It’s Wednesday today, so that means there is a new Mixed Media Art Crew post up on Birgit Koopsen’s blog!
The theme this month is ‘Imagine a world where…’ and I tried to come up with a way to kill two birds with one stone.
Visit Birgit’s blog to see what I did!
Enjoy your Wednesday!
PS. The $40 early bird deal for Creative JumpStart 2018 ends tonight Nov 29 at 11.59 pm EST! Sign up here: CJS 2018 if you haven’t already! (affiliate link)
Oh, how time flies when you’re having fun! It’s the 10th of December… so it’s time for another Inspired by!
Inspired by is a monthly challenge. My friend Riikka and I decide on a theme (and that theme can be anything from a film, a book, a painting, to an item, colour scheme or material) and then we create something with that theme or thing in mind.
We keep what we’re making a secret until reveal day on the 10th, when we show you and each other our creations.
The theme for this month is ‘festive food’. We’ve never done anything food related before and in my head I was going to bake something for Sinterklaas, because in the Netherlands we tend to save anything Christmas related until after December 5th.
And that got me thinking about festive food dishes to serve festive foods in. I don’t have Sinterklaas bowls, plates or mugs and I decorated a Christmas cookie plate several years ago for a trade show:
I don’t have it any more, I left it at my aunt’s house last year (and I think this grainy breakfast-in-bed-iPhone-photo is the only proof of its existence!).
So maybe it was time to decorate a new plate? I had meant to do so for quite some time. I even had plates and porcelain markers ready to make it happen!
December 5th approached and I still hadn’t baked anything… So the Sinterklaas plates became Christmas plates instead:
I tried incorporating colour like on my previous cookie plate, but I was working from memory and in my mind the stars needed to be yellow…
I thought I couldn’t get it to look right because I was using a different brand of markers (these by Baker Ross). But now that I’ve seen a photo, it makes sense: on the original I probably used a gold marker instead of a yellow one!
Anyway: the black marker was perfect, so I stuck with black (and white) this time.
I hope there is time for some Christmas baking this year, because I can’t wait to use my new plates!!!
Don’t forget to visit Riikka at Paperiliitin! I wonder if she did make time to bake?!
Busy season has kicked in, so I’m on the look-out for easy to do handmade projects, that take minimal effort.
Today I’m sharing a minimal but stylish gift tag idea over on the Elizabeth Craft Designs Blog.
I was looking at a magazine and saw these beautiful gift tags with fresh greenery attached to them. I loved the idea, it’s easy to do, but you can’t really prepare this in advance, as the fresh leaves and berries won’t keep until the holidays.
Unless… you make them out of paper!
The individual steps for these tags hardly take any time, so I think this is an excellent project you can do one step at a time, whenever you have a spare moment!
Here are the steps to create the tags:
1 | Die-cut as many leaves and (berry) branches as you think you’ll need out of watercolour paper.
2 | Colour the leaves and branches with watercolours. Leave the watercoloured die-cuts to dry completely.
Don’t have time to wait for paint to dry? Replace the watercolours with a colouring medium that is instantly dry, like alcohol markers, brush tip pens or coloured pencils!
3 | Die-cut as many tags as you think you’ll need out of your favourite cardstock.
4 | Add Glossy Accents and/or Puffy Paint to the berries. Leave to dry completely.
Don’t have time to wait for the accents to dry? Replace them with Glitter Dots or self-adhesive crystals. Or… just skip this step!
5 | Adhere the branches and leaves to the tags with small strips of washi tape.
6 | Add some twine to the tags and use the tags to decorate your gifts or your home!
Happy crafting!
SUPPLIES:
Elizabeth Craft Designs:
1074 Leaf & Berry Branches
1033 Leafy Branch
958 Tags & More 5 – Sunburst
758 Berry Branch
703 Triple Leaf Set
Other:
Watercolours (Winsor and Newton)
Bakers twine
Glossy Accents (Ranger)
Puffy Paint White (Tulip)
There is a new Designer Challenge up on the Elizabeth Craft Designs Blog!
This time the theme is a colour combo: White – Gold – Silver.
My contemporary white and gold glitter candle holders started out like this:
Here are the steps to create the candle holders:
1 | Clean three glass bottles. They need to be clean on the inside and completely free of grease on the outside.
