Playing with Gel Medium

 

I am fortunate enough to have many many photographs of my little girl both posing in her various dance costumes and dancing on stage thanks to the skills of a local photographer who is the official photographer at our local dance eisteddfods - Dancevision.

I wanted to keep the background simple and have the photograph stand out but I had no blue papers or card in my stash which matched her outfit.  I resorted to using a Prima mask of bricks with a gel medium (something I’ve not played with before).  I love the effect of the gel medium – it gave me a subtle texture to my background which allowed the photograph to stand out from the other black but did not overwhelm anything.

 

Here are some up close shots of the gel medium brick work.  I love the shine it leaves behind

 

To this I wanted an embellishment which would again blend but add something to the layout -  the stunning Molossi birdcage which I wet embossed with silver embossing powder, was a perfect solution.  I’ve simply tied some organza ribbon around the top of the cage, punched out some branches with a Martha Stewart punch and some scrap green card, added in a few flowers and bling and finally printed off a butterfly from an online kit I purchased somewhere and fussy cut it.

The title are some glittered chipboard lettering from Bella that I’ve had forever and the flowers  and bling are again a mixture from my stash from Kaisercraft and Scrap of Difference.  I twirled the wire of a couple of the flowers around a pencil to have spiralling off in different directions from the cluster and die cut a couple of branches using a Couture Creations die with a piece of scrap silver cardstock.

Thanks for dropping by – see if a birdcage works as a lovely girly accent for your next page – Molossi has a number of different designs to choose from J

 

ENDLESS SUMMER

 

This summer has seen me spend more time on the beautiful Australian beaches than I have since I was a teenager.  It was therefore such a thrill to receive the Endless Summer chipboard title from Molossi in my latest kit.

 

 

I decided I wanted two different colours on the title to make the words separate and stand out from each other.  I applied versamagic embossing ink to the word Summer and sprinkled copper embossing powder over it and heated.  I then repeated the process on the word Endless but added a gold embossing powder this time.  I love the end result, even the little bit of gold embossing powder that ended up on the word Summer as to me it looks like sand drifting onto the lettering J 

 The wonderful thing about using embossing powders to colour your chipboard is they are very thorough – there were no inconsistencies in colour, the entire piece was covered and it looks glossy and gorgeous!

 If you haven’t tried using embossing powders with your chipboard in the past – give it a go.  If you have a large flat shape you could even consider dry embossing it first – running it through an embossing folder in your machine and then apply the ink /powders.

 

The remainder of the layout was just playing with elements – a couple of scraps of patterned paper from my paper drawers, a stitched flourish in the bottom left corner using a Midgemoo template and embroidery thread hopefully gives a movement feel like waves, some Green Tara sand coloured mesh, some sea shells and other chipboard beachy shapes I’ve collected over the years and a little bunting banner across the top right corner, along with a small metal corner which again I picked up somewhere many moons ago!

 The little sun was a bit of fun – it’s actually an anywhere punch from Martha Stewart – you can use the punch individually as I have done here or create a whole background of them by placing them side by side or on top and underneath each other – I mounted a contrasting piece of paper behind on foam mounting dots so you would not lose the look of it being punched out of the paper but still have some colour come in behind it.

 

The finishing touch was simply a very fine black marker and a ruler to draw a border around the photo block and to write in the journaling and I was done.

I’m sure it’s one of those layouts I will look back on and remember this summer fondly – thanks Molossi for the inspiration by way of this title block.

For further inspiration on what to do with chipboard or in fact the many other amazing products that Molossi now carry - click here and see all the cool scrappy supplies now available to the public via Molossi's online store.

thanks for dropping by.
 

Weddings & Wishing Wells

I will apologise in advance for the number of wedding related posts you are going to see from me in the coming months.  My little brother finally tied the knot in December and I was lucky enough to be asked to do the little things that add to a special day like the invitations, wishing well etc.  My little girl was blessed with being one of the flower girls along with my two beautiful nieces.  So, as you can imagine I have a HUGE pile of photographs waiting to be scrapped.

