Wednesday 28 September 2016

Keeper of the Heart by Lesley

Hey people. Lesley here with an art doll assemblage for you.

I had sooooooo much fun creating this, was actually a little bit sad when i finished it!


As usual, i started out having no clue what i was making (pretty much the norm for me!) So i gave myself a challenge and closed my eyes and grabbed the craft part out of the box. This ended up to be one of the small cubes. I glued this together and covered it with sand texture paste. Once dry, i painted it with a grey wash.


The legs was from my stash.........they were given some sand texture paste as well, and then red paint rubbed over them. A couple of rusty washers and then her black shoes were added on.


Her head was roughly painted grey with a few dark grey strokes added. I used a lump of clay to make her neck. I used three cogs to sit her head on.


The clay was quite ugly looking.....so i used a length of cord to wrap around her neck.

For her eyes, i used mini screw heads.


The rusty knob thing on her head was something one of my twins bought home after a walk!

She needed arms.......they came from my stash. The hands are actually on hinges......so i thought she better have her heart to hold!


To finish off, i added a bit of glitz to her head.


I hope you like her as much as i do........she was a joy to create!


Thanks for reading.
L.xx

Ingredients used,

Wooden cogs, style 5
Wooden cogs, style 2
Mini MDF hardware shapes 
Artist trading block, cube kit

Sunday 25 September 2016

Spool City - Mini Shrine Storage! by Julie Ann

Hello, it's my favourite Monday - the one when I get to play with Calico Craft Parts! This time I'm thinking about the coming months when I'll be creating Christmas gifts and wrapping them with twines and ribbons. My stash of trims and twines on wooden spools remind me of a little city, so I decided to brighten up my crafting area with a fantasy Spool City! Who lives inside the houses and how do they help me with my gift wrapping, I wonder?



My 'go to' material when it comes to attaching a tag or tying a package is good old, rustic twine. There's something very special about the combo of 'brown paper packages tied up with string', so my city is presided over by the beautiful, practical Twine Goddess always there to dispense string to her followers.



To make her, I combined one of the new doll kits from Calico - I am completely besotted with these - and a shrine kit. I used just the torso of the smallest sized doll and her arms. For the inside of the shrine, I painted with light acrylics and then made circle marks. The tiny circles are made by dipping the plastic packaging from a paint-brush into puddles of yellow paint and then printing with it! I try to keep to the rule of having the interiors of the shrines lighter so that they are easier to see against the darker outside walls.



I chose a warm coral for the outside with some vintage style tape in a complementary colour. The halo is from a sheet of mini Steam Punk shapes. I used one of my own hand-drawn faces for the roof/Goddess's head.



Lace scraps, stiffened with heavy gel medium and brushed with a touch of gilding wax made her sleeves and skirt. I added tiny blobs from a lilac pearl pen to finish her off.



Who doesn't love surprises? The Goddess has a neighbour, Chance. She adds to the mystery and excitement of gift giving! She plays with miniature die and flies on the wings of imagination.



This tiny house is decorated with patterned tissue, embossed copper foil and little scrabble tiles transformed into vintage playing card tiles with digital downloads of vintage playing cards stuck to the reverse, plain side of the Scrabble tiles. Mini windows and an all-seeing eye help her in the quest for the perfect gift and the prettiest ribbon to tie it with.



I stamped the walls with text and white embossed to create contrast against the Jade walls. Edging with Gilder's wax helps to create a vintage feel, which goes well with the dark wood of the spools.



Here's a glimpse of what she looked like before her home was fixed. As with all Calico 3D pieces, these shrines are so easy to assemble with a little white, non-toxic super glue applied to the edges before you slot them in. I use a wooden barbecue skewer to apply the glue.



  The third shrine is home of the Knave of Hearts. He reminds me that it's important to wrap a gift with love and to be as creative and imaginative as we are when making or choosing it. I cut the words from a sheet of designer paper. There's some map paper and some vintage style tape on the roof and the clay roses are from home-made moulds.



Now I just need to start making those Christmas gifts! I wonder if someone might actually like a spool shrine in their stocking? Have a lovely, creative week whatever you choose to do and thank you for visiting my Spool City!

Calico Craft Parts Used
MDF Plain Tall House/Shrine Kit (Small)
Standard jointed Art Doll Kit, Style 2 (Small)
Sheet of Mini MDF Steam Punk Motifs, Style 3
MDF Plain Tall House/Shrine Kit (Mini Kit)
Sheet of MDF Wood Scrabble Tiles
Sheet of MDF Wood Wings
Sheet of tiny MDF doors and windows

Friday 23 September 2016

Beach Secrets : Guest Designer : Jennie Atkinson

Hello Everyone and thank you for joining me for my second project this month.


As we sail around the west coast and islands of Scotland every summer I am always picking up bits and pieces on the beach and decided I needed a little box to keep them in. I love altering boxes and these small ATC sized kit boxes are just great for a small project or gift.


