DREAM Wall Art

I’ve taught this class at Paper Niche and loved the result of using Bo Bunny’s Timepiece Collection. The colors in the collection are great for altered art and home décor pieces. There are lots of papers to choose from that work well in the piece: here I’ve shown you three variations.

 They’re constructed so that they hang on a wall or can be left free standing on a table or nestled in a bookshelf. Although they are a little time consuming to make, they're worth it for the impact they can provide.  

The letters are 8" tall. I start by painting the sides and back in a complimentary color, this time in an antique gold.  Then the fronts are covered in scrapbook paper (a 12 x 12" sheet) with a decoupage medium.  I use bookbinders glue but Modpodge works too. I then cut around all the letters to remove most of the excess paper.  The rest is removed with a rough grit nail file. I ink the edges of the letters, then seal each with the bookbinding glue for durability.  They're then screwed together and the hanging hardware is added.  If I'm going to add a drawer knob, it's done at this point.  Where do I get my drawer pulls?  EVERYWHERE! I scour flee markets, take them off discarded furniture, bring them back from London (couldn't believe we ran into a shop that sold nothing but door and drawer hardware, both new and used) and buy them at my favorite source, Anthropologie!

After the drawer pull is added, I go to my stash and  look for objects that fit the theme. For this series the theme was "time" so I went with gears, watch faces and watch parts. I try to incorporate both hard and soft items so there's a balance.  In these, I added some rose ribbon in brown and some hand died seam binding that holds the watch charm on. I created this series for my ETSY Shop and plan to take them with me to the Fall Art Shows if they don’t sell first! Enjoy!

YIKES!

I try hard to blog here at least once a week. Sometimes I have no excuse for missing my self-imposed deadline. This time I have a VERY good excuse.  My daughter’s getting married!  She and the Groom want a February wedding.  Not February 2013, but 2012, like in 7 months – YIKES!  My daughter is employed as an administrator in a local school district, so she goes back to school on Monday!  Yikes, again!

So in the last 14 days we (collectively) have:

* Chosen a date

* Secured a venue and put a deposit on it

* Moved money around to pay for everything

* Shopped, selected and paid for a wedding gown

* Picked out a color scheme

* Selected a manufacturer for bridesmaid dresses

* Created a guest list

* Shopped for, designed and created “Saved the Date” cards and Wedding Invitations

* Met the grooms parents

* Booked a block of rooms for out of town guests

Oh, that’s right, this is a destination wedding (Key Largo, Florida) everyone (including us!) will be from out of town. Thanks Casey and Frank, I now have LOTS to do in the next 7 months.  Figured you needed a sneak peak, and I promise you this will be the last of this until after the event.  Here are some peaks at the dresses that didn’t make the cut . . .

A real close contender

See the look on her face, it's a $4000 Vera Wang dress.  Beautiful, but not in the budget!

I think the worst of it is over, wishful thinking I guess. I’m going on-line to see what I can from the recent CHA convention!

Graduation Cards - a small tutorial

Yesterday I went to the grand opening of a new craft store in my area.  Found a really cheap ($1) graduation stamp, came home and got busy!  I had purchased a card of graduation caps a few weeks ago with the intention of making some cards to go with the University Photo Trays I sell on ETSY.  They sat on my desk for a while because I just wasn’t inspired to finish them.  With the addition of the stamp, the card came together in about 5 minutes.

I used Colorbox Gold ink to stamp the image and then heat embossed it with Sparkle N Sprinkle "Agatha" embossing powder. It’s one of my favorites because it’s black with gold glitter in it. Framed the image with gold paper and then raised it on a layer of black chipboard. Mounted all of that on black cardstock.  Created some custom ribbon by spraying white seam binding with Perfect Pearls Mist in Sunflower Sparkle.  I scrunched up the seam binding and dried it with a heat gun that left it with just the right amount of interest in the ribbon.  Added the graduation cap and pronounced it ….. finished!

I’m loving it: hope you do too.