Happy Birthday AVJ

Hello all and welcome. It's the first Friday of the month and that means a new challenge over at A Vintage Journey. But this is not an ordinary challenge month, it's our second birthday and there are lots of changes afoot!!! For details do hop over to check it all out! So what have I made and why?

Let me start by explaining our theme this month: The lovely and multi talented Nikki is our hostess and she chose a very clever theme. Those of you who know AVJ will know that for the last year we have been publishing so called Destination Inspiration posts. Each month we pick 4 things, a substrate, a technique, a colour choice and a product, and then members of the team create a project with those 4 items for the month.
Well this month Nikki chose as her theme that everyone should use the 4 things for this month, and this is what she had to say:

For our birthday challenge we thought it would be fun to challenge you to use the products in our DI Travel Bag this month. You’ve seen how the Creative Guides have used the products in the past and you will see how they use them this month too. So join us in using the following products and enjoy the journey!

Substrate: Board (eg grey board, coaster board, cardboard)

Main Colour: Lilac or Pale Purple

Technique: Rust Effects (perhaps using rusting or embossing powders or rust coloured paints)

Product: Something Metal

Time for some honesty, - I thought this was quite a challenge, rust technique together with lilac or pale purple??? But, nothing like a challenge right, so this is what I came up with. Below is a short step by step:

I decided to use mount board as my substrate and started adding some texture through a stencil and when dry, adding  some pale lilacy colours. I used Paper Artsy Mushroom and Moonlight Fresco Finish paints and mixed a bit of gesso into it too.

Next I added a couple of sprays, to add more interest, - Victorian Velvet and Seedless Preserves.

I also added a few drops of Shimmerz "Before Dawn" for some more interest and did some background stamping.

I think these are both old Prima stamps.

Time to gather some embellishments, the die cuts are all Sue Wilson dies, the flowers are from my stash.

Now for my metal and rusting technique. Well I layered up a little dragonfly over one of the trusty old Tim Holtz ornate frames and put some book paper behind the opening. I then gave it the rust treatment with a mix of paints and a bit of rusting powder too..

Now all that was left was to put it all together.

And here you are, but....somehow it all did not quite hang together for me, so I decided (and this was after it was all mounted onto card already) to give it a bit of mixed media treatment. So I pulled out my Shimmerz spray again as well as the Hickory Smoke spray and carefully sprayed over the diecuts and flowers. I also added some gesso splatter still, so here is take two:

There is not much difference but I'd love to know which version you prefer, so below you can see them side by side:

Here's a close up of the spraying and splattering:

I added the word Friendship still, because all of my fellow design team members have become my friends, many of whom I have met in real life, so a Vintage Journey will always be special to me.

Well, that's it, and sorry for this rather long post.... do make sure to visit A Vintage Journey to see what wonderful new things we have in store for you, (including a fantastic new sponsor for this month yay!!!!) You want to know who it is? Andy Skinner!! And for those of you who don't know him, Andy's mixed media creations are sensational - if you are not familiar with his work do check out his website. Andy has kindly donated a fabulous package to this month's lucky winner which will be made up of his brand new stencils and stamps. But aside from that trust me you do not want to miss the inspiration pieces my team mates have created.

Thanks for your visit here today and stay crafty and creative!!!