Paper Artsy theme #7 Niches

Look at me actually playing along with Paper Artsy's theme this time instead of just stalking!  Woo!  I have been wanting to do a canvas shadowbox for some time, just never got the lightning bolt of inspiration (yes, that is a real thing...trust me...).  AND I have had this idea about using the round containers from retired SU! buttons as shadowboxes so this theme of niches was the just the lightning bolt (see, I told you it was a real thing) I needed to go off and be creative.  As an added bonus, I was able to use the one non-Christmassy Paper Artsy set that I own!  Oh- don't worry, I have a few more sets on the way (and I can't WAIT to get my hands on them!!!)  I even remembered to take a few along-the-way-photos!  So here we go! 

 Nope, didn't take a pic of the stamped insert in progress...oh well.  First up, painted the inside of the frame with Seedless Preserves Distress Paint just because I could.  Then stamped and colored the insert piece.  Stamped with black Archival and colored with Dyan Reavely's sprays in water brushes.  And yes, there were masks stamped and cut out even for the sprangly flowers!!  Glued the insert into place with matte Multi-Medium.  Then Glue-n-Seal to adhere the paper pieces onto the frame.  Next up we have Ranger's Texture Paste (which really looks like frosting as you are applying it...don't use it when you are hungry...heh. heh. heh.) applied in varying thickness and stamped with the leaves and the egg looking thingys from Darcy's set 14. Let it dry and then washed a mix of Gathered Twigs Distress Paint and Perfect Pearl water over it.  The Pearlyness didn't really show, so once dry

out came my only pot of Treasure Gold- White Fire.  I am now officially addicted to this stuff.  And yes, two more pots are on the way.  :)  The round containers started out plain clear plastic, but I got a little carried away with the regular old craft paint.  I have a dabber top on this particular bottle and it left the fine bubbly texture- especially since I have NO patience and heat gunned it.  Yep.  Just a little, didn't 
want to melt the plastic or anything..  It does tend to flake off, but it's not going to be handled so it is fine.  Plus, it adds some more cool texture.  I then add a dash of Potting Soil Archival and more White Fire.  (soooo addicted...)

Cut some pretty paper for the inside and proceeded to try not to cover it up with the embellies.  All pulled from my stash, I KNEW hoarding was okay...  

 We've got some Tim Holtz gears and a lightbulb.

Not sure if that is a TH bottle or a random one I picked up somewhere.  It's filled with some micro bead shinys.  the butterfly is a woodcut covered in embossing powder with wire for the body and antenna.


Used some Wendy Vecchi embossing powder on my letters and of course got speckles on the wood block part on one.  Well, we can't have speckles on only one, but do you know how hard it is to make random speckles of embossing powder on purpose?!?  Solution?  More Treasure Gold!!  Then of course I got some on the letters- and sadly didn't like that so back to the embossing powder!  By now there are at least 5 coats of that stuff on those letters...and the green one actually started out red!

Added some paint to a word band, tied it on with ribbon, stuck the cups in place and thought, "that corner needs something, but what?"  Look through the stash, find a thin chipboard gear butterfly (that I had forgotten was in there!!) spray it with Perfect Pearl water and cover with Distress Paints.  Dry with heat tool (NO patience, remember?) and get sad because it's not shiny anymore.  :(  Wink of Stella!!  Yay!  Still not shiny enough...Glossy Accents!!

YES!!  But that was a LOT of squeezing.  My hands hurt.  But look at that shine!  Totally worth it!  Painted the outside edges with Seedless Preserves.  Hope you enjoyed looking at my creation as much as I enjoyed making it!  Thanks for stopping by, let me know what you think!  :)

I'm on Paper Artsy! Woot!

