Winter Wonderland Shadow Box Tutorial

Hello crafters! It is time for more Christmas crafting! During November, the Eileen Hull Inspiration Team is sharing Holiday projects. Don't miss all the inspiration throughout the month.

I made a sweet little winter wonderland shadow box, with lots of glittery snow. The Trinket Box & Frame, Book & Pages makes a cute shadow box, which is very easy to assemble. As the name of the die suggests, you can also use this die for a range of other projects: books, cardmaking, an oval frame, a covered box and more. I am planning to add a hook to the back and hang this shadow box on the wall. If you want it to stand flat, it is better to cut off the half-oval part at the bottom, to make it flat. As you can see on the photo, I used a small stone to stabilize it for the photo.

Start by die cutting the pieces seen above, from mat board. You need the Extended Cutting Pads since this is an XL die, but it fits perfectly into an ordinary Big Shot or Vagabond. Place the oval inside the window for the piece to the right, and remove it to get a solid background.

Die cut a second rectangle from one of Tim Holtz's Christmas Worn Wallpapers. Glue the latter to the mat board.

White emboss a sentiment above the oval and a tree and snowflakes all around. Repeat on both sides of the side pieces.

I was in the mood for warm, neutral colors and inked the mat board with Antique Linen, Vintage photo and Ground Espresso. Mat board takes ink beautifully.

Ink the other pieces too, and the side pieces on both sides.

Smear white Texture Paste in the front and cover with Rock Candy Distress Glitter.

Paint a Tim Holtz Salvaged Snowman with Distress Paints. Water down some brown paint and color the Woodland Tree.

Smear Texture Paste on the tree and cover with Rock Candy. Also add some texture paste to the snowman's hat and again cover with glitter. For his body, which is already meant to be snow, I used Transparent Gloss Paste instead, in a very thin layer and not everywhere. Cover with glitter.

Assemble the box as shown, placing the rectangle inside the two side pieces.

I wanted the tree and the snowman to be raised a little and added a piece of cork under each one. Add a thick layer of texture paste into the box. Press the snowman and tree into the paste and add some more at the front, so that it looks like they are standing in the snow. Again, cover everything with glitter.

Glue the front piece to the shadow box and you are done. Here you can see what the snow looks like from above.

Don't worry about stray embossing powder, since it just adds to the snowy winter look. I left all the stray powder on purpose.

Glue some metallic stars to the front.

The snowman almost has a porcelain look, and all the glitter adds to the frosty feeling. Do you spot the difference between the white paste on his hat, and the transparent paste on his body? The latter lets the paint and texture show through, while the former would have covered it up.

Here's a closer look at the paste and glitter. I love this effect of Rock Candy glitter.

And the tree looks pretty frosty too. If I had used mist to color the tree, the paste would have picked up the color of the mist and would have become brown, with paint you don't have that problem. 

I can think of so many other little scenes to build inside this shadow box and I am looking forward to using the Trinket Box & Frame, Book & Pages die again soon.

Thank you so much for visiting here today! I hope you will have a lovely day!

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.

Dry Embossing and Printing Layout

Hello crafters! I hope you had a fun weekend! I was planning to have taken the Christmas card photo of the boys this weekend, but it was rainy, so it has to wait a little, since we have a tradition of always taking it outdoors.

This week at the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Blog we have a Thanks/Thankful theme. Don't miss the gorgeous Thanksgiving project by our November guest designer Jo, aka Let's Art Journal.

I started out planning to do an autumn themed project, and felt like a scrapbooking page. As I was looking through a pile of photos, thinking about thankfulness, I came across this photo of a humble little Common Daisy, or lawn daisy. I had to google the English name, in Swedish it is called a Tusensköna, which translates to something like 'beauty of thousands' or more literary 'thousand-beauty'. My grandmother had many of these in her lawn and she thought they were weeds. I couldn't understand why since I thought they were so pretty and almost colored the lawn. My favorites were always the ones with purple tips. I was happy to discover them in our lawn and they always make me think of my grandmother. She lived on the countryside and had a huge lawn, which must have been hard work. She used to cut the grass and then rake it all into a pile for us to jump in. 

