Awesome Altered Bag from Danni

Hello Peep's

It's Dannii here with another monthly tutorial for the Crafter's Cupboard.

My mum came for a visit last month and we spent a day shopping together. She's such a sweet heart, she brought me a gorgeous hand painted  leather handbag of an Owl. This got me thinking about painting my own type of handbags.

So, whilst out shopping this week I came across these cheap tote bags and figured it would be the ideal style to give handbag painting a crack. Using some of my new Paper Artsy fresco paints and Jo Sonja's textile medium (thanks Jennifer for letting me know about this medium) for fabric painting,  from my stash  I mixed 2 parts paint, 1 part textile medium making sure I mixed well with a palette knife.

Then I used a credit card to swipe the paint using Paper Artsy Fresco Jade over the front of the  bag

Then using a fan brush I stippled the paint around the edges, so the background didn't look too blocky.
Using a soft grey lead once the paint was dry, I used a ranger heat gun to speed up the process and quickly sketched out a face for the front of the bag.

Once I was happy with the sketch. I used my flesh coloured paint mixed with textile medium to block in the face  and paper Artsy Fresco Prawn to block in the hair.

Making sure I gave the face quite a few coats between drying.

Once I was happy with the coverage

I used a Paper Artsy stencil  PS016 and Paper Artsy fresco paint Little Black Dress to decorate the background around the face.

I also used a piece of bubble wrap to stamp and a Paper Artsy Electica stamp set EEV06 to decorate the background.
Once I added the background I used paper Artsy chalk and my flesh paints to add highlights to the face.

Then Irish cream and cinnamon were added for shadows.

A touch of Prawn and Flesh was added to the cheeks, lips and throat for blush

and the eyes were worked on with the Cinnamon and Irish Cream Fresco Paints

Once I was happy with the flesh tones

more work was added to the eyes using Jade for the Iris

and adding more highlights to the face and hair using paints, ink intense pencils and pitt pens

The face is nearly completed at this stage just a few more details to the eyes adding highlights

and brighter colour to the lips using Posca pens and pitt pens

Once I was happy with the over all look of the face. It's back to the background

stamping with prawn and chalk and adding a butterfly from Dina Wakley stamp set

 Scrbbly insects - MDR44499

 to the hairline and colouring it with silks

which is also ideal for painting on fabrics

I am pretty happy with the out come of the bag and the textile medium was great to work with as it kept the paint wetter longer so I was able to blend well with the paints.

The paint (with the help of the textile medium) has stuck down well and appears to have set in to the fabric. I don't know if I will give it a coat of mod podge or not -  I really don't think it's needed.  I have given it a good scrub and wiped it down with a wet sponge with no paint peeling or lifting. So hopefully this tote will be quite useful for carrying my products to art journal class as well as being an original and pretty bag to look at.

All the materials I have used can be purchased from Crafter's Cupboard here

I am off to the shops now to buy a  few more of these bags. They're going to be great presents for family and friends

Give it a go -  this was really an easy project to make

I hope you enjoyed it and don't forget to leave a comment

I love to hear from you all

Until next time

get out there  play, create and enjoy with mixed media.

 

A tag from Julie

Hello Everyone

This month I have created a large tag using items from Crafters Cupboard and some from my stash.
I hope you get some inspiration -  the Dina Wakley paints are a full body acrylic paint and you can get those lovely paint brush lines with ease, you can also use a wet brush to avoid these if a smooth effect is what you desire. 

Supply List 
Archival Ink Jet Black 
Archival Ink Forget me not  
Stamp Dyan Reaveley - Strength 
Dina Wakley Acrylic Paints Lime Night White Magenta 
Tim Holtz Distress Spays Pickled Raspberry Peacock Feathers 

Stencil Artistcellar Quasi Stencil, Script Stanp, Timber Tag and gesso from my stash. 

Step 1 Apply a coat of gesso & dry.

  

Step 2 Using Dina Wakley Acrylic Paints Lime, Magenta & White and a dry brush apply Magenta & White and a dry brush apply Magenta to one side and Lime on the other use the White to blend.

 

Step 3 Place stencil over the top spray, remove your stencil and roll over with paper towel to remove excess then repeat the process with your other stencil and spray. This avoid bleeding and running of the sprays.

  

Step 4 Using a stamp block & black archival ink stamp your image & dry, the with the forget me not stamp some script on the edge & dry.

   

 Step 5 Using the midnight paint lightly dry brush the edge to frame.

   

 Hoping you all find some time to create, play & enjoy your craft. 

 Julie

Geraldine's First Sneak Peak - Exciting times ahead !

Hi All,

Here is the first sneak peak for my upcoming 3 - 12 x 12 mixed media class.
Sunday April 26th 9:30 - 4:00 pm

Click here to book 

Looking forward to seeing you…….

Geraldine

PS: Places are filling fast !

Art Journaling with Geraldine Pasinati

Hello Everyone

Geraldine here with this weeks project, which is in keeping with our theme for March - Purple, Teal and Silver (but I've added some Gold for good measure)

I've completed an art journal page using Paper Artsy Fresco Chalk Finish Paints, Paper Artsy Stamp Hot Pick 1004 and the Tim Holtz Doily Stencil. The page has been journaled into my delicious Dylusions Creative Journal - you can buy them here

I've used a white Gesso (any brand will do)  to provide a base layer to my page so that the products I'm throwing on top don't soak into the journal page too much. This journal has been designed to take the 'wet' of mixed media and the gesso helps to give the page extra strength. Dina Wakeley says that 'gesso is the underwear for your art'. Wise words …..