However, today I thought I would show you the Wishing Well I prepared for the special day - It's raw version is a Molossi product and I'm fortunate enough to be on their design team.  In addition to the wells they can also custom laser cut MDF for you in freestanding names for the table or even to add to your well - I'm just waiting on photos from the wedding photographer to show you the ones I ordered and decorated for my brother.   If you have a wedding coming up or perhaps you make invitations for people as a little business - follow this link to the Molossi site and check out all their custom cut items - they even do cake toppers now!!!!

The wishing well is laser cut from 12mm MDF and stands 80cm high.  The actual box part of the well is 40cm wide and 30cm high.  When you receive the well it comes in 8 flat packed pieces.  It is really easy to assemble and in fact I decorated mine in pieces and transported it flat from Qld to NSW for the wedding as I didn’t have a great deal of room in my car.  I simply put it together the night before the wedding by tapping the lugs into the correct holes.  To transport it home I simply pulled it apart and brought it home flat packed also J  You can glue it for extra strength but I found this really wasn’t necessary.  It is a very sturdy well and at no stage has it ever looked like it might separate.

Now I’m blessed with a husband who is a spray painter, so I took the raw pieces to him and had him spray them and clear coat them in 2pac car paint!  I knew that no amount of knocking around en-route to the wedding would damage them this way and I simply wrapped the pieces in cloth to avoid any scratches.  However, the edges are black due to the laser cutting and it takes more than a fine mist of paint to cover this.  Out came my trusty Adirondack acrylic paints ( I found a pearl colour which was an exact match to the white pearl paint hubby had used) and two coats with a paint brush on the edges and all was covered perfectly.  As the paint was pearlised and therefore had a sheen of it’s own and it was just the edges,  I haven’t bothered with any clear lacquer over the top.  However,  if you don’t have access to a painter friend and are doing the whole project in acrylic paint I would suggest you then cover in a clear gloss to give your well a shine and protect the paint.

I then ran a fine line of Helmar 450 glue (this stuff sticks ANYTHING) along the edges of the well and added some sticky bling runners also from Molossi.  These runners come in a huge range of colours and even pearl runners – check out this link to see all of them http://www.molossi.com.au/online-shop/#!/~/category/id=6949268&offset=0&sort=normal.  Now whilst these are self adhesive, I found that without a bit of added adhesive help the heat affected them and they peeled off.  A quick touch of glue beneath them and they are there for life J

 My final touches was simply a piece of ribbon in the bride’s colour scheme to complete the look

 

Now as I've added wedding invites and other stationery to my little business this year, I played around with changing the colours of the ribbon and bouquet to show other brides what the well would look like should they wish to hire it for their special day - here it is in the pink/peach tones.

 

Thanks for stopping by and if you have a special day coming up in your future - I hope it is simply magical xx

 

 

 

Daddy's girl

I spent December in Sydney with my family to celebrate my little brother's nuptials and Christmas all together.  One of the wonderful things about this visit was being able to sit around with family both immediate and extended and reminisce over old photographs and fun times gone by.   Living so far away now I don't get the opportunity to see my aunts, uncles and cousins regularly anymore which I really miss.  However, this trip and time together gave me the kick up the tail I needed on my return home to get back to my scrapbooking of my own life project that I've been ticking away at for a few years now.  So, I was delighted to find on my return home a package of goodness from Molossi which included this gorgeous chippy title - Still Your Daddy's Girl

Immediately I knew I wanted to use it on a layout of photos of me as a child with my Dad.  

I kept the treatment fairly simple for this layout as the photographs already had plenty going on and I wanted space for handwritten journaling.  I’ve simply used a sheet of white cardstock which I added faux stitching around the outer edge to.  The paper is from Kaisercraft and I’ve used a Martha Stewart border punch down the right hand edge and then inked the entire sheet.