So instead of an autumn project, I made a cheerful layout about thankfulness, for both the little things and the big things, with journaling on the back. 

The background panels are left-over from a gel printing session. I like to use dry embossed papers to make impressions and patterns when gel printing and sometimes those very paper end up looking even nicer than the prints. I have a tutorial coming soon on the printing process too. The panels were cut into squares, and I also distressed the edges. I used paints by Dina Wakley and Ranger's gel printing plates for the printing.

I wanted this page to be full of words and used a bunch of different sentiment stamps. They were stamped on left-over printed papers, so they coordinate in color with the dry embossed panels. Some were stamped on white paper. I used the following stamp sets: Inky Antics/Andrea Ockey Parr The Queen's Quips, Darkroom Door Nature Walk, AALL & Create/Tracy Evans clear stamp set #44, Tim Holtz Way With Words and Nature's Wonder.

For some additional flowers and even more color and happiness, I die cut flowers and leaves from more left-over gel printed papers, using Tim Holtz Sizzix Wildflowers, Funky Floral 1, 2 and 3.

I wanted the title to be white, and die cut it from white mat board using Tim's new Letterboard die. The letters were coated with Glossy Accents, which makes them look really nice and shiny.

I love the random paint on these panels and on the papers used for the sentiments and die cutting. A couple of the sentiments from Tracy Evans' set were small enough to stamp in between dry embossed areas. The third sentiment here comes from the Darkroom Door Nature Walk set. The embossing folder used for this panel is the Sizzix 3-D Lily Pond folder.

I really like both of these sentiments, and on that different path, you might also be more likely to see the flowers. The first sentiment is from Tracy Evans and the second from Tim Holtz's Nature's Wonder. All the panels were stitched to the background.

Some of the panels had only been used for one print, while others had been pressed on the gel printing plate more than once, giving them a multitude of colors. This is dry embossed in the Tim Holtz Gridlock folder.

The page needed more life and I stamped three adorable Garden Birds by Darkroom Door, designed by Godelieve Tijskens. They were stamped on more gel printed paper.

Here's another lovely sentiment from the Tracy Evans set. The photo was layered on vellum and cheese cloth.

Yesterday, when I was out walking, the weather was pretty grey and damp, but with a sense of wonder, you can find little treasures and beautiful things everywhere. So the theme for my walk ended up being moss and bark, both of which have gorgeous colors and interesting textures. The embossing folder used here is the 3D Leaves folder.

This lovely sentiment comes from The Queens Quip's stamp set by Inky Antics, designed by my SSS Monday Blog team mate, Andrea Ockey Parr. It was stamped on a die cut Stitched Oval.

I went wild with favorite sentiments on this page, since I wanted it to be filled with colorful words.

And I just had to add one of my favorite Tim Holtz sentiments, which fits well on a page about thankfulness.

This tiny Darkroom Door sentiment, fit perfect with the theme and the flowers.

To the right of the photo, there is a little cluster of wild flowers. Die cutting them from gel printed papers give interest and variation to the flowers, while also being very quick.

And another adorabel bird.

Here's a close up on the effect of the Glossy Accents on the letters.

I hope you will join us this week in our Thanks/Thanksgiving challenge. As always, you have a chance to win a $50 gift voucher to do some fun shopping at Simon Says Stamp. You have until next Monday 8am Ohio time. 1pm UK time, 2 pm CET to join in.

Don't forget to follow Simon Says Stamp on Instagram, they post great stuff daily. 

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

Thank you so much for taking the time to visit 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.

In The Forest Wrapped Journal Tutorial

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a good weekend. We went to an art exhibition with sketches and finished paintings by a children's book illustrator. It was gorgeous. I particularly enjoyed seeing the sketches where pages were planned out in stages, and how much changed from the first sketch to the finished illustration. The ways in which art takes on its own life always interested me.

