Tea party over the rabbit hole. By Zuzu

A wee bit of an Alice theme today using a couple of the Artist Trading Block cubes. I used the large one with the arch shaped front and one of the small ones as a table.

I’ve decorated it with book pages from an old copy of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

Inside I’ve added a bit of a fantasy woodland clearing with moss, flowers, toadstools and a white rabbit (which is really a hare but let’s not dwell on that.).

Other Craft parts used:

Toadstools
Rabbit/hare
Teapot

Zuzu x

She Was A Strange Little Girl - Lesley

Hi everyone. This week I have created a piece using the middle part of a triptych kit. These are a fab size for working on.

I used a sheet of corrugated card......a part of the packaging the craft parts came in!
I used a variety of mediums to create a textured background, including spray inks, crackle paints and embossing powders,

The clock face, corner and  keyhole were embossed with rust and beeswax powder.

The clock hands and other bits and bobs were from my stash.

Thanks for reading
L. x

Ingredients used

Rustic Roman Numeral Clock Face
Wood Corner, style 3 Art Deco Floral
Rounded Rectangle Triptych Kit
Wave Keyhole Escutcheon

Who in the World am I? Toadstool MDF Shrine Kit

Hello - it's great to be back at Calico Craft Parts with something of a first for me! I usually like to work with miniatures and - although I'm a great fan of Calico shrine kits - so far I've concentrated on small/mini shrines and houses. This week I decided to dream BIG!

There's miniature work inside, of course, but the large sized Calico Toadstool Shrine Kit gave me the opportunity to decorate a bigger area and incorporate lots of detail. There was more room to allow my imagination to roam through an enchanted forest!

 There's something so 'otherworldly' about coming upon a bright red Fly agaric, dotted with white in a quiet woodland spot. I loved the impression of a grassy bank cut from the MDF with those magical mushrooms rising out of it and I wanted to make the most of this feature, so I used patterned tissue with a butterfly design to create interest without detracting from the outlines - tissue is nice and easy to file away from intricate areas.

Eventually I added several layers of different translucent greens and coats of fluid matt medium before the background dried and I could use a nail file to sand off the edges.

Because I wanted my shrine to have an aged appearance lots of sprayed diluted craft acrylics and sponged layers were applied.

I used a white gel pen and a black fine liner for adding leafy details.

For the interior, I wanted a cracked and aged look, reminiscent of gnarled forest trees. I used a crackle glaze over black Gesso with a final coat of light green.

I love to paint over cracks. So often they form features almost without our help! The translucent, diluted craft acrylic was very much like tree bark.

Calico Craft Parts are so beautifully made I like to use them just as they are; but sometimes I close my eyes, take a deep breath and break them up to create something a little bit different. On this project quite a few pieces were split for different effects.

The focal point of this shrine was a tiny shrink plastic figure of a fairy pierrot. I created her from one of my sketches, scanned and printed onto ink jet printable shrink plastic.

Although this project is not overtly based on 'Alice in Wonderfland', I have tried to capture something of the mood of this book, which has always been one of my favourites. The quote on the blank 'word element' is from the novel and there is a white rabbit - or is he a March hare - bounding into view?

The flying house is my own invention, created from some scraps of paper; a house I cut from MDF and some shrink plastic wings. Perhaps in this enchanted wood there is a rare breed of butterfly who - snail-like - carries her home on her wings. I wonder what other curious creatures might be waiting to make our acquaintance?

As you can see I split yet more Craft Parts to create an impression of depth: dog roses and leaves frame the entrance to the enchanted forest.

The branches snapped from the skeleton tree make the perfect place for the mysterious owl sisters to hide away on the sides of the shrine. Who in the world are they and what stories have they to tell?

Thank you so much for stopping by today and taking a walk with me through my enchanted forest. I wish you a fortnight of wonder and creativity until we meet again. 
Calico Craft Parts used in this Project
Large Toadstool MDF Shrine Kit Style 9
Flowering Dogwood Sprig
Skeleton Tree Style 5
Skeleton Tree Style  8
Sugar Maple Leaf and Twig
Sheet of mini Hares
Word Elements Blank

 

Acrylic Pouring and Calico Craft Parts

Hello everyone!

Now I have finally tried out this trend-setting Acrylic Pouring Technique. 

I still had an MDF "&" sign in my inventory and thought "Well, fine...that one has to bite the dust now".

I worked with DecoArt Pouring Medium and the Puddle Pour method.