Next step: Texture with Paper Artsy Grunge Paste through the Tim Holtz Doily stencil - just love the pattern in this stencil and it looks awesome on a journal page.

I then created some sprays with the Fresco Chalk paints using Pumpkin Soup, Inky Pool, Slate and Squid Ink.  The recipe is a simple one - take a mini mister, add ⅔ water, then add ⅓ paint (paint must go into the water, NOT the other way round). Give it a good shake up and voila ! you have a paint spray. For this journal page I've added a pearl additive to the paint to give it a 'shine'.

After spraying the paint I tilted the book and watched the magic happen as the paint spray ran down and across my pages

I then stamped with the Paper Artsy Hot Pick 1004 Stamp, placing the stamps in strategic places around my paint spray and using the sentiment to finish

Finally, I distressed the edges of the double page spread with Tim Holtz Black Soot Distress Ink to create a frame for my art journal page ! 

This page was so much fun to do. I love the way the Fresco paints can be used as a spray and effects are gorgeous. You can never go wrong with a Paper Artsy stamp in your art journaling - they work so well and the texture effects created with grunge paste and any good stencil add dimension.

Hope you have enjoyed my project and I look forward to seeing what you can all do.

Til next time

Geraldine

Simple Creations with Bri

Hello Everyone, Bri here.

In our monthly art journaling class at Crafters Cupboard we use a massive array of product, from Fresco Paints, Silks, Neo Colours and Gelato's to an amazing collection of stencils and stamps to spark our creative imaginations. Last month in our class, Jennifer challenged us to using only a couple of sets of stamps and only the Paper Artsy Fresco Chalk finish new paint colours. All the other delicious products were off limits for this lesson .. nothing else but what was in front of us.

From this, it has had me thinking, as I often literally throw my entire craft collection at a project. I started to ask myself, How do I use product? Do I think outside the "normal" use with a product? What techniques am I using? 

This last month I have gone back to basics with my card making, using simple techniques, simple products, remembering that not all my projects need to be a marathon event. I challenged myself to create cards using embossing powders and stencils. The one rule was ... don't throw the entire craft room at the project!

First I have a card using Paper Artsy Stamp set by Ellen Vargo (EEV10), stamped in Versa Mark and embossed with Ranger White embossing powder onto craft card stock. 

Now I am no water colour artist, however you can use embossing to keep you "in the lines" to create a stunning water colour effect. Here I used another of the flowers from the same stamp set by Ellen Vargo (EEV10), stamping using Versa Mark Ink and embossed the image in Ranger Clear embossing powder. 

For a second card, using some of the new Fresco Chalk paint (Banana, Bougainvillea, Jade and Snow Flake), I put some paint out on my craft sheet and added water to the paint until the paint was watery. Now I can use the Fresco paint as a water colour paint to colour my image. When the image was dry I used a baby wipe to carefully wipe over the embossed parts of the image to remove any paint (the embossing powder resists the paint).

Bokeh is a photography technique that changes the  depth of the background of an image, making the background of the photo "blurred". It's an amazing effect that can be easily achieved with stencils and paint. In a third card I have used Prima Elements Bubbles stencil and Fresco Paints in Chalk and Old Gold to create a stunning background (slightly trippy). The sentiment on this card is from the new Paper Artsy Stamp set by Sara Naumann (ESN15).

Securing my card stock to the stencil I put a small amount of Fresco Chalk paint onto my craft sheet and applied 2 spritz of water to thin the paint out (this makes the paint more transparent). Using a Tim Holtz blending tool I applied the white paint over the stencil carefully in a circular motion over the stencil.  I had to be careful not to overload the paint to the blending tool as the paint can bleed under the stencil and distort the image. Once the chalk paint was applied I carefully removed the stencil and cleaned it while the paper was drying. With the stencil clean and the paper dry I re applied the stencil, aligning it directly over what I had done then moved the stencil down and to the left a little (just a little off from the original stencil).

Securing the stencil again I put out a little Fresco Old Gold paint onto my craft sheet and applied 2 spritz of water to the paint (to make the paint more transparent). Again gently applying the gold paint over the stencil. 

This technique works amazingly with not only paint but paint and ink combined. Both the images below are using Fresco Chalk paint and an ink pad close to the paper colour.

Simple techniques to create some stunning and simple cards with limited products. These techniques can be used not only on cards but in your art journals, canvases and all your wonderful creations. I encourage you to re look at some of your products and how you use them, strip back some of your projects and see what amazing things you can create. 

Until next month, happy creating. 
Bri

There's a good reason ….

…. why we have been so quiet for the last week

And here she is…..

Our fantastic Olivia, who runs Customer Services for Crafters Cupboard (and also happens to be our daughter - don't forget we are a family business) has had her new baby girl and we have been spending many hours at the hospital and now at home enjoying this new addition to the family. Skylah Jaxem was born weighing a very healthy 7lb 13oz on Monday afternoon, 2nd March. Here she is asleep today at one week old.

Big sister Azarah loves her to bits and has taken time off from helping Angus with sorting out orders to enjoy her new sister (we start them young at Crafters Cupboard).

So please accept our apologies for being quiet on the blog, but now you've all seen the reason why, I'm sure you'll understand !

Now - back to business

Apologies to all the people who've been trying to upload their February Challenge entries.

Please email them through to Customerservice@CraftersCupboard.com.au and we will forward them onto the design team for judging.

Our link tool is behaving badly and we are currently working on it for the March challenge.
Again, apologies for this and we will be back to normal soon.


Til next time
A very happy Nana
Jennifer