LIVE!

My latest addition is to my Gel Plate - there is an unlimited amount of fun to be had printing your own backgrounds and making a whole range of things! This month I have made two different backgrounds for my large Journal using the same equipment. The first journal page I made I shared last week.
Before I start, a couple of things to note: I made this on a really hot day so I wasn't able to photograph everything as the paint was drying so quickly! The second is that the sunshine created some shadows on my photos so please forgive these!

I brayered Bougainvillea paint and created my first print

The second print used Snowflake

Then a print using Banana

Then a print using Caribbean Sea in just part of the paper

Then I used Teresa Green - I didn't intend to over print the blue - doh! But the joy of this system is that you can just keep adding layers!

Another layer of white fixed that problem!

Then the first stencil - Tracks with Banana

I added two more stencils Gothic (using Slate) and Splotches using Bougainvillea. Then I sanded the page and trimmed it.

In completing my page I used off cuts from other projects using the same paint colours

The final piece included stamps from Everything Art and Emma Godfrey. The quotation (typed on my ancient typewriter!) says:

Live! Live the wonderful life that is in you! Let nothing be lost upon you. Be always searching for new sensations. Be afraid of nothing. Oscar Wilde

Thank you, as always, for popping by - and do have a look at my first project here.

Gabrielle x

Working with the new 3D folders by Tim Holtz (2)

If you saw my post on Friday (scroll down to find it) you will have seen how I used one of the 3-D Texture Fades to make a background for two pretty shabby vintage cards, today I am using the Foundry EF to make this industrial tag. Again check out the previous post for the link to Tim's video where he shares lots of tips, tricks and ideas for using them.

I began by sticking some metal tape to black card and running it through the Big Shot. The details that emerge are so textured and clear, it really looks as though you have sat ans tuck individual pieces over a silver background to create this design.

FRom the back you can see the debossed side and how the details are imprinted into the card.

I adhered the card onto a chipboard tag and left it for the glue to dry .......

.... before rubbing in some carbon black and burnt umber premium acrylic paints from DecoArt. I left it to dry for a couple of minutes and then added a small amount of the black paint again and rubbed it over with a dry babywipe - you could easily use a soft cloth. You can see this left some of the paints in crevices and now is beginning to look aged and timeworn.

When this was perfectly dry I rubbed over some quinacridone gold media fluid acrylic and again left it to dry and repeated the process above.

Lastly again when it was perfectly dry I painted some raw umber, paynes grey and quin gold into crevices, spritzed them and let them move around before using the heat tool to dry them.

It's now ready to add some rusty looking cogs, gears, some remnant rubs and a vintage photo.

Have fun with the 3-D texture fades and this technique.

hugs Brenda xxx

www.bumblebeesandbutterflies.com

Working with the new 3D folders by Tim Holtz (1)

Tim always looks to bring us new innovative products and we now have a set of 3D texture fades / embossing folders we can work with. These bring added dimension and texture to the world of embossing so that we can see some amazing details in the design and patterns. At the moment there are four different ones, this on I've used is called Botanical..

I am not going to go through the general start up of using these fabulous folders as Tim says it all on this Sizzix post HERE. Watching this is a great starting point as he gives lots of tips, tricks and ideas for using them. I wanted to to have a play and see for myself how good the detail is and how I could use them.

I love creating collage projects so I took some heavy card brayered over with burnt umber, titan buff,  quinacridone magenta and titanium white before I dipped it in two watery washes of firstly burnt umber and then titanium white mixed with a very little quin magenta watery decoart premium acrylic paints ....

....  and then ran it through the ebosser embossing machine. I lightly sanded the raised areas and rubbed a tattered rose distress oxide pad over it which helped get just the right amount of definition and used it as a background for my cards.

With some Tim Holtz lost relatives and ephemera and some additional bits and pieces from mysupplies I created two cards for the price of one. Both going to different people.

Thanks for stopping by and I'd love to see any cards you make this way with the 3-d texture fade.

hugs Brenda 

www.bumblebeesandbutterflies.com

Flowers are smiles

My latest addition is to my Gel Plate - there is an unlimited amount of fun to be had printing your own backgrounds and making a whole range of things! This month I have made two different backgrounds for my large Journal using the same equipment.
Before I start, a couple of things to note: I made this on a really hot day so I wasn't able to photograph everything as the paint was drying so quickly! The second is that my plate had some pits on the surface after I'd washed it. These have since disappeared - so ignore the 'bubble' effect on the first few photos! You won't have this one your plate and I haven't experienced this since.

My first step was to brayer a layer of Caribbean Sea paint to the surface - you don't need a lot of paint as you can repeat any of the steps to cover your paper.

Lay your page on the paint and rub the back of the paper to transfer the paint to the paper. Then peel your paper off the plate.

This is my first print.

I then made a second print using Teresa Green.

Then I added a white (Snowflake) layer. I tend to add a layer of colour and then a layer of white. I like the layers of colours - think lots of layers of wallpaper in an old house!

You don't have to add paint to the whole of the surface of your plate, here I added Bougainvillea to a small areas on the plate. You can, of course, put paint on the plate and only put part of your paper on the plate; rotate the paper so you don't always use the same part of the plate on the same part of the paper and print as many layers as you like.

So, that's my base. Now to add some stencilling! On the plate, lay your stencil and brayer paint through.

This is what that stencil looks like.

This is Tracks in Banana

And this is Gothic in Slate

This is the finished page, trimmed and with Vintage Photo Distress Ink around the edges.

To finish the page off I used lots of Zinski Art stamps

Thank you for popping by - my second page using these paints and stencils will be here next week!

Gabrielle x

Antonis Tzanidakis Workshops

 

Today we are sharing some pics from the recent Workshops held at Country View Crafts on Friday 11th & Saturday 12th May with Antonis Tzanidakis

 

 Antonis Tzanidakis is a world-known artist!

You may already know him for his incredible mixed media art

that include fabulous handmade home decor and beautiful work on wood.

When he is not at home creating, he is travelling around the world

offering workshops to teach others new ways to create.  So we were thrilled that he wanted to teach workshops at Country View Crafts and we all loved his work & teaching techniques so much we have invited him back next year too

 

Using DecoArt and Stamperia products everyone was busy creating

 

 

We even used wallpaper for one project

Old hard backed books

and air dried clay

The stamped impression was so detailed on the clay

rusting effects

and some oil paint

Helen & Antonis

 and then some of us all

 

with our projects

 

Antonis we all had a fantastic time - Thank You So Much x

 

Our next workshop is with Brenda Brown on Saturday 9th June so if you feel like joining us book your place on our website