Saturday 28 November 2020

Altered Art Bottle - Winter Magic by Kerstin

 

 Welcome, creative friends!

 

I was inspired to create another glass bottle in Altered Art style

suitable for the magic of Christmas time.

 




Tips & Tricks

 

 

Firstly I covered the whole bottle with Weathered Wood, a crackle medium from DecoArt,then, after a drying time, I painted that with Chalky Finish 'Serene'. 

The middle section was painted with diluted paint for better visibility of the door windows. 

 

I love to decorate the flat MDF shapes with 3D effects using a silicone cake mould ('Gothic window')

and air drying clay (only the outer frame of the mould was used in this case).



One of the

Sheet of Mini MDF Street Lamps 

was perfect for a hanging lantern above the window!
To have it well fixed, it was pressed into the not yet completely dried clay
 and additionally fixed with construction adhesive - this glue fixes the MDF shapes
 very well on glass, but you should note that it has to dry overnight for a stable hold.


 
Below the window I glued a

Rectangle Shape

 in small size as a terrace, which gets additional hold through the swirls of the

Winter Trees & Snow Swirls.

 



Some close up's

 

 



 

Calico Craft Parts used: 

 

Gothic Stone Window - MDF Wood Shape

 

Winter Trees & Snow Swirls

Sheet of Mini MDF Street Lamps

Picket Fence Panel MDF Wood Shape - Style 3

Fir Boughs - MDF Wood Corner

Mini Star Wreath

Sheet of Mini MDF Acorns & Oakleaves

 Rectangle Shape - MDF Mixed Media Board

 

Other materials:

Snow -Tex DecoArt

white acrylic paint

brown jute

 

Wishing you a happy advent season!

Kerstin

Monday 23 November 2020

Step Right Up! - Artist Trading Block - by Claudia

 Hi, servus and thanks for stopping by today! How about sharing a little crafty inspiration to distract ourselves from all the craziness that's happening in the world these days?! 


Have you already seen the new circus themed craft parts in the shop? They're vintage designs and I fell in love with them at first sight. 



I especially love the monkey, but the director is just as fab! 






Calico Craft Parts used: 

- Artist Trading Block Cube Kit - Plain Cube - large 

- The Ringmaster - MDF Wood Shape

- Snarling Tiger - MDF Wood Shape

- Circus Elephant - MDF Wood Shape

- Circus Chimpanzee - MDF Wood Shape



I assembled the artist trading block (which is really easy as all joining points are marked with matching letters so you can't go wrong) and covered the sides with some striped vintage designer paper (from a Tim Holtz paper stash) using matte DecoArt Decou-Page. I also used diluted Decou-Page on top of the paper after I had inked the edges with dark brown archival stamping ink and a piece of blending foam. 



While that was set aside to dry, I dry brushed all the craft parts with "relic" DecoArt Americana Chalky Finish paint, using a flat, soft brush. This way the engraved patterns started to show beautifully. 


Once the cube had dried, I applied DecoArt media white Crackle Paint with a palette knife here and there along the edges and put that on the central heating to speed up the drying and crackling process. 



In the meantime I started colouring the prepared craft parts with various washes of DecoArt media fluid acrylic "Quinacridone Gold" using a detail brush. 


Then I highlighted some areas with DecoArt media fluid acrylic "Titanium White". 


The crackle had turned out just beautifully in the meantime! I added a wash of Quinacridone to that too. 


Afterwards I went in with a wash of Raw Umber DecoArt media fluid acrylic paint to accentuate the crackle and tone down the elephant's skin. 


Using the Tim Holtz "Alphanumeric Shadow Upper" dies set, I die cut my quote and painted the inner parts of the letters with more Quinacridone Gold (using a fine detail brush). 


Finally I added sprinkles of Raw Umber, Quinacridone Gold and diluted DecoArt "Gold Rush" Metallic Lustre to the showing sides of my block, before I glued everything in place using matte Decou-Page. To help the characters on the top of my block stand, I used snippets from left overs of MDF Add On Sheets. 


I also used the Metallic Lustre to customize the little star stickers I added to some spots. 





Every circus needs its stars and a bit of bling, doesn't it?!





Some close ups: 
















I hope you've enjoyed the little visit to the circus! 





Stay safe
and as always
hugs and happy crafting!

Claudia 
xxx






Saturday 14 November 2020

Art Journal page by Kerstin

Welcome!


I was inspired to create a Art Journal page  in mixed media style this time, titled

- A walk through nature -

where I used only one MDF shape from Calico Craft Parts...

yes, it works 😁!!

 

I love to play with various shapes and textures and using the layering technique well know from scrap booking.

 In the background I worked with stencils, old book pages, stamps and Distress inks. In the foreground I also worked with dried nature materials like  leaves, moss and lichens. Always important for me: it must not look too  neat and tidy, because nature always convinces with diversity and apparent chaos.

 

Some close up's




Yes, I did it again! Some of you may have already seen some of my projects where I used this awesome tree as a tree but also to form roots with.

Firstly,  I covered the MDF shape with Weathered Wood (a crackle medium from DecoArt), after drying with white acrylic paint  and finally with 'Walnut stain' distress ink (Ranger) in some spots only.



 

Skeleton Tree Duo MDF Wood Shape - Style 1



 Many thanks for your visit!

Happy crafting!

Kerstin