One photograph I’ve cropped slightly smaller than the others and this one is actually mounted on foam tape, the other two adhered directly to the patterned paper.  Die Cut stickers from the same range of papers from Kaisercraft is mounted on foam tape with some organza ribbon tied around the base, the branches and birds simply adhered direct to paper.  Add some flowers and bling from Kaisercraft and a flower paper clip from Bella and a few snippets of ric rac and the basis of the layout is complete.

The chipboard title,  Still Your Daddys Girl , from Molossi needed little attention as the beautiful differing fonts make it stand out on it’s own.  I’ve simply painted this in black acrylic paint and adhered to the top right of my layout.  I think you’d agreed it is the first thing your eye is drawn to and hopefully tells the story of the layout.

With a fine black marker I have then handwritten my journaling in the bottom right corner of the layout.

Here's the end result - thanks for stopping by :)

 

Zombies are taking over my home......

My little man turned 9 a couple of weeks ago and whilst his birthday used to see me making racing track or truck cakes, this year his request for both cake and party were all zombies!!!  Eeeeek - really!
My sweet little boy has been replaced by a video game freak who wanted to spend his birthday party with his mates killing zombies on the X-Box.

Despite my reservations, I gave myself a stern talking to and other than insisting on a bland non-zombie cake to take to school on the actual day I allowed him to celebrate his birthday in the theme he wanted.  His cake request was to have a zombie hand reaching out from the grave - to say that the pinterest research for this cake was disturbing is an understatement!  Whilst there are many talented cake makers out there who can no doubt whip up a zombie hand in the blink of an eye - I'm not one of them so I decided a toy hand would have to do the trick

I was actually excited to find a confectionary warehouse within a 30 minute drive of me that stocks Halloween products all year round.  Suddenly, not only did I have access to a number of hand choices, I also had Frankenstein head cups that could double as the party treat bag, little skeletons riding a bicycle with a lollipop on the back, blood sucker lollipops, candy brains, ghost drops and other endless supplies to make this ghoulish party a success.  Now the fact that this warehouse also stocks candy by colours (a perfect addition to my Invitations business for party candy bars) of course had little to do with my excitement :)

So it was cake time - 2 x chocolate bar cakes, some black royal icing made into gravestones and the red royal icing spelling out RIP - some grated chocolate in both dark and white and a few jelly worms and the scene was set.  Have the skeleton hand reaching from the centre of the graves and a little toy skeleton propped up at the end of the grave and the job was done.  I got WOW from all the boys which I hope meant it was what they were hoping for!

Here are the party treat cups -

 

Now one of the mums from school had suggested I added a green ice cordial hand to the drink bowl to add to the fun.  I simply made up a green cordial and poured it into a plastic glove.  I then pegged the glove to the wires inside my freezer until frozen.  On the day of the party I cut the glove away from the now frozen hand and floated it in a punch bowl of lemonade - the green cordial coloured the lemonade an eery green and the fingers broke off one by one as the hand melted.  Each of the boys got a finger in their cup!

 



Now what birthday is complete without the birthday card??  So to keep in theme I hit the scrapbook room and created this little treasure.

A little zombie from clipart coloured with my American Crafts alcohol markers, the banners chipboard from Molossi treated a little differently to normal - this time coloured in the ghoulish green and looks more like steps to the dreaded basement below.  Follow this link to Molossi's site to see what other wonderful chipboard they have that you might be able to do something with a little out of the ordinary - http://www.molossi.com.au/online-shop/.  The Happy Birthday is again from clipart with the text added to the centre prior to printing and fussy cutting and the 9 is a little wooden number which has been coloured in the Pillarbox red ink from Dylusions - the same product used here to create the blood splatter and drip.  The background is simply Glimmermist sprayed onto white card and allowed to run down the page and then mounted onto black cardstock before being mounted to the card base.

Whilst I'm desperately hoping that by next year this phase is well and truly over, I confess doing something a little different was loads of fun.  Thanks for stopping by and sharing it with me :)