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Showing posts with label bees. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bees. Show all posts

Wednesday, May 13, 2020

BUZZY BEE'S BUTTERFLY BOUTIQUE - NEW IMAGE SETS


Spring has sprung and I have a new project for you; Buzzy Bee’s Butterfly Boutique.  I’ve used a 7” tall 3” deep theatre box (made from a kit) to create Buzzy’s shop.
On the front, you see butterfly fairies sporting the latest fashions while bees and butterflies fly around them.  The sign at the top (which you will find further down in the post to download) is accented by Butterfly & Honeycomb Medley that I painted and accented with Chipboard Leafy Swirls, bees, chipboard and metal butterflies and flowers.
When you open the hinged doors you’ll see inside the shop with more fashions and there is Mr. Buzzy Bee himself (you’ll find him further down in the post to download.)
All of the butterfly fairies come from my two new collage sheets, Butterfly Fairies 1 & 2.  I’ve also used some older ones; Butterfly & Moths Collage Sheet (or you can use the digital Butterflies & Moths Set Download) and the Dress Forms Collage Sheet.  
I’ve used more chipboard leaves, swirls and cattails to frame the rooms and trimmed the inside with moss.
The inspiration from the project came from this sweet 6x6 paper pad titled “Tell the Bees”.

NEW COLLAGE SHEETS
Butterfly Fairies #1 and #2
These two sheets are filled with whimsical butterfly fairies in various sizes.  To complement the fairies I’ve included lots of colorful butterflies.  You can make them even more magical by adding larger wings from the Butterflies and Moths collage sheet or digital image set pictured further down in the post.

To purchase this sheet click on the image below.

BUTTERFLY AND MOTH SET DOWNLOAD

THE DETAILS
After I assembled the theater cabinet I covered it with yellow cardstock.  I then used a mini honeycomb stencil and Vintage Photo Distress ink to add the honeycomb pattern to the paper.  
Next, I painted a sheet of honeycomb chipboard gold which I then cut into pieces and used to decorate the front of the theatre and also the back.  On the back and sides, I added a piece of decorative paper from the Tell the Bees paper pad.

I then used hinges to attach the doors to the back.  You want to make sure your hinges are wide enough that brads that are used to attach the hinges clear the edge of the box.  To make the attachment marks, be sure to hold the door and back together, then punch the holes and then attach them with brads (I used glue as well).
 
On the inside, I added more of the paper and then moss around the inside edges.


To decorate the front, I used a variety of chipboard and die-cut vines, leaves, cattails and butterflies which on which I used paint, watercolor pencils, and iridescent powders.


For the topper, I used a chipboard honeycomb and medley piece which I painted and then added bees, butterflies, and flowers.  To open the door you need to cut the topper in half.

To cover the cut, I used a dragonfly charm which I glued to only one side of the topper.
To make the paper frames I used three pieces of the paper and drew an oval on two of the pieces.
Next, within the oval, I cut slits into the paper.
I then pulled back the cut paper and tore off the edges of the paper.
Lastly, I stacked the two cut pieces together and mounted them on the solid sheet.  I then curled the torn edges back.  Before attaching the frames to the shop, I trim away much of the excess back paper.
NOTE: Decide which side of the paper you want to show when the curling is finished as it is the opposite side of the paper where you draw the circle that way you won’t see it when you are finished.  You can use more than two torn pieces of paper if you like.

I embellished the butterflies fairies with butterflies printed on vellum.  I also printed the fairies multiple times, cut out bits of the dress, and attached them to the main image tape with foam double-stick tape which gave them more dimension.  For the antenna, I used flower stamen.
For the dress forms on the inside, I cut up multiple butterfly images (printed on vellum) glued them to a dress form (you can find the stand further down to download for free).  In the pictures below, you can see the progression of how I added the pieces of wings.  Additionally I accented the dress with dragonfly charms.

FREE IMAGES
Feel free to download the images below and use them in your artwork.





Wednesday, August 13, 2014

Altered Bee Themed Bottle & Jars


I have a couple more decorative Bee themed projects for you.  The first is an altered honey bee bottle covered in real beeswax with faux honey and a bee skep topper that I will show you how to make.  I thought this would look cute in my kitchen and maybe yours too.

