A Bountiful Harvest

Hello everyone and happy Halloween to you all.
Today is the start of a new challenge over at A Vintage Journey. The lovely Sandy is our host and this is what she had to say about the theme:
With Halloween's passing we step into fall. For this challenge let's think about the harvest. It seems that pumpkins, wheat, corn and even the Harvest Moon could be in order. For us in the US - a Thanksgiving theme could work but not necessary.

I decided to alter a book box, I want to use it for all the lovely crafty gifts I have received from blog friends and using the harvest theme for all these gifts of kindness, a different kind of thanks giving....

I had great fun altering it and adding lots of lovely autumnal embellishments. Unfortunately I got so caught up in the process, that I forgot to take a lot of step by step photos, but I'll try and talk you though at least some of it.
This project started as a large paper mache box. I first added lots of wrinkled bits of tissue paper to the box with matte medium. After it had dried, I covered it all over with gesso to seal, scraping it on with an old credit card for even more texture and then played around with various colours of Decoart Media acrylic paint until I was happy with the result.

I then added some verdigris embossing powder in places, added two little metal corners and highlighted the raised bits with Treasure Gold. The metal corners were treated with both Distress Paint in Peacock Feathers and Treasure Gold before before adhering them.

Of course it is important to treat the sides and back of the box too. In the photo above you can see how adding the strips of tissue almost gives a leather like appearance to the box after you have coloured them with the paints. My box had the raised bits on the side already, but if you like this "old book" feel, you can easily create that by adding some strips of card to the spine, before covering with tissue.

Next I took a piece of Core'dinations card stock in a sort of cinnamon colour and gave it a few spritzes with Walnut Stain Distress Spray. Loved the effect, but I wanted to add some "harvest" feel to it, so rant it through the Tim Holtz Thankful embossing folder.

I sanded it lightly to bring out the words. (Please note it is a good idea to emboss after you have used the sprays and not before as you will lose some of the depth of embossing by adding the wet medium).

I tore around the edges and embossed them with the same verdigris embossing powder, being careful to keep the words Thankful and Harvest.

I added an ornate plate, again altered with paints, glued a bit of book text behind the opening and then added the little dragonfly, just because I felt it needed something else. As you can see I continued the book text theme further down with a rusted up pen nib, all of course to add to the vintage feel of it all.

Finally I had great fun in adding some harvest themed embellishments in one corner, - a mix of die cuts, berries and some beech nuts, and that was it for the outside of the box.

The inside of the box was covered first with Brown chalk paint, then Decoart Weathered Wood Crackle medium and then when it was touch dry with another colour of chalk paint. In the lid I stamped a sentiment from the Way with Words set on a piece of Scrapbook paper and that was it.

I loved doing a harvest themed project, make sure you check out what my wonderful teamies have made, like usual, they have out done themselves, you don't want to miss it. Just click HERE.  And of course we all hope you will play along in the challenge, and you could even win a generous voucher from our wonderful sponsor Countryview Crafts

Thanks for dropping by and happy weekend!