Bookbox tutorial for a Vintage Journey

Hello friends, just a very quick post from me to let you know that I am sharing a tutorial for how I altered a book box that I showed here a while back, over on the A Vintage Journal blog.

Here is the box and if you would like the details of how it all came together, just click here

All the best for a creative week

xxxxx

A planner page and some bookmarks and the kindness of strangers

Hello friends and thanks for dropping by. I am back to do my regular Friday post this week and thought I would show you last weeks planner spread and some bookmarks I made for a swap on Instagram

This spread was done in my good old Dylusions planner. It is getting very fat and bulky because of all the gessoing I do over the pre printed artwork on the right hand page. I am starting to wonder why on earth I purchased this planner at the end of last year, and I may just ditch it soon and use another one.
Anyway, I had fun adding texture, washi and some stickers, stamping and paint to this one. Below is a close up:

I also made some bookmarks in a similar collage style, for swapping on Instagram, I love making these. The ones shown below are all claimed, but if any visitors here are interested in swapping one, let me know as I really enjoy making them :o)

Now before you sign off, I want to share something else with you. The other day I was contacted by someone by email, this is what he wrote:

My name is Antonio, born in Italy and moved in UK for love. I have been living in this country for over 10 years, working in Food, Fashion and Beauty retail industry.

 Few weeks ago I have launched a youtube channel called AntonioMakes, a platform where I share my passion for handmade projects, mostly related to cooking, crafting, homemade cosmetics, general DIY and much more.

My dream is to turn this hobby into a job, I love your blog and I was wondering if I could send you some items (HAPPY MAIL) I made as well as some gifts I bought for you. I am hoping your followers will like my creations.

Well I am always happy to help another creative, so thank you Antonio and just look what he sent me:

Some wonderful home made soap, beauty products and wonderful sweets. There was even more, but hubby nicked them before I could photograph them... Here is a link to his YouTube channel:

 where he shares recipes, tutorials on how to make soap etc. You can also find him on Instagram here

Well, that's it for this week. Thanks for your visit like always and I hope you will have a creative weekend and a good week ahead!!

xxxxx

Tissue Paper project for a Vintage Journey

Hello friends, - it's the first Friday of the month and that means a new challenge is starting at A Vintage Journey. The theme is Tissue Paper as the title of my post suggests, and this month I am the host. So if you play along with us, (and of course we all hope you will) this is what I would like you to do:

There are many different ways you can incorporate tissue paper into your project - create texture by scrunching it up, stain it, paint it, wax it, stamp on it, emboss on it. You could use cheap tissue from the supermarket, recycle gift wrapping tissue, or even use old dressmaking patterns. Just remember to create in one of our preferred styles of vintage, shabby, mixed media, art journaling, industrial, timeworn or steampunk.

Now those of you who have followed me lately may have noticed that I love using wax seals, and in the last year or so, I have collected quite a few of them, so I decided to make a storage box for them.

I used various techniques for this project, using normal tissue paper, collage and rice paper, both also kinds of tissue paper and even some tissue paper stickers.
Here you can see the outside of the box

And below some photos of the inside

Now this week, I will keep my post to this, but in two weeks time I will do a full tutorial on the AVJ blog with lots of details of how this project came together.

Thanks for your visit today and please hop over to A VINTAGE JOURNEY to see what my fabulous teamies have created, and hopefully you will feel inspired to play along!

xxxxx

Finally back for Tag Friday at A Vintage Journey

Hello friends, - as you can see after having been away from home and blogging for nearly two months I am finally back to share a tag which I made for A Vintage Journey

When I started with this tag I had no idea where I was going, but after numerous layers of paints, inks sprays and papers, this is what was the result, - vintage shabby chic.

The roses in the background are a paper napkin, the little girl is of course one of Tim Holtz's paper dolls. There is stamping and stenciling in the background as you can see.

Under several layers of paint and gesso, there are some vintage book pages as well as a background stamp by Wendy Vecchi.

There is even some crackle in the background

And then it is all finished off with a wax seal spamp and some washi tape underneath the twine.

Well, there you have it, a vintage shabby chic tag. If you would like to get some more tag inspiration do head over to the Vintage Journey Blog  

Oh and there is also a special announcement about some amazing new teamies that are going to join our team. Do head over, I promise, you will not be disappointed.

Thanks for your much appreciated visit,

xxxxx

Neutral Zone for A Vintage Journey and a blog break

Hello friends and welcome. It's the first Friday of the month and that means a new challenge is starting at A Vintage Journey. This month the lovely and talented Nikki is our host, and this is what she had to say about her chosen theme "Neutral Zone":
Time to banish colour! You can create with blacks, whites, greys, beiges, creams and browns but whatever you make, and whatever style, needs to stay in the neutral zone. And remember to create in one of our preferred styles of vintage, shabby,mixed media, art journaling, industrial, timeworn or steampunk.

I decided to make an eggshaped tag, seeing this month we will celebrate Easter. I then decided to use the tag to decorate the cover of my latest journal insert.

At the last moment I decided to add one of my dried ferns, which of course adds a little spot of colour, but I hope this will still qualify as most of it is definitely in the neutral zone....