 That's a simple technique where acrylic paints are layered on top of each other in several ‘puddles’.

 I chose this method because it seemed more suitable for this MDF piece. Flow movements can be controlled a lot better.

 I used only four colours: white, black and Metallic paints 'Copper' and 'Silver' from DecoArt.  

After a longer drying time I examined my attempt....hm...."why not?"...but I still wanted to make something special out of it. Then I saw the new steampunk parts and thought we'd see if we could combine them.

some close up's 

These new amazing wood shapes look like finished collages. I don't know how to make them even more beautiful, because they are already perfect. So I only used a very fine black embossing powder.

Then I added a cut out steampunk lady head together with two feathers,

 a wooden gear and a small light bulb

 I also used black embossing powder for the dial.

 

This beautiful old key was first painted with white crackle paint and after drying covered with Metallic Lustre 'Black Shimmer' (DecoArt) .

the upper edge was stamped

Calico Craft Parts used:

Steampunk Mechanical Cogs Motif Style 22

Roman Numeral Clock Face 

Clover Key MDF Wood Shape

I had a lot of fun trying out this new technique, 

Now it's a very special sign and deserves a place of honour.

Thanks for your visit!

Happy crafting!

Kerstin

 

Spring Canvas by Lesley

Hi everyone. This week I have decorated a little canvas.

I started out with using some spray inks and dry brushed the edges with silver paint.

A handwritten stamp in black ink was added next.

I tore up some white cheesecloth fabric and added some more spray in before attaching to the canvas using brads.

I painted the fancy flourish in metallic paints and added an ivy leaf garland.

Splodges of glue was added which I then sprinkled with glass beads and tiny micro beads.

Thanks for reading,
L.xx

Ingredients used
Fancy flower flourish
Ivy leaf garland

Ahoi! - Altered Book Box - by Claudia

Ahoi, hi and servus! It's the "other" Monday today - so it is my time to share a new project on this wonderful blog filled with amazing inspiration by the whole design team. ;)

Today I want to show you a book box I have made for an upcoming event - a Pirate themed Murder Mistery Dinner! So I of course needed a cool book box to store my info sheets in...and to show off with. lol

The open book box and its back cover look like this:

As the Calico Craft Parts that I used to decorate the cool Book Box with were already stunningly beautiful in their original, untreated state, I did not do a lot with these and only added paint washes so not to loose any detail from the engraved laser texture.

Calico Craft Parts used:

- MDF Plain Cover Book Box Kit

- Navigation Globe MDF Wood Shape

- Seashell Wood Shape

- Sheet of Mini MDF Hinges Wood Shapes

- Sheet of Mini MDF Label Holders Wood Shapes

- Sheet of Mini MDF Hardware Wood Shapes

The cover of the book box was quite quickly done. I used a beautiful map (a gift wrapping paper) and glued that onto the front and back covers using DecoArt matte Decou-Page. Once that had dried I sanded the excess paper off with a sanding block. 

The globe, shell, hinges and label holder with screw heads were glued in place with matte Decou-Page as well, before I started painting them partly with DecoArt media fluid acrylics Burnt Sienna and Transparent Yellow Iron Oxide. I only applied these as light washes here and there to create more depth and interest. 

The hinges, screw heads and parts of the globe were painted using DecoArt Matte Metallics Vintage Brass.

Using my fingertip I applied DecoArt Gold Rush Metallic Lustre around the covers' edges.

It seems a subtle effect, but it makes quite an impact.

Once all was done, I assembled the box for the inside and glued it in place using more Decou-Page. (....and it is always good to have some large, heavy paint bottles in reach to put on top of projects while the glue dries ;)

Done!

I hope the cool effect from the Matte Metallics paint on the globe and hinges gets visible in the picture! 

Thanks so much for stopping by today! See you in two weeks!

Hugs and happy crafting!

Claudia

xxx

Spring ‘Time’: an altered alarm clock case by Zuzu

A friend of mine was having a clear out and she gave me a box of treasure to use in my crafting. In the box was a little alarm clock case with no back.
I’ve used it along with some Calico Craft Parts to make a little spring time assemblage.
I’ve used whole parts but I also often break off bits to fit my needs. The grass, daffodils and bird are all piece of a larger shape. I have to admit that this is a project that, in my mind, didn’t work but it’s not bad enough to say it went wrong. It’s just not what I had hoped. But it still gives a bit of inspiration and maybe you could do a better job 😉

Craft Parts used:
Alert hare and sitting hare
Daffodils
Grass
Bird
Cog