The "Quilted " duo

Hello crafty friends..

Welcome to my page today. I am right now working on my house interiors after the painting and going about giving some crafty touches to them!

As always I decided to give some cosmetic touches to the existing furniture and this time around it was the faithful shoe rack’s turn! Having been with us for over 12 years now, it was dull and boring to see this fella greet people at the entrance.

So in he enters my studio! Here is the process of the makeover....

Step 1- I removed all the hardware and gave the surface a good sanding and cleaned it up with a wet cloth. I was waiting to use the new chalky finish paints from Deco Art that I received. This time it was the cheerful” delicate” that hit the skeleton of the rack. This it was not going to be just paints...since this is at the entrance, I wanted it to be catchy and decided to quilt on it!

Step2- I love the TH Wall flower paper pack and always think twice before tearing a page and believe me, I decided to quilt with his papers! Can you imagine the number of papers I would need to quilt on a big surface like this...well there is a solution? I took a good quality photocopy of the ATC pages and my quilting started. I needed about 80 ATC’s to patch up! 

Phew...am not complaining...I inked all the edges with Archival leaf green and had them on the top of the table using the De c Art decoupage glue. Once they were dry and secure, i started sewing! Yup...used my Faber castel PIIT pens to draw the stitches on the panel and voila...my quilt was ready!

Step3- For the drawers, I cut them into stripes and for a change. I planned a 2 tone coloring this time and the wall flower paper pack was just perfect to take that! My second color here is the Deco Art”new life” chalky finish paint.

 Definitely gave a new life to my shoe rack, lol!

I mean look how vibrant it is now!

Step4-I gave a coat of Deco Art cream wax, light to the entire rack and as that was drying...worked on the handles. I gave them a coat of gesso and sponged in Deco art media acrylics, burn t umber to give it the lovely antique brown!

Now it was time to work with the dark wax. I always loved the weathered look it gives instantly to the furniture...have a look. The right side here has the dark wax and left doesn’t...too bright eh???

The handles were dry by now and found their places.

I gave a nice coat of Ultra matte varnish from Deco Art. For the quilted portion I gave at least 2 coats of varnish.

Here is one last look of it inside my studio...

And ZOOM into my house, where it sits pretty in the green corner!

Look it has a companion now...a little stool to match the rack. The same colors and same quilting from the left over pieces just made them with 2 inch squares this time!

That’s a lot of quilting for the past 2 days and no more louvered doors! 

I had a tough time painting them but seeing these cheerful fellas smile after 12 years....was worth the efforts, what say???

See you soon with another project.

Until my next creative journey,

Happy Crafting and recycling.

Cheers.

DecoArt Products used-

Chalky finish paints- Delicate and new life

Decoupage glue

Media line acrylics- burnt umber

Ultra matte varnish

Hickory Dickory Dock!

Hello crafters..

A new month beckons…and it’s already March! Can you believe we are 2 months up??? I am excites about the coming months as I am planning to give my 10yr old house a BIG makeover! Can you imagine the possibilities that open up for me as an “altered art” artist???

Am loving the thought of it and so I begin this month with my DT project for Rhedd’sCreative Spirit where it is always ANYTHING GOES but altered art or mixed media only. Isn't that fun.. I clubbed the 2 possibilities and came up with this “Hickory Dickory Dock” but only this time you have birds flying up and not the mouse, lol!

Have you guessed??? YES, it’s an altered wall clock…

How exciting is that…I have altered a boring wooden clock to suit the new color scheme of my house and that too using a lot of Tim Holtz products and techniques. What do we do without the master??? It’s amazing how things can be altered using his products and that is what you will be seeing soon…

I started by sanding the entire wooden clock after removing all the clock parts. Once the wax and gloss was removed, I applied 2 coats of gesso and patiently waited. This time it is a big project..3 feet tall…so I better be patient, lol!

Once dry I chose my new colors Distress stain in peacock feathers and applied randomly all over the clock and simultaneously added watered down gesso, to make it more chalky and applied all over the wooden parts.

Again, my patience tested as I had a good amount of coverage to be done…so 2 coats again with sanding in between. Once I was happy with the color tone, I applied rock candy distress crackle paint in random parts and applied walnut stain distress stain in the cracks.

Also weathered down the clocks by sanding the edges to reveal a bit of the wood and also inked in many places with walnut stain to give it the “antique look”…it is a 20 year old clock, anyways(gifted for my wedding)!

The next stage was to take up TH stencils in cargo and I applied homemade texture paste and as it was wet, sprinkled some fine glitter on it. Voila, as the texture dried, it also started sparkling!

Once the outer of the clock was ready, I moved to the inside makeover. I am finally gathering up courage to tear up papers from TH wall flower paper pack, but only 1 sheet for a project lol! Here I managed 2, cos I knew I would be looking at this clock every day and would have a chance to admire the papers too, lol!

I fussy cut the floral patterns from one page and the birds from the other and distressed the edges and modge podged the floral patterns on the shadow box portion of the clock.

To my delight, I had a big shadow box to play with and since this is a battery operated clock, the pendulum is actually a static piece which means I can work on it too!

Once the flowers were in place, I gathered some twigs from the garden and applied picket fence D Stains to it and made a little “platform” for the birds to perch on! I stuck the twigs to the length of the pendulum and had the birds sitting on it!

