, very clever idea. These are going to look wonderful in your craft space. All perfectly embellished too. Tracy x x

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  5. These happy birds are SO COOL, Anna-Karin! I love all the pieces you put together to make them and the colors are gorgeous!

    *mwah*
    Steph
    Simon Says Stamp!

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  6. Love your whimsical birds, Anna-Karin.. they're fabulous! I also just saw your great homemade stencils post on the Sizzix blog - fabulous tute!

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  7. Wow!! Almost speechless (did have to stare at these again & again), I absolutely ADORE these birds. Your step by step is awesome, so much imagination & creativity here with just sublime results!! I am bookmarking this for future although I cannot ever imagine achieving your level of pure amazingness?! Not sure that's a word but your birds have rendered me tongue tied. Thank you so much!! :))

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  8. Awesome trio of birds! Love that you used different textures and charms on each bird! Each bird has it's own personality!

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  9. So wonderful your three birds! Love that each has a different technique and look to it! Supers! Hugs, Sandra

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  10. These are wonderful Anna-Karin! You did such a great job with each one---I like how each one has a different style and different techniques! Thank you so much for showing us the steps and teaching us!! Beautiful!

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  11. Oh my gosh these are so cute!!! I love all the things you've made these out of! WOW! The coloration is fab too!!!

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  12. These are SO COOL, Anna-Karin! I love the Stempunk detailing and the variety of materials that you used to put them together. Blessings!

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  13. These are such a treat, Anna-Karin - love the three different styles, yet they work as a group (flock?!) too... I think the steampunk is my favourite, and if you see my offering (just posted) - I promise I hadn't seen these first (I always try to visit the DT after creating) but great minds...!!
    Alison x

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  14. These are delightful!! I can picture a flock of these birds hanging in a window.

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  15. Anna-Karin, thank you so much for sharing not only your beautiful design, but the gift of your incredibly detailed tutorial as well. I do believe that my patio needs an entire flock of these beauties as a way to celebrate the hope and beauty of Spring.
    Kathy J.

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Thank you so much for leaving a comment! Happy Crafting!