Second, are two altered mason jars with cute toppers and with a glow supplied by LED lights.  I think these jars would look lovely on a patio table in the evening and would also make a great hostess gift.
Honey Bee Bottle
To give the bottle an aged look, I used Deco Art Perfect Crackle.  The instructions that come with the product are through and the product is easy to apply.
Next, using a sponge, I applied black StazOn ink to the raised design on the front of the bottle.
I used a honeycomb stencil and a pencil to trace a pattern on the bottle.  Next, I filled in the traced areas with Caramel Alcohol ink.  I left the pencil marks as I thought it looked more distressed.
I melted yellow beeswax and used a small spoon to drizzle the wax down the sides of the bottle.
Now was one of those moments when I decided to add something else to the bottle that should have been added before I drizzled on the wax.  Looking at the bottle I thought that it would look better with some faux honey inside.

I melted some clear glue sticks and added Caramel Alcohol ink to create a honey color.  Next, I poured the melted glues sticks into the bottle.  The only problem was that the heat of the glue melted the wax at the bottom of the bottle.  After the glue cooled, I added more wax to fix my mistake. 

UTEE (Ultra Thick Embossing Enamel) would be a better choice for this process and not as much of a mess, but I was out of it and the glue sticks were a cheap alternative.  I will say, that the consistency of the melted glue was very much like real honey.
In the picture below, you can see the faux honey in the bottle and the wax back in place.

Making the Bee Skep Topper
I decided that a honey bottle needed a bee skep top.  After much thought, I settled on using cording to construct the skep.  It doesn’t matter what the cording looks like as you won’t see the original colors when it is finished.

Start by making a circle with the cording the same size as the top of the bottle.  Begin wrapping the cording in circles gluing each circle on top of the previous circle.  I glued one circle in place, then waited for it to dry before gluing on the next.  For the first 3 circles keep them the same size.
Continue gluing cording in a circle but begin to make the circles smaller and smaller forming the shape of the bee skep. 
Once you have a tiny hole in the top snip away most of the extra cording, poke the end through the small hole in the top and glue it in place.
I found it helpful to add glue to the inside of the beehive to help it keep its shape.
To block out the color of the cording I painted the outside of the hive with white acrylic paint.
Next, I coated the inside and outside of the hive with Mod Podge.
The final step was to use the Caramel Alcohol ink to color the hive.  Because I coated the hive with the Mod Podge first the ink and paint did not mix and lighten the color of the ink.
Once the hive was dry I glued it on top of the bottle.
I added other embellishments such as brass sunflowers, fibers, and Masonite bees.  These are the same bees that I used on the other bee projects (see the previous bee projects for the tutorial on how to paint the bees).

Small Mason Jar
This next project was inspired by Mason Jar Toppers.  These toppers fit wide-mouth Mason jars.  The glow in the jar is from an LED tea light and clear pebbles.
To make the garland, I twisted the stems of paper flowers together.
Next, I twisted each end of the garland together to encircle the top of the jar.  I placed the light at the bottom of the jar then added the clear pebbles to cover the light.  Nothing is glued in place so it is easy to unscrew the top and pull out the light to turn it off.
The topper is painted with Onyx Metal Patina and decorated with one of the round medallions from the Bees collage sheet.  The label holder comes off making it easy to paint the lid and to add images to the top. On the Bird & Bees collage sheet is a small honey label that is sized to fit the holder.

COLLAGE SHEET

Large Mason Jar
I started by coloring the raised design on the jar with StazOn ink to make it pop.  I found the jar at Wal-Mart in the craft section.  Next, I used a tissue and alcohol ink to color the jar.

I painted the topper with Onyx Metal Patina paint.  Note the hook on the bottom and the handle on the top.  These are easy to remove for painting and decorating.

Hanging from the mini mobile are brass bees & Masonite bees.  These are the same bees that I used on the other bee projects (see the previous bee projects for the tutorial on how to paint the bees).  The mobile hangs from the hook under the topper.

Just like with the smaller jar, I placed the light at the bottom and added clear pebbles to cover the light.  Nothing is glued in place so it is easy to unscrew the top and pull out the light to turn it off.
To decorate the topper I rubbed it with Inca Gold Gilders Paste and added a bee themed medallion.