Below a quick step out of how I made the tag:

I diecut the tag from white card, using the largest of a set of tag shaped dies I had in my stash, and added some strips of book and craft paper and some texture using one of Tim Holtz's stencils.
.

Next I added a mix of some Paper Artsy Fresco paint in Buff and some Decoart Media paint in Translucent white and while the paint was still wet a few spritzes of Distress Oxide spray in Vintage photo, plus quite a bit of water. I then dried with my heatgun.

Next came some background stamping and a little strip of washi tape, to balance out the darker left side a bit.

Finally I added some lace, some dried baby's breath flowers and a wax seal and hand wrote the sentiment with my dip pen. At first I thought that was the project all done and dusted, but as I had no one particularly in mind to give this tag to and I have piles of tags and other projects gathering dust in my craftroom (do other people have that problem)? - I decided to add the tag to the cover of my latest journal insert.

As you can see that's when I then decided to add the little fern to the other dried flower, gluing it down with some collage medium.

Below still a few close ups and a few of the journal pages inside.

And some of the journal pages, please bare in mind this is really a writing journal, not an art journal, I just like to decorate the pages a bit with ephemera, washi tapes, some background stamping and so on. Makes it more fun to write in it.

So, that's it for my project, do hop over to a Vintage Journey  to see what my talented teamies have created and of course we would love you to play and share your neutral projects with us all.

Well, like always thank you for your visit for now and it may become even more quiet here as I will be going off to Australia in a few days time to spend time with my grandchildren and family there and I am pretty sure there will not be much time for blogging. So I may see you now and then and again towards the end of May on my regular Fridays...

xxxxx

Tag Friday at A Vintage Journey

Hello friends, it's the last Friday of the month, and in a month when there are 5 Fridays, AVJ's creative guides do a tag Friday, where we create tags just for fun and hope you will add yours for us to enjoy and be inspired by. So here is my tag for this month:

 

I love making tags, so I made a kind of double one. I am sorry there are no process photos, but I'll quickly talk you through the details:

I cut two tags, from watercolour paper, using the largest of Tim Holtz's tag dies. I coloured the bottom one with Distress Oxide and normal Distress inks and sprays, in various green shades. I also coloured the back of the top one in the same way, but with brown tones, wetted it slightly and then rolled it down.

The front of the top tag was coloured with various sprays and inks, some stencilling with copper coloured texture paste and a prima stencil, and some background stamping in Ground Espresso Archival Ink.

 I cut various flowers with some of Tim's new and old wildflower dies, coloured them with a mix of Distress Inks and water colour paints and tucked them between the two tags.

Then I embellished with the smaller of Tim's facetted hearts, cut from Metallic Kraft Card and coloured with alcohol inks.

Finally I stamped and cut one of the moths from the Ethemology set and coloured it with some shimmering water colour paints. I also tugged some berries inbetween the flowers still to fill it all up a bit more.

Well that's it for today. I hope you will hop over to A Vintage Journey if you have not been yet, and please feel free to add your tags, - we would love to see them!

Thank you for your visit like always and happy crafting and creating! 

xxxxx

A new week, a new page and some faux leather

Hello friends, it’s Friday and that usually means a new post from me. So this week I have my new calendar page to share and also a little mini travel journal with a faux leather cover and insert, all made from scratch.
Here first of all are some photos of the new calendar/planner spread, - when I took the photos it was only partially filled in.

The background was created with some Papper Artsy Fresco paint in Buff, mixed with some Decoart Media Trancelucent White, both of which were on my palette anyway from another project. I also added a few sprays of Vintage Photo Distress Oxide spray and quite a bit of water, all while the paint was still wet. I added some stencilling with a Tim Holtz stencil and Ranger translucent mat texture past and then I added some of my usual elements, stamping washis a wax seal etc.

The bee stamp is from a set by AALL&Create

Wax seal and dried leaf from my garden

Some of the washis were plain brown and I stamped them with Stazon Opaque white.

The sentiment is from one of Tim's word sticker collections. I always like to add some words to my pages. The scribbly stamp behind is also from the same AALL&Create set.

So far for the calendar page... I also made a tiny (6 x 3") travel journal, - I made it that size because I wanted to use the 6 x 6 Kaisercraft Pen and Ink collection papers, which when folded in half and trimmed a little, make for the perfect insert.

Here is the cover. I used a technique first learnt from Sheena Douglass, and rather than giving you a long winded description, here is a link to her Youtube tutorials for the process if you are interested.
I dry embossed the front

But left the back cover just plain, I actually like that better. The metal bit is actually a faux metal sticker purchased in the States a while back. Think it was at Michaels.

I added an extra strip for the spine to give it more strength, and used a really simple elastic closure. The inside was lined with fabric, like Sheena suggests.

A few photos of some of the inside pages, I have done many more, but I thought this post was long enough already...

 

Because the 6 x 6 papers I used are one sided, every other spread is always blank, which is of course perfect for journaling.

on one of the pages I added a little journal card, from Tim Holtz, but further decorated by me.

Here you can see the other side of the journal card

Well, that's it for this week. Sorry it's quite a long post, but at least I only post once week (grin)

Have a wonderful weekend and thanks for your visit

xxxxx