Wednesday 7 December 2016

A snowy wish!

Hello crafty folks,
Welcome to my page. its already December! ! Yes…its December…month of festivities, holidays and the countdown to welcoming the New Year.
Today, I would like to show you a step by step to making a Christmas décor project using Folk art paints and texture paints from PLAID.
My recycle elements for this project are these humble, ordinary looking pill bottles( these are approx 4 inches in height!).
Here is how I made it..
Step1- Once the bottles were cleaned and the labels removed, I gave a coat of white gesso to all the bottles and painted them with home chalk paints.I colored the 3 bottles in 3 different colors.

Step2- For the lids, I took some air dry clay and wrapped the lid with it to form tiny hats and let them dry overnight. I had some little Christmas print outs in my stash and adhered them to the bottle using modge podge. These were just 2 inches in height, just perfect fit on the bottle. I inked them with archival brown ink before sticking.


Step3- I applied one step crackle paint to the bottles and let them take its own course to dry. Once the cracks appeared, I applied some burnt umber acrylics and then rubbed it with a wet wipe. This way the cracks got filled up with brown paint and voila! The bottles had vintage look. I gave them a coat of Folk art home décor Varnish and they were good to go.

By now, the caps had dried and I painted them in different colors. For one I had snow dripping on it using the Folk art texture paint (snow white). I for one, love this texture finish and have had it as a feature in all my Christmas projects. It’s probably the easiest way to give snow effects, just so REAL! I had a little bit of it on the snowy image on the bottle too.
Step4- I wanted each bottle to have a different element and so for the other, I had some moss dripping on the lids. Here again the Folk art painted finishes came to my rescue. It’s just so dimensional you can actually feel the mossy texture. I also had the same poured onto a wooden disc that I intend using as a deco platter later in the project. You can actually see that I have used just a stirrer to pour out the texture paint on to the disc as I wait for it to dry, you can see the dimension later.
Step5- I started to add some embellishments to the lids from my stash again. I stamped some music notes onto plain paper and distressed it with vintage photo DI and then stuck it to an empty cereal box and cut out the alphabets “JOY”. I have layered 3 cartons to get a chipboard feel to the alphabets and inked that too with brown archival int. I then heat embossed some gold on to edges of the alphabets and stuck them to the lids with hot glue gun. All of them have snow dripping on them too!
Here is a look at all the caps. I tucked in some coconut coir and some red pollens for the “J” cap.
 For the “O” I liked the overload of snow on the caps on the rims!
 The “Y” cap had some moss and green foliage


Step5- The bottles were ready to hit the final spot for decoration! I dressed up a wooden disc with glass crystals and placed all the bottles on it. The rimes of the disc are covered with moss and snow. I also kept some pine cones and foliage dipped is snow as additional embellishments. Here is the final look captured in different moods and locations.
I like how this project turned out..a vintage white Christmas! Do let me know your feedback on the same.
I would like to link this to the following challenges...

Stamps and Stencils- Christmas wishes
Blog studio75.pl- Christmas decoration
Craft Stamper - Snow and ice
A Vintage Journey-Winter magic
Country view Challenges- Christmas
Frilly and Funkie- Home for the holidays
Simon says Monday Challenge- Christmas gifts

 Until my next creative journey,
Happy crafting and recycling.
Cheers,
Rupa




Thursday 1 December 2016

My Vintage buddy !

Good morning!
Welcome to my page. It’s been a while since I blogged...I hope to be more punctual next year! Yes…we are in December…the year is coming to an end!
I am sharing my DT post for Rhedd’s Creative Spirit, where every month it’s “anything goes”, altered art or mixed media.
Last few months have been months of festivities in India and it’s been raining sweets here, lol! One such thing is the chocolate box, which I was happy when it got empty than when it was full!
I have been wanting to play with metal and this chocolate tin was just right to experiment what I had in mind. My latest toy in my studio is the sewing machine and I wanted a company to it to guard all my threads and needles…and hence the birth of this project, a sewing box!
An easy project that I managed to do in a couple of hours but had this idea in my mind, a box so vintage like a grand moms hand me down! I wanted an old looking box to hold my sewing treasures and so decided on a vintage theme! Do I need to say so!
The box was given a liberal coat of gesso and once dry, I decided to work on the focal point of the lid.
I decoupaged a floral tissue to old book page .
 I am so in love with peek of text thru the tissue…this is my current favorite and I think I will be using this is in a few more projects to come. It’s an instant vintage look!  I then had that decoupaged on the lid. Once dry, I played with Deco Art acrylics yellow ochre, raw umber and green.
I merged these 3 colors to give a distressed look to the lid.
For the base, I gave 2 costs of raw umber acrylics and then played with the doily stencil from Deco Art. I have used yellow ochre acrylics to sponge in thru the stencil.
I liked the vintage look of these 2 color combinations. I also dry brushed some yellow ochre randomly.
Once all of it was dry, I gave a coat of varnish and my box was ready.
It proudly its next to its BIG friend and promises to help me in my future projects! Here , have a look…..
I look forward to hearing your comments on this and hope you would drop by to see what the team has in store for you. Do play along beforeyou get busy with your holidays.
I will see you on the other side of the break, hmmm maybe next year!
Until my next creative journey,
Happy crafting and recycling.

Cheers.
 PRODUCTS FROM DECO ART
Decoupage glue 
Acrylics- yellow ochre, raw umber, green
Ultra matte varnish
Doily stencil