2 | Prep the glass bottles with (matte) white spray paint.
It was my intention to completely cover the bottles with spray paint, but I found that it took quite a couple of coats just to cover the green glass. It also started to rain, so I decided to make do with just a thin coat.
3 | Once the spray paint was dry, I continued to cover the bottles with white paint, but this time I choose gesso. Gesso covers well and it dries fairly quick.
Give each bottle three coats of gesso.
4 | Back a sheet of 270 gr Soft Finish Cardstock with Clear Double-Sided Adhesive Tape and die-cut as many Sea Glass shapes as you think you’ll need with the Jewelry Set 1 – Sea Glass die set.
5 | Adhere the Sea Glass shapes to the bottles. Cover the paper shapes with another coat or two of gesso.
6 | Paint the bottom of the bottle with a liquid adhesive (I like to use Mod Podge Matte for this) and cover the adhesive with Solar Gold Silk Microfine Glitter.
Leave to dry completely before you remove any excess glitter with a soft brush.
Repeat this step until you are happy with the result!
SUPPLIES:
Elizabeth Craft Designs:
508 Clear Double Sided Adhesive Tape – 64 mm
629 Solar Gold Silk Microfine Glitter
954 Jewelry Set 1-Sea Glass
PSF102 Soft Finish Cardstock 270 gr
Other:
Glass bottles
Spray paint
Gesso
Mod Podge Matte
Do you ever go to a store determined to find something cute and then come back empty-handed because every time you saw something there, you heard this voice in your head saying: ‘I can make that!’ Or: ‘I would totally buy that, if only it would come in another colour’… ?!
Well, it happened to me this week: I went to the garden centre to look at what’s new in Christmas decor and I found a wooden Christmas tree frame with fairy lights that I liked. Except the colours were not to my taste and then I thought: I wonder if I can customize it… Or… maybe I can just make something similar using my dies and Shimmer Sheetz.
Turns out it’s an easy peasy Christmas decor project to make!
Here’s how I created it:
1 | Get a piece of 3/8 inch square dowel and cut it into three parts to create a triangle shape. Glue the dowel pieces together with wood glue or a strong craft adhesive.
I’m not a wood worker and nor is my husband, but I just told him what I had in mind and he made something up. I don’t think he even measured it! The bottom dowel ended up 6.7 inches and the upright dowels are about 9.45 inches long.
2 | Paint the tree frame to match your holiday decor!
3 | Add a wooden building block or something similar to give the tree a trunk.
4 | Choose three or four colours of Shimmer Sheetz and use Ornament Set 4 to die-cut 5 or 6 ornament shapes.
Remember that you need a Metal Adaptor Plate to be able to die-cut through Shimmer Sheetz with intricate dies like the ornament shapes!
5 | Add Transparent Double Sided Adhesive Tape to the back of a scrap of Shimmer Sheetz before you die-cut the little ornament hanger. Remove the protective sheet and stick it on the ornament.
6 | Wrap a small string of fairy lights around the Christmas tree frame.
I found these micro-LED lights at the garden centre. I didn’t use anything to fix them to the frame, I was able to just bend the wire around the frame and it stayed put on its own.
7 | Use jump rings to hang the Shimmer Sheetz ornaments on the wire.
I like to use two pliers to bend the jump rings open (like you see in the photo above) and I close the ring (on the wire, with the Shimmer Sheetz ornament attached) by bending it in the exact opposite direction before closing it.
8 | Find your Christmas tree frame a place in your home and turn on the lights!
Have a wonderful day!
SUPPLIES:
Elizabeth Craft Designs:
1065 Ornament Set 4
508 Transparent Double Sided Adhesive Tape – 64 mm
Shimmer Sheetz
803 Cuttlebug and Big Shot Metal Adaptor Plate
Other:
3/8 inch Square dowel
Wooden building block
Micro LED fairy lights
Wood glue
Paint
Jump rings
Looking for a clear and easy Christmas ornaments? Go on over to the myStamp BOX blog! For day 10 of the myStamp BOX 12 Days of Christmas I turned clear plastic baubles into festive window decorations.
Come and join us on the myStampBOX blog for 12 days of Christmas projects!