I have been stalking the Paper Artsy blog for quite some time now and finally got the courage (heh- canvas title, see what I did there?) to put my name in the hat for the #3UP.  Then was excited and a little worried and excited that my name got picked!  I decided to take the theme of Deconstruction, because I really, really like breaking stuff, so much so that it would be my dream job to break stuff all day.  :)

Sadly, I don't have any of the Paper Artsy Fresco paints (birthday is a-comin' so that won't be a problem for too much longer...) so I did the best color matching as possible.  I used a combination of Distress Ink sprays and paints, Stampin' UP! inks and regular old craft acrylic paints.  Did I write down the colors I used?  Of course not.  Audible sigh.  I also was having such fun destroying things that I failed to take any step by step photos.  Another audible sigh.  Still, I had a BLAST with this.

First step was to paint the base layer on the canvas.  I do remember that I inked it which turned out to not be such a good idea...heat gun to the rescue...sorta...well, dry enough to work with at any rate.  I then proceeded to rip, cut, tear and beat the canvas with a hammer.  Seriously.  Well, Tim's texture hammer, but it still smashed the heck outta that canvas!  My favorite part got covered with the box that I stuck in the big hole...shoulda put that a little lower, cause I had totally bashed the frame and it looked awesome!!  You'll just have to trust me on this one.  Scraping the point of my Cricut tweezers across the canvas was way fun too.

 The butterflies used to be a soft drink can and the bird was some random packaging.  I think the black netting used to hold Boomwhacker tuned percussion tubes (I'm a music teacher by day) and the girl is some random fabric.  I am now officially hooked on deconstruction- after I was done I kept thinking, "Now what ELSE do I have that I can destroy?!?"- it's a little frightening.  But only a little.  OH!  I own two Paper Artsy stamp sets (well, now three, but the other one hadn't arrived before the deadline...one day after, but not before.  Isn't that always the way?) and they were both Christmasy.  So I was very pleased (would that be "chuffed" across the pond?) to be able to use them on this very non-Christmasy canvas!!  Go me!!  :)  Thanks to the great folks at Paper Artsy for letting me play along, and if you stuck around through all that inane prattle, here are some close ups to reward you!  :)

 Thanks for stopping by!  Let me know what you think!  :)


Edited to add:  Obviously I don't know how to schedule a post...so this is DAYS late (I was out of town...) oh well.  Maybe someone will find it...

So I've been away...

a looooong time.  But I am back to show you some new storage and it rocks! 

I love the storage options available from Stamp-n-Storage!  And before you ask, no, I don't work for them, but I wish I did!  I have, starting on the bottom left, the old style lock down punch holder, the Slim ink pad holder (72) and the Standard holder (60).  On top of that from the left is the new lock down punch holder (and it is amazing!  The SU! tag topper punches or large border punches (like the stars and hearts) will fit in the center row and the other punches will fit anywhere!  In the old holder you could only put the two smaller sizes in the top and bottom rows.), then there is the Petite ink holder (48) and in it are the MINI DISTRESS PADS!!!  Woot!!  Now they aren't in a box!  To make them fit, I purchased the spacers that are supposed to go in the Blendabilities holder for washi tape.  But I didn't like them there.  So I moved them and I do like this!  YAY!  The last two items are the Blendabilities holder (but since that product line is discontinued- sad face- it now has aquapainters filled with Dyan's sprays) and the half shelf on top of the punches.  I also have a three shelf stamp shelf and another half shelf on the other side of the room.  But these were the most exciting.  Well, to me anyway!  :)  Windows?  Who needs windows?!?  I gots me a wall of punches and ink to look at!  yay!  Here is a closer-up of the mini distress pads...

Room for expansion!  (or to store the new colors in big pads until they come out with the minis...heh.)  I am pretty sure that the tins on the top will be replaced with another 48 distress pad holder, but hubby was already frowning about the two orders I placed, so give it another month...  :)  And Stamp-n-storage has free shipping too!  Yay and woot!  Plus a lot of other storage options, so if you need storage go check them out- reasonably priced and very high quality.  Hope that helps anyone in need of storage options!  :)  I really need to see if I can work for them, right?  heh.  :)  Thanks for stopping by, let me know what you think!