Hocus Pocus! by Claudia

Halloween is still some weeks from now but usually I am always late with starting Halloween projects and run out of time - so this year I decided to be an early bird and create my first little witch house already at the end of August.

The yellow paint, the green door and window shatters, ivy climbing the building - they are all typical elements of houses as we have them in the beautiful Salzkammergut region in Austria - mainly the region around Bad Ischl (where Emperor Franz Joseph used to spend his summers).

But the tiny second door.....and the gigantic mushrooms? So maybe it is a Salzkammergut witch who lives here. Who knows. (and maybe she is looking unhappy because it has been raining on and on for the last days. If you know the typcial Salzkammergut rain, you will know why she is in a bad mood...lol).

Calico Craft Parts used:

- Block Style MDF House Kit - Wide
- Sheet of Mini MDF Door Wood Shapes
- Sheet of Tiny MDF Door and Window Wood Shapes
- Sheet of Mini MDF Wood Lamp Posts - Style 3
- Mushrooms - Funghi MDF Wood Shape - Style 9
- Ivy Leaf Garland MDF Wood Shape - Style 2
- Stars - Mini Greyboard Shapes

The house kit was assembled using matte DecoArt Decou-Page (I love it as it dries so incredibly fast).

Then I glued on some dictionnary pages and also covered them with the matte Decou-Page.

I played around with all my Calico Craft Parts until they had all found their perfect positions. Then I put them aside and painted them with DecoArt media fluid acrylics. I have no images of this part of the process this time - simply because you are meant to choose whatever colours you like best. (I used two greens (a darker and a lighter one), Raw Umber, Quinacridone Gold, Titan Buff and Gold Green).

But before I started painting my little pieces to decorate the house with, I applied a very thin coat of DecoArt media white Modelling Paste with a palette knife and engraved a roof tiles pattern into it using a fine tip embossing tool. I let the modelled roof dry naturally.

The house was painted with a light wash of Gold Green and Transparent Red Iron Oxide afterwards to tone everything down. For more texture I added some stamped on crackle on the house's front, the star and the mushrooms. A copy of a vintage potrait was cut to size and glued in place. Then I painted around and over it and added the pointy witches hat.

I made a wash from DecoArt media Quinacridone Gold fluid acrylic paint and added it to the roof.
This way the texture became more visible and the tiles' shapes were accentuated.

Then I dabbed a frame around the house's edges using my fingertip and the same colour as before.

The cat was hand drawn using Faber Castell PITT Artist Pens.

I shaded the mushrooms using Raw Umber. Highlights were added using a very fine tip soft brush and Titan Buff.

I also added a lighter green to some of the edges on the window shatters and door to create more of a 3D impression.

Sancho, the wise raven, was added...

...and a word sticker finished it all off.

So here it is -  my little Salzkammergut style house! 

Thank you for stopping by today and I hope you have enjoyed your visit! See you in two weeks!

Hugs and happy crafting!

Claudia

xxx