Smile and Laughter Tag

Hello friends! Today I have an tag to share, with some inking, stamping and heat embossing. It can easily be turned into a card or an art journal page instead. 

I hope you had a fun weekend! We had a mix of activities: ice skating, soccer and a friend's birthday party. Everybody enjoyed it, and we now have two week's with birthday celebrations coming up.

This week at the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Blog we have a Frame It challenge. Lots of options here! I hope you will join us. Don't miss the beautiful project by our February guest designer Christina, with her blog Rosso Papavero. 

I made a tag using one of my favorite frame stamps, and I also framed some words with circle die cuts. The background was done by inking through a stencil and then stamping on top, plus a tiny bit of water misting. It is a quick and simple background and can be varied in so many ways, by using different colors and patterns.

I first stamped the frame from Tim Holtz Mini Ornates with Jet Black Archival Ink. Ink the whole tag with Antique Linen. Place the Ornate stencil over the tag and ink with Mermaid Lagoon. Avoid inking inside the frame.

Ink with Vintage Photo, particularly around the edges. Mist and splatter with water for extra texture.

Stamp the background with a dot stamp and brown ink.

I die cut Simon Says Stamp Daisy Stem and Circle Loops from heavystock paper. Heat emboss with Ranger's Mixed Media powders: Scarlet and Lime. Always be careful when you heat emboss and never touch the melted powder until it is completely cool.

The Circle Loop set is one of my all time favorite dies, and here I embossed them with both Lime and Scarlet powder. Use the circles to frame rub-on words. The words I used are from Tim Holtz Tiny Text.

Stamp a sentiment in the frame with Red Geranium ink. The sentiment comes from the Paper Artsy The Happiness Edition by Alison Bomber. It is such a great quote. I also added a metallic number.

Frame additional words with two more circle loops. For a fun touch, I also added some sequins, from the Simon Says Stamp Sunken Treasure.

This is a simple, but effective, background, and even though it is just one layer, it has the appearance of depth.

I hope you will join us this week in our Frame It 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.

Peony Mixed Media Canvas Tutorial

Hello friends! I have a peony mixed media canvas tutorial to share with you today, made with a stencil, acrylic paint and pastes. It is much easier to do than what it might look like, which is usually the case with mixed media. The finished product might look complicated, but if you just work one step at a time, it isn't hard to achieve. 

We have such bleak and grey weather here, a cheerful floral project was just what I needed.

The canvas board is 6 x 6 in, and for some reason it is not looking totally square here, which must have been caused by the angle of the camera. I made it with the new Simon Says Stamp Peony Bouquet stencil, which is so pretty. You could also do the techniques for a card or an art journal page, if you use a sturdy paper for the base, such as watercolor paper.

Start by coating the canvas with gesso and when that is dry, smear texture paste through the stencil with a palette knife. Let dry.

Water down Antique Linen and Pumice Stone and paint the canvas, to give a base.

When dry, start painting the flowers. Later, I covered up most of the Victorian Velvet, since I wanted them to be brighter.

Continue with the leaves.

Bring in one or two darker colors, to make the flowers come to life. It can be hard to see where the darker areas should be. Imagine where the light is coming from, and now and then hold the canvas at a distance. Looking at it from a distance makes it much easier to see where to paint the darker colors. Don't worry about perfection.

Add a little crackle paste around the edges and let dry. Crackles appear as it dries. The paste was on my desk since my lighthouse tag.

Paint the paste with watered down Pumice Stone.

Add more Pumice Stone as shading to the flowers, and a little green and brown.

Apply a glue stick here and there, especially around the edges, working one area at a time. Let dry for maybe 30 seconds to a minute (it depends on the glue) and then rub a foil sheet on top. This leaves of small areas of shiny foil, giving a great extra texture to the canvas. I used Therm o Web Rose Gold Deco Foil.

I also added dots of white paint to the petals, especially where the light was meant to be hitting.

I used a quote from Paper Artsy's The Happiness Edition by Alison Bomber.

Here's a close up of the cool textures created with the paste, paint and foil.

The foil is hard to photograph. Its a rose gold, which fitted well with the project.

I hope you will try out some of these techniques. You don't need to do all of them on a project and can, for example, skip the crackle paste and foil, which will also give you a cleaner and less distressed look.

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.

Lighthouse Tutorial

Hello crafters! Today I am sharing a mixed media tutorial, with a crackle paste background, mica flakes and lots of texture. The techniques can be used for cardmaking, art journaling, 3-D projects and more.

We had a fun weekend with soccer, playgrounds and walks. Yesterday it was very windy and I struggled to photograph my project. It kept blowing away. All trees are still standing around us luckily.

This week we have a Crack It Up theme at the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Blog. Don't miss the lovely project by our February guest designer Christina, with her blog Rosso Papavero. 

I love crackle paste and have for a long time. Ranger's Opaque Crackle Paste is a one-step crackle paste and much easier to use than the two step pastes I used many years ago. It is very easy, you just apply the paste and crackles will appear as it dries. All you need is a little bit of patience. The sea on my tag also has a crackle appearance, since it is covered with mica flakes. These are two easy techniques, which will give great results.

Coat a tag with gesso and when dry, apply Distress Inks. Most of this will be covered up, and you can actually skip painting the sea.

Apply Ranger's Opaque Texture Paste across the sky, but don't cover the background completely. Apply Transparent Gloss Texture Paste over the sea.

At this point, my eye fell on a jar of Tim Holtz Mica Flakes and I decided to cover the sea with flakes. You can also leave it without the mica, which will create a cool effect too. 

When the crackle paste dries, crackles will appear. Let the gloss paste dry too and then add some color to the mica flakes with Patina Alcohol Ink. Pounce up and down on the flakes with an ink blending tool and a felt applicator. This gives a cool varied look, instead of having colored all the flakes beforehand.

Add color to the crackled areas with watered down Tumbled Glass and Pumice Stone.

Die cut the SSS Lighthouse from watercolor paper and from grey cardstock. I actually ended up not using the grey matte piece shown on this photo, but instead die cut the lighthouse with the details once more from the grey cardstock.

Color the lighthouse with Scribble Sticks, by picking up the pigment with a paint brush from the tip of the crayons. I left the stones in the die cut paper, but removed the waves.

Stamp the Woodware Collection Make Art background stamp on Specialty Stamping Paper. Cut out the sentiments you want to use and have the rest ready for another project. It's such a great stamp.

Splatter some black dots on the lighthouse by dipping the black Scribble Stick in water and flicking a paint brush against the tip. Mount the watercolor lighthouse on the grey one, placing the latter a little to the side.

I added a small stamped zigzag piece behind the window at the top of the lighthouse.

Glue the sentiments to the background.

I also added an art pebble and stamped some birds on the background.

I love the look of crackle paste.

The reason for why I didn't use the solid lighthouse matte piece is that I wanted the mica flakes to show through the die cut in the wave areas.

I hope you will join us this week in our Crack It Up 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.