Art Journal Cover by Karen

For today's post I thought it was time I decorated the cover of my art journal. What to do if you want some texture but without things that will catch and tear? Tissue paper and different texture pastes was my answer.

Manila paper tends to suck the colour out of everything and I wanted to have a bit of white space so I started with a layer of white gesso, feathered out so there were no hard lines. Then I added a bit of light background stamping and stamped my title on to tissue paper.

I painted the back of the tissue paper white so that it would stand out against a coloured background...

and I added Turquoise acrylic paint to the cover, again feathering out to avoid hard edges.

For a pop of contrast and some texture, I mixed Magenta paint in to transparent relief paste (now called Design-It) and stenciled this over the other colours.

To take the title stand out more, I added a light touch of Cadium Yellow and used gel medium to stick down the tissue paper adding a coat under and over to be sure it was well adhered. I added a third lot of stenciling too.

Mixing Yellow and Scarlet paint for a bright orange, I added more stenciling and doodled round the stars and circles with black and white pens. I used Black Acrylic Paint to sponge round the edges of the cover.

For more texture and contrast, I stenciled Black Expand-IT paste on to the cover. I also added lines with the edge of a paint knife to the 'Art' letters, and heated the Expand-IT to puff it up for some volume.

I am sure I will continue to doodle or add to this over time but, for now, it makes me happy that my journal has a decorated cover in some of my favourite bright colours. It gives a hint of what is inside. More of that another day!

Bye for now
Karen
x

Soft Form Relief Paste	EXpandit 3D expanding medium	StazOn Jet Black	Plastic Painting Knives	Golden Matt medium
white gesso	Heat Gun	Golden haired nylon brushes	Eco Acrylic Paint

Thankful Animals Index Cards with Suzi

Good Day All, Today I'd like to share with you my latest creations using some of the fabulous products available in the ColourCraft store; For Today's projects I've used Black & Natural ExpandIT Paste, Brusho Crystal Colour Powders, Metallic Lustre Paint and Eco Acrylic Paint.

The first thing I did was to Die Cut some Elements for my Index Cards, including a Geo Butterfly, Geo Rabbit and A sentiment block.  I used a Rainbow Mirri Card for these elements;

I also used a die that resembles sequin waste, I used this along with some Brusho Crystal Colour Powders in Gamboge, Lime Green and Alizarin Crimson to create a patterned paper.

I sprinkled the same Brusho Crystal Powders through the sentiment block;

I created a couple of sheets of paper using Brusho Crystal Colour Powders in Gamboge, Orange and Dark Brown to go behind some of my die cut animals.

Once all the papers were dry, I adhered my die cuts to the papers and then fussy cut around the die cute to create my focal images.

I then had a rummage in my stash and found some Index Cards onto which I'd added ExpandIt Paste and heat set it.  One background was made using  Black ExpandIt Paste with a thin coat of Copper Lustre Paint over it.  One background was made using Natural ExpandIt Paste mixed with Cadmium Yellow Eco Acrylic Paint.  The other two backgrounds were created with Natural ExpandIt Paste which I'd then covered with different shades of Green Eco Acrylic Paint.

I then set about adding my elements to the Index Cards with the addition of some staples, decorative die cuts and dew drop embellishments.

Here's my finished Index Cards;

I had great fun creating these Index Cards, I love how the Rainbow Mirri Card catches the light and contrasts the Brusho backgrounds I created for the die cuts. I love the texture the ExpandIt Paste creates, I've still got a couple of Index Cards in my stash that have ExpandIt backgrounds but no focal points yet, they are a great thing to keep for future projects.

I hope you've enjoyed reading how I created my Index Cards; Index Cards are a wonderful thing to craft on, they are a lovely size, so perfect for experimenting and trying new products and techniques.

That's all from me for today, I hope you have some time to relax and craft

Bye for now

Suzi

xxx

Christmas Decorations by Karen

I decided it was time to make some new Christmas decorations! I bought some wood slices and other supplies and put together some snowy scenes with the help of a few ColourCraft products.

