Robin Mixed Media Canvas

Hello crafters! I hope you had a fun Halloween and a good weekend! My youngest was Bumblebee for Halloween and had a great time trick or treating.

Please note: this post has affiliate links, for which I receive a small percentage of sales generated by the link, at no extra cost to you.

This week we have a Thinking of You theme at the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Blog. I hope you will join us! Since it is the first Monday of a new month, the team is showcasing products by a specific designer/company and this week it is Tim Holtz. You can find Tim's fantastic ranger of products here. You don't have use his products to join, but it is fun if you do. 

We also have a new guest designer and during November Teresa York is joining us. Check out her Instagram account to see the stunning tag that she created for this week's challenge.

I made a Thinking of You mixed media canvas with a winter/Christmas theme. The canvas is 6x6 in. The bird is a loosely colored robin. I used paint, stencils, paste, glitter and stamping on the background. Lots of wintery foliage was die cut from scrap papers.

Start by die cutting the bird from watercolor paper with Tim Holtz Sizzix Feathered Friends.

Watercolor the three pieces in a loose manner. Leave some of the white of the paper showing for highlights. I ended up using two wings instead of one.

Glue the bird together and add feathers, details and highlights with a black pen and a white gel pen. 

Coat a canvas or canvas board with gesso and let dry. Paint with watered-down Distress Paint and mist with more water to blend. Leave to dry.

Stamp the branch from Tim's Winter Watercolor 2 twice. Stamp the birds from Tim's Mini Ornates and the sentiment on tissue paper and adhere to the canvas with gloss medium. Add a layer of medium under and on top of the tissue paper. The tissue paper will disappear. I did this since I noticed that it was hard to get a crisp stamped impression on this particular canvas. 

The foliage was die cut with Tim Holtz Sizzix Vault Festive Foliage. I used left-over inky and watercolored papers. 

Glue together and give them some shape. Later, I die cut new red berries, using a piece of watercolor paper where I tested the orange/red shade for the bird. 

Stamp the background with Simon Says Stamp Old Letter.

Sponge Distress Paint through Tim Holtz Latticework. This is such a pretty stencil.

Apply Texture Paste through the Bubble stencil and not Grit-Paste which I accidentally photographed here. Sprinkle Distress Rock Candy Glitter over the paste. Let dry.

It was hard to capture the glitter as day-light was almost over when I photographed this project. The Texture Paste is not completely opaque. If you want it to be, you can mix in a little white paint. For this project, I wanted a hint of the background to show through.

Magical comes from Simon Says Stamp Forest Scenery and was stamped on inky paper. 

I used a pen for the eye and the white gel pen to add the white dot in the eye. The cut out was too small for the actual eye, but too large for the white dot. Fold the wings and tail feathers out slightly. 

The foliage was layered under the bird, almost as a nest. Here you can see the new berries, die cut from paper painted with the same paint as the bird. The sentiment comes from Forest Scenery.

I also added some foliage around the sentiment. The branches with the red berries were placed so that they would help the eye move around the canvas. The sentiment comes from Simon Says Stamp Retro Wishes.

I added a bunch of Simon Says Stamp Clear and Surf Pawsitively Dazzling Gems. I have written it before, but I really like these gems. Sequins, gems, pearls, brads and small buttons have for a long time been favorites of mine when it comes to finishing touches.

Join us this week in our Thinking of You challenge! You have a chance to win a $25 gift voucher to do some fun shopping at Simon Says Stamp. You have until Monday 8am Ohio time. 1pm UK time, 2 pm CET to join in.

Do you use Instagram? If so please add #sssmchallenge so we can see your entries there too.

Thank you so much for visiting my blog today! 

Happy crafting!

Anna-Karin

Supplies:

* Please note: the links are affiliate links, for which I receive a small percentage of sales generated by the link, at no extra cost to you.

Flowers on wood planks

Hello friends! It is the last day of October and I have an autumn flower project to share.

Please note: this post has affiliate links, for which I receive a small percentage of sales generated by the link, at no extra cost to you.