It is a new month and that means that the team at the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Blog is showcasing a specific company/designer and this week the turn has come to Carabelle Studio, and their gorgeous range of stamps and stencils. You don't have to use Carabelle Studio products to join, but it is always fun if you do. Our challenge theme is Make Your Own Background.

Since it is a new month, we also have a new guest designer and our November guest designer is Jo. I hope you will visit her wonderful blog Let's Art Journal, where she shares much inspiration and also gorgeous photos.

I made a forest inspired wrapped journal this week. I can't get enough of these journals and they are so fun to make and also perfect gifts. This one is going to my sister as a birthday gift. The background was created with a stencil, paint and a little bit of stamping, and reminded me of a forest, both in terms of colors and textures. The finished journal measures 4.7 x 5.1 in folded.

The journal is also inspired by a very cute squirrel that lives close to us, which I often spot when I am out walking. 

Start by die cutting one Wrapped Journal by Sizzix / Eileen Hull from mat board. Die cut a second one from sticky-back canvas (I used white canvas, but the natural will work just as well). It won't be quite long enough, so you'll have to die cut the latter in two pieces. I placed the joint in the wrong place, since I was initially planning to wrap the journal the other way around. It would be better to have it on the flap that is covered, or, maybe even better, at the back. Glue down the canvas with matte medium.

Coat the canvas with gesso and let dry, then apply texture paste through the Carabelle Studio Bulles stencil. I love the different sized circles on this stencil.

When the paste is dry, paint the background with: Pine Needles, Twisted Citron, Mowed Lawn and Peeled Paint Distress Paint. When the paint has dried, dry brush gold paint here and there and splatter with brown paint. Finally, add a little bit of stamping using the SSS You Matter stamp.

The cute Ecureuil stamp was first stamped with Distress Inks, inking up with two shades of brown and misting with water about four times. I stamped three impressions, since the technique I planned to use is unpredictable and I wanted to be able to choose the best one.

Ink the stamp with black ink and wipe some of it off. Use a stamp positioner and stamp directly on top of the Distress Ink impression. I use the EK Success Stamp-a-ma-jig, but you can also use Tim Holtz's stamp platform. This is a favorite technique of mine that I hadn't done in quite a while. It adds detail and interest. Funny story: Leo later wanted a squirrel of his own, but he said that the brown one looked too 'old', it had to be a newly stamped one using only red ink. He now carries around four red inked squirrels in his pocket.

The papers were cut to about 7.7 x 4.7 in (19.5 x 12 cm) and folded in half. They were arranged into four signatures of about 6 papers each, and stitched down the center. You can also round the corners, but I didn't this time.

Punch an additional hole in the center of the spine, so that we can use to to create a closure for the book.

I used a black elastic to tie the journal, as shown here. You can also find instructions on the die packaging.

Slip the signatures under the elastics to keep them in place. 

The finished journal has a nice chunky look to it.

This is how the right hand side wraps around the inserts.

All the shades of green, gold and brown, together with the texture from the stencil, made me think of a forest, maybe on a spring or summer day. Pine Needles Distress Paint is such a pretty shade of green, which I use too rarely.

The journal also feels nice to the touch and the canvas adds texture too. If you don't have canvas at home, you can skip that step though and work directly on the mat board.

Cut branches from burlap using Tim Holtz Branches die, and dye some cheese cloth with Antique Linen, for a cozy place for the squirrel.

Beads, pearls and sequins are meant to look like acorns, and also add a little bit of shine.

Here's the back of the journal. You can decorate it too, but I usually keep it plain. For more wrapped journal inspiration, check out my:
Wrapped Journal Tutorial
Blue Textured Wrapped Journal
Wrapped Leather Journal
Wrapped Felt Journal

I hope you will join us this week in our Make Your Own Background challenge. As always, you have a chance to win a $50 gift voucher to do some fun shopping at Simon Says Stamp. You have until next Monday 8am Ohio time. 1pm UK time, 2 pm CET to join in.

Don't forget to follow Simon Says Stamp on Instagram, they post great stuff daily. 

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

Thank you so much for taking the time to visit 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.