Dream Mixed Media Layout

Hello all! Darkroom Door is sponsoring Scrap Around the World this month and the design team were invited to play along. I hope you will join in too, you could win a whole bunch of Darkroom Door stamps, and there are a lot of other prizes too. Here is the lovely mood board:

 

I had such fun making my mixed-media layout:

 

I was inspired by several different things from the mood board: the colours, the happy celebration theme, the macaroons and of course the balloons. The background is done with layers of gesso, paint, stamping and stencilling. I really wanted to use this photo of my son walking with a balloon, even though it wasn't totally the right colours. He loves balloons.

 

I coated watercolour paper with gesso and when it was dry I gave the background a first layer of Distress Paints, using pretty light colours and watering the paint down first. The title was stamped with Vermillion Archival Ink.

 

I love the new Gum Trees set and knew I wanted to use the trees on this layout. These stamps are detailed and since the background was slightly textured, because of the gesso, I decided to stamp them on tissue paper using Archival Jet Black ink. The stamped tissue trees were adhered to the background with glossy multi-medium, making the tissue paper practically invisible. I added another coat of gel on top of them. When dry, the trees were lightly coloured with Distress Paint and I also painted hills for them.

 

When the gel was dry, the background was stamped with various Darkroom Door stamps, such as: French Script Texture, Grid Background, Smile Word Block, and Coffee Stain.

The following layer consists of molding paste applied with a palette knife through two stencils by Simon Says Stamp and one by Tim Holtz. Here you can see the wonderful Leaves stencil. When the paste was dry, I coloured it with paint.

The shadow was done with a Distress Marker, smudging it out with my finger. It adds great dimension. The little butterflies were die cut with the Sizzix Butterfly Frenzy die.

 

The red bike comes from the Enjoy the Ride set, and so does the sentiment you see here. It is better to do most of the stamping before stencilling with the paste, since it looks nice with stamping underneath the paste, and it is also hard to stamp on the background once the paste is there. I used some Darkroom Door word strips to add more text to the page, there is also a bit more journaling on the back.

Under the photo there is a piece of music patterned paper and I also used images from Darkroom Door Sweet Treats Montage sheet, which fit real well with the mood board. The little bow is made with Tim Holtz Bow-Tied die.

Even though you hardly see the Bingo Numbers stamped with red, I like the look of them peeking out from under the stencilled leaves.

Apart from the stamped sentiments, I also printed some quotes and cut into strips. You probably already know that I like to use quotes on my projects. This one is an abbreviated version of the original quote, I believe (I often check to make sure I have the quotes right). The letters to the left come from Tim Holtz Schoolhouse stencil.

Thank you for looking! I hope you will join in the challenge, and don't forget to check out the gorgeous layouts by my fellow DT members.

 

Enjoy your weekend!

Anna-Karin

Supplies:
Surfaces: Daler & Rowney watercolour paper; Bazzill Antique 6 x 6 paper pad; Tim Holtz Core'dinations Distress Colour-Core cardstock
Stamps: Darkroom Door: Gum Trees, French Script Texture, Enjoy the Ride, Scratched Alphabet, Smile Word Block, Grid Background, Bingo Numbers, Coffee Stain
Dies: Sizzix: Bow-Tied, Courtyard Frameworks, Butterfly Frenzy
Ink: Ranger Archival Ink: Vermillion, Viridian, Jet Black; Distress Ink: Gathered Twigs
Paint: Distress Paint: Antique Linen, Frayed Burlap, Walnut Stain, Evergreen Bough, Victorian Velvet
Marker: Distress Marker: Black Soot, Walnut Stain
Medium: Golden Artist Paint: Gesso, Light Molding Paste
Stencils: Simon Says Stamp Exclusives: Leaves, Blocked Circles; Tim Holtz Stampers Anonymous: Schoolhouse
Embellishments: Darkroom Door: Sweet Treats Montage, Prague Vol. 2 Word Strips; Tim Holtz Idea-ology: Elements Tissue Tape, Label Letters; lace trim