I sprayed the sisal trees with Sea Green Brusho Mist Spray, turning them to spray from all angles. You can see the neturalcolour on the right alongside the colour when sprayed. There was so much colour on my craft sheet afterwards that I mopped it up with white card to keep for another project.

When dry, I gave the ends of the branches a touch of gesso to help stop the green bleeding in to the white and then repeated this with white paint for a snowy look. I sprinkled the trees with Brusho Sprinkle-It 'Flash' for some sparkle letting it cling to the wet paint.

To get an old brown-gold colour, I mixed a tiny bit of Prussian Blue in to the gold paint. The deer were coated with gesso to help the paint adhere and then given a coat of this paint mix.

I glued the trees and deer on to the wood slices, trying to make sure they looked good from different angles. Expand-It was the applied round these with a painting knife and then heated to puff up and look like snow on the ground.

To finish, I gave the Expand-it and and wood parts still showing a thin coat of white paint with a little white Pearl powder mixed in. This gives everything a lovely shimmer but still lets the wood grain show through. Unfortunately I don't think this shows in the photos.

We now have these on show in our house but they would also make nice hostess gifts at this time of the year.
Have a great end to the year. I'll be back with a new project on New Year's Day!
Karen
x

Pearl Powder Pigments Lustre	EXpandit 3D expanding medium	Brusho Mist sprays	Plastic Painting Knives	Eco Acrylic Paint
white gesso	Heat Gun	Aztec eco metallic paint starter paint

Silent Night Christmas Cards with Suzi

Good Day All, Can you believe it's only 2 weeks until Christmas! Have you finished making all your Christmas Cards yet?  I haven't, so for today's project I'd like to share with you a set of four Christmas Cards I've created using ExpandIt Paste and DesignIt Paste on Vellum along with some Metallic Acrylic Paints in Blue and Silver.

The first thing I did was grab a couple of Festive stencils from my craft stash along with some Blue Vellum.  Then using a palette knife I applied a layer of ExpandIt Paste through my stencils, whilst that was drying I took another sheet of Blue Vellum and applied a layer of White DesignIt Paste through my stencils.  I also used the DesignIt Paste straight out of the tub to create the impression of a snowy bank using the same palette knife.

I heat set both the ExpandIt and DesignIt Pastes, You get a lovely fluffy texture with the ExpandIt and a rougher bubbly texture with the DesignIt Paste.

I then used my brayer to add a layer of Blue Metallic Acrylic paint over the pastes.

My next step was to add some colour to my card blank, using the same brayer I added the Blue Metallic Acrylic Paint. At the same time I created two A4 background papers using the same technique using Blue and Silver Metallic Acrylic Paint; I'd use some of this to back my sentiments.

I then tore the patterned vellum's I'd created and added a strip to my card, using blue staples to attach it.  I stamped a sentiment onto some of the plain blue vellum, heat embossed it with clear powder, then tore around it and layered it onto a piece of my background paper, before adding to my card.  I used foam pads to give the sentiment some extra dimension.

For my third card I just used one large piece of the patterned vellum, and attached it to a card blank.

For my final card I took a plain card blank and cut a strip out of the front, I then used a piece of my patterned vellum to bridge the gap.  The main piece of vellum on this card was stencilled with the DesighIt paste, onto this piece of vellum I'd layered a section from the vellum stencilled with the ExpandIt paste, You should be able to see this layered effect more clearly in the second picture.

I love all the different textures I managed to get on these cards using the different pastes and the metallic acrylic paint. I love the contrast between the beautiful shimmer of the metallic paint and the textures of the pastes. Not only were these cards great fun to create, but they were pretty quick too.

That's all from me for today, I hope I've inspired you to have a play with our wonderful pastes and paints.  Thanks for visiting with us today.

Bye for now

Suzi

xxx