I stamped and watercolored a whole lot of flowers in mainly autumn shades and let them flow down a tag. The tag was covered with Halloween Baseboard wood planks to create a sturdy and interesting background.

Start by sanding the Halloween Baseboards wood planks.

Ink them with Scorched Timber.

Glue them to a tag die cut from black kraft-stock. You need to cut some of the wood planks and sand the edges where you cut them.

White emboss Simon Says Stamp Old Letter on the tag, but don't cover it completely.

Stamp Simon Says Stamp Beautiful Blooms on watercolor paper. I stamped more than I needed. These flower stamps are so pretty.

Watercolor the flowers and cut them out when dry. There are coordinating Beautiful Bloom dies, which would speed this process up a lot. 

Add details and highlights with a black pen and a white gel pen.

Shape the flowers with a Shaping Kit and Simon Says Stamp Pawsitively Perfect Craft Pad.

Dye May Arts Faux Wrinkled Silk Ribbon with coordinating colors. I used Distress Ink.

Don't worry if you get specks of white embossing powder here and there, it just adds texture.

Some of the flowers were glued directly to the background, while others were adhered with Simon Says Stamp Pawsitively Perfect Foam Tape.

I added Simon Says Stamp Pawsitively Dazzling Gems to most of the flower centers.

The main sentiment was stamped with Pawsitively Saturated Violet ink. The sentiment stamps comes from Simon Says Stamp Create stamp set.They were die cut with the coordinating Create dies.

Leaves of of the white of the paper showing for highlights when watercoloring. I dropped blue paint into the purple paint when it was still wet. 

Shaping the flowers gives them life and dimension.

You could also turn this project into a card instead, or use just a few flowers.

Thank you for stopping by here today! Happy Halloween!

Happy crafting!

Anna-Karin

Supplies:

* Please note: the links are affiliate links, for which I receive a small percentage of sales generated by the link, at no extra cost to you.

The Apothecary Tutorial

Hello crafters! I have one more Halloween project to share, the front door of a spooky apothecary practice. 

Please note: this post has affiliate links, for which I receive a small percentage of sales generated by the link, at no extra cost to you.

I really like Tim Holtz Baseboard pieces and they are fun to layer. Here I layered an arch and a door, with the addition of a sign post and a sentiment strip. Lots of fun little details which can belong to a spooky apothecary: bottles, jars, glass balls, sweets and of course skulls of some of his victims.

Here you can see the individual pieces. The shelf was made by gluing to wood planks from the Baseboard set together. Sand all the edges.

Glue a Halloween Transparency to the arch. I used one of the spider web transparencies.

Glue the door on top and glue the shelf under the door. Splatter black paint on the background. The skulls and bones were also distressed with black paint.

Using the Sizzix Vault Wicked set, the bottles were die cut from leftover papers, Simon Says Stamp Color-Blend cardstock (which is glossy), Black Glitter Cardstock and gold metallic cardstock.

Glue sentiments from the Halloween Sticker Book to the sign post. I really enjoying picking clipping sentiments, creating a story.

Two bottles were placed on the title and adhered with Simon Says Stamp Pawsitively Perfect Foam Tape. 

I glued a transparent bat to the door too. Fold up the wings.

Glue mummy cloth to the shelf, as a table cloth. Add Bubbles, skulls, Simon Says Stamp Pawsitively Dazzling Gems, bones and bottles to the shelf. I used two layers of foam tape for the bottles.

I added clippings number stickers to some of the bottles and wrote numbers on the rest.

Here you can see the shelf from above with all the little details. 

Shelves are easy to build and give space for many different types of dimensional items.

Stack three skulls on top of each other, with a bone under one of them. I also added idea-ology candy corn.

The project has quite a lot of dimension.

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial! See you soon again!

Thank you so much for stopping by here today! Have a good weekend!

Happy crafting!

Anna-Karin

Supplies:

* Please note: the links are affiliate links, for which I receive a small percentage of sales generated by the link, at no extra cost to you.