The kit boxes are very easy to assemble and after giving the outside a couple of coats of gesso I applied DecoArt Crackle Paint to all the outside surfaces.  Once this had dried I then applied DecoArt Cobalt Turquoise Hue Fluid Acrylic using a baby wipe. I like this way of getting the paint onto the crackle - the baby wipe makes it watery and gives you time to keep adding more layers until you find the colour you want.


Before assembling the box I had painted the inside pieces with the same Cobalt Turquoise Hue and used some beach themed stamps to create a little interest.


The sea shells and anchor were dabbed with white acrylic paint. Sometimes one coat is enough so that you can see the wonderful markings, sometimes up to three or four coats is needed to get the effect you want. I dabbed a little Turquoise Hue around the anchor with the coloured baby wipe.


All the elements were layered on the top of the box with some netting, muslin, found shells (on the beach and in a shop!) and some seed beads.


I ran a gold pen around the edges of the box here and there to add to the "old" driftwood feel the crackle had created.


I just love these small letters and thankfully they fitted on the little plaque. Again I just used white paint in various layers to keep the washed out beach feel.


The inside of the lid was decorated as well with this little sea shell poem.


And finally the first inhabitants! Not found on the beach but both given to me by my husband this year. One which represents established love and given to me on our 40th Wedding Anniversary and the other my birthstone which I received on my birthday. Beautiful treasures and most unexpected at the time!


Many thanks again to the team here at Calico Craft Parts for inviting me as Guest Designer and the wonderful opportunity of working with more of their wonderful products.  Thank you too for visiting and for the wonderful comments you left on the blog for my first project.

Happy Crafting!

Jennie x


Calico Craft Parts used today:



Monday 19 September 2016

"Don Consuelo" - The Tattooed Man - by Claudia

Servus and welcome back to my fortnightly share of Calico Craft Parts projects from my usually crammed and devastated looking workdesk in Vienna!

Calico Craft Parts have recently released a lovely series of beautiful art doll kits - and I couldn't resist to lay hands on (at least) one of them (for starters...)!

Please, give it up for "Don Consuelo" - The Tattooed Man!!!



You can tell by the look on his face that he knows exactly about his looks and the effect it has on his female audience...


...and pure honey he is, isn't he? ;)

If you - like me - still have some decou-page glue for Serviette-technique and a load of unused flourish stamps at home THIS is the project for you. It is as easy and fun as it is quick!

Calico Craft Parts used:

- Standard Jointed Art Doll Kit - Style 2 - medium size

But I started with two different art doll kits as I couldn't decide at first which one suited my idea of a tattooed man best. So I compared the above kit to the Standard Jointed Art Doll Kit - Style 1.


For a muscle man I found the style 2 kit more suitable, but I am sure I will find the perfect project to make from the style 1 kit too! (giggle...the right doll is looking as if it was scratching his bum...I only see that now that I am writing this post...naughty boy!...lol...;)

I wanted to keep this project as simple as possible and also achieve the impression of a tattooed man as shown in this photograph from the early twentieth century. So I decided to use black and white only and started by adding a thin layer of white DecoArt media Gesso to the pieces.



As the white DecoArt media Gesso is quite liquidy, it mixed a bit with the MDF which brought a lovely brown-ish tint to my art doll. I could of course have fixed this by adding a second layer of white Gesso, but I loved the look - so I only added one layer and let that dry.

In the meantime I stamped some flourishes and other smaller detailed images onto a paper tissue using black archival stamping ink.


I found that some matched the shapes of my doll's body parts perfectly!!!


Slowly it all came together...


The stamped face was too small actually, but I simply cut the eyes and mouth-and-nose-bit apart and placed them on the head shape as needed.

His hair and smaller details were added using DecoArt media Paynes Grey and a fine detail brush, ...


... a fine tip black china ink pen and a white gel pen.


Small dark brads were used to join the doll parts ...



... and the head was permanently glued in place.


He would make a cute jumpin' jack too...


...but I think he looks very much like a modern guy (maybe even a little too modern) when he poses like this, doesn't he?



Thank you as always so much for stopping by! I hope you enjoyed your visit! 
Hugs and happy crafting and see you in two weeks! 

Claudia xxx



Wednesday 14 September 2016

House on the Cliff by Lesley

Hey everyone. Lesley here with a little house for you. (i'm still quite obsessed with these!)

I've been wanting to use this slab of wood for awhile now. To me......it resembled a cliff, where it has been chiseled away....so i knew a house had to sit on top of it.


 The house is a large block style cube one. I gave it a coat of gesso and then attacked it with rust paste.


The roof was heat embossed with rust embossing powder.


The windows were painted grey and then black dabbed over the top. And then i added some little screwheads.


And the door was coated in crackle glaze with black rubbed into the cracks.


 I trimmed the fence down to fit and left an opening where the door is. I left this plain, as the natural colour of craft parts is rather scrummy!


 I added a smidge of colour by adding a little tree, which consisted off a rusty screw, a blob of glue and some green moss type stuff.


 I think i may have one more house idea up my sleeve............

Thanks for reading.
L.x

Ingredients used

Mini MDF doors
Mini MDF windows
Block style MDF house
Mini MDF hardware
Picket fence panel