For the round portion of the pendulum, I had some pattern papers stuck with modge podge and then stamped this wonderful quote from Paper Artsy on tissue and flaunted it as the focal piece there…very true isn’t it ???

Now comes the clock face…I just die cut a crclr to suit the size of the face using the same PP and inked the face with alcohol inks in matching colors. You see a blue/green and brown in the edges??A closer look at the inside and you will find the secret date of our wedding day…after all it is a reminder of our wedding, you see!

I still had a lot of space inside the clock and so built a lovely BIG nest with loots of coconut coir tucked in and perched a little bird there with an egg too! So you see a lot of birds here and not the mouse!

Embellishment time…my most enjoyable part of ant 3D project and this time I wanted to make some different flowers. I decided to do some cabbage roses using left over PP from my stash and followed every step of the talented “flower queen” ( I am sure many of you will agree) Jennie of Live The Dream. You have to see her amazing flower tutorials and see how your project comes to life with those beauties. Thanks Jennie for being an inspiration! I just love the look of these flowers on my clock, just PERFECT. This such a lovely idea to use up scraps.

The flowers are all made using TH tattered florals die. I assembled the flowers with some chip board branches from Creative Embellishments which I painted with picket fence D Stains too.The leaves are using TH tattered flowers and Die nemics die. One more bird tucked in here, waiting to get inside…

Isn't it cute???

I loved how the entire thing shaped up and for the impatient soul in me, this was a true test! This project took me 3 days with all the drying time that I dint speed up!

Now I have Huge satisfaction of altering a mega project  and it proudly hangs on the wall now bringing memories of our wedding! Though the walls still wears the old look, in a couple of months, it will be a perfect fit to the new colors up in the wall!

Thank you so much for your patience too, reading every bit of my makeover process and would love to hear your comments. I just love reading every bit of and can’t thank you all enough for that.

You are going to see more makeover projects and home décor projects from me in the coming months . Hope this inspires you to play along and would love to see your wonderful projects out at Rhedd’s Creative Spirit this month.

I would like to have my Wall clock enter the following challenges…

A Vintage Journey - Special numbers ( wedding anniversary here!)

Stampartic- special day

Artist Trading post- Alphabet soup

Decorate to Celebrate- Anything Goes

Crafting for all Seasons- Dies/ punches

Simon says Monday Challenge - Anything Goes
City Crafter Challenge Blog- Use it Up- have used paper scraps for the cabbage roses
Mixed Media Monthly Challenge- Birds of a feather
Natalie and Amie Challenge Blog - Flowers
BGC- Mixed Media

Until my next Creative Journey,

Happy Crafting and Re cycling.

Big Hugs.

A Journey Of Love !

Hello crafters..

It’s the month of LOVE and am back again soon with another project to share with you!
this I think will be a small post and has loooots of browns! After a few projects I had done before this, my hands were itching to touch the browns and this has a whole lot of it, lol!

A good friend of mine wanted a “special” gift for her husband and she had a few pointers for me.

These two had met during a flight travel and that’s how their “love” blossomed. So she wanted something that would remind them of that moment, 

no pinks(understandable!), 

no flowers..difficult, but possible, 

masculine and classy…that’s it. 

What do you think…I knew I was going to love doing this and this is what I came up with…

A wallet style album with pockets, flaps, folds and tags! Loads of brown…yummy!

I used Kraft CS and TH wall flower paper pack. My heart allowed me to tear only one page thought I needed three 12X12 sheets…so for the rest, I tore a few pages from an old school atlas (perfect for the journey theme) and a dull red PP from DCWV…I think these 2 papers just complemented the lovely wall flower paper…have a look.

The wallet cover has the lovely TH paper with the script side up and I made the label using TH stamps…stamped it on canvas, distressed the edges and mounted on card board.

The gear is a resin mold, sprayed with black and metallic gold acrylic colors and so is the hand made band “LOVE”. I made this using air drying clay, stamped the word, colored with acrylic sprays and pierced a hole to insert some red twine!

A little ticket tucked says it all…”admit one only in my heart”, lol! On the top I have a eyelet from which dangles a lovely vintage car, metal charm with some gold chain and some mini ornate book corners adds that classy metal look to the wallet!

When the wallet opens..

To the left..

I have used sheets from the atlas, some more stamping on tags, a little vintage clock held together with a little red wooden peg.

The center..

Has a belly band with more tags and space for journaling.

To the right..

More atlas sheet panels and some tags with the vintage jeep this time!

The bottom flap..

Opens up to reveal another pocket which has another photo mat. On the whole, this wallet can hold up to 25 photos of different sizes..PRICELESS!

The wallet is held together with an antique gold magnetic clasp.

I love making albums, and this one is really special cos it really has all the elements that I like to work with and mostly…it has lots of browns and is vintage too. What can I ask for…

My friend loved it and am waiting for the final verdict when she surprises her husband this weekend!  Keeping my fingers crossed..

Before that, I would like to have your feedback, that will make the wait easier for me, lol!

I would like to have my wallet enter the following challenges…

A VintageJourney – metal embellishments, spray, twine and also ephemera and paints.

Lessology- Tic tock (vintage clock embellishment and stamp, and pages from an old atlas re cycled)

CraftHoarders Anonymous- How I love thee

Make MyMonday – Valentine

SentimentalSundays- as much or as little  red

Thank you so much for stopping by.

Until my next creative journey,

Happy Crafting and Re cycling.

Big Hugs