CVC Challenge February 2025 #1 - Romance and Friendship

 PRETTY GRUNGE AND MORE

I thought I'd make all of my three grandchildren a Valentine gift, which would also be a bit of a keepsake. (Well it will be if they like them lol). So here are three small shadowboxes.

The heart was made using layers of Americana Decor chalk paints, metallics, PaperArtsy Fresco Finish and Distress Spritz. I just painted, sponged, waxed, rubbed and sanded it until I was happy with the results. 

Ella is the eldest and at university training to be a teacher, she is the pink girl. I found a background already made and distressed, cut it to size and attached it to the back of the inner white frame. I also found a piece of card embossed with Eileen Hull's lace folder and again in the pink tones. I cut strips to cover the inner frame, splattered with a mix of picked raspberry distress stain and worn lipstick Spritz mixed together and also with white acrylic paint. Once finished I rubbed the white paint over the raised areas of the texture to bring the pattern back to life.

I collected elements together to build the design, painted and rubbed down some metal bits and as I built the project and as I got further into it more pieces were gathered, altered/distressed and added.

Close-ups of the elements.

The distressed heart.

A shabby bow coloured with distress inks.

Snippets to create interest in the background.

The largest of the two bottles, both were painted with collage medium, left to dry and then painted with crackle paste I filled this one with pretty coloured beads, painted and distressed the cork and tied pink thread around it.

Three little flowers were tucked into the corner.

The smallest bottle was coloured up with alcohol pearl and a snippet cut down to fit. On top is a small pink eyelet.

Here is a small frame with a distressed metal button, an altered key and a glittery heart.

I also added a metal plaquette, small metal snowflake and beads, Ella's name and rub-ons to distress the frame.

xx

Supplies

TH- Distress Spray Stain - Picked Raspberry, Spun Sugar, Seedless

TH - Distres Spritz - Worn Lipstick, Villainous Potion

TH - Collage Medium, Crackle Paste

TH - Rock Candy Glitter

TH - Snippets

TH - Gumdrop Hearts

TH - Metal Plaquettes, Gumdrop Hearts,  

Ranger - Patina - Cinnabar, Rust

Ranger - Alcohol Pearl - Deception

Ranger Archival Ink - Hydrangea

Americana Chalky Finish - Innocence

All & Create Rub Ons - Acid Blends

Eileen Hull - Lace embossing folder

AVJ March Challenge Tutorial

I'm sharing the process steps for my March AVJ project today over on the AVJ challenge blog.

Come see how I made this background

The candlestick ......

The platform it all sits on .......

The vignette box ......

Embellishments

The word banner and little extras ......

I was so pleased with the outcome of this and it now sits proudly on the sideboard in my dining room.  

Thanks for stopping by and ......

xxx

Happy Birthday 'A Vintage Journey'

Today we see AVJ celebrate its 5th Birthday. Can you believe we have been offering challenges for five years? It has been an amazing journey and adventure.

We are hoping that lots of readers will join the journey for our Birthday challenge. To do so we are asking that you include the word or any images that depict a 'journey' or even something that shows a creative journey you are on. Please tell us how your project fits the theme in your blog post and remember to create in one of our preferred styles of vintage, shabby, mixed media, art journaling, industrial, timeworn or steampunk.

 

I created this shabby piece of home decor which is going to fit in beautifully in my dining room.

I haven't included any of the process steps as a description of how I put this together will be available on the AVJ blog on the 15th March.

There is though lots of inspiration from my very dedicated and talented friends on the challenge blog so please pop over to AVJ and leave us some love for our birthday and it would be wonderful if you could find time to add a project to the line up.

Have a great new month of March.

xxx

Supplies

Tim Holtz stamps - Mercantile, air travel, dapper, purely random, vintage auto

PaperArtsy stamps - HP1802EZ

Paper Doll
Tim Holtz wooden vignette box
My candlestick was from Ikea

A trio of tags

Yes three tags today made all together when I was trying to get different styles all using Andy Skinner stamps and DecoArt media products. Three completely different colour ways and designs - one rusty/timeworn, one vintage and one pink and shabby.

As my blog is a place for me to keep a record not only of the projects I make but also the steps I take to create them this is now a long post - so be warned you either need a cuppa in your hand or just take a quick scroll through all the photos.

Vintage Tag

I didn't have vintage in my head when I started out on this one but I really like the look 0f it in the end.

Seal the tag with gesso.

Make two watery washes, raw umber and prussian blue, dip and splatter with water twice.

Add remnant rubs.

Stamp arch with coffee and black archival ink.

Use stormy sky DI through a stencil blast with a heat gun.

Replace stencil and stamp text with black archival through it.

Collect collage pieces and adhere to the tag, Give a light coat of white gesso or titanium white.

Add some raw umber and quinacridone gold around some of the edges of the collage pieces.

Distress the edges and ink with vintage photo DI.

Pink shabby tag.

Seal the tag with gesso.

Make three watery washes, quinacridone magenta, quinacridone red and raw umber, dip, drip and dry twice.

Stamp text and postmark with embossing ink and use bright white embossing powder.

Stap images over the top with black versafine.

Splatter with titanium white mixed with some water and carefully dry without overheating the embossing powder.

Sand the edges and blend with vintage photo DI, then spritz with water and dry.

Add a small collection of shabby elements and a dies ribbon bow to finish the look.

Pink and Andy Skinner products? You don't see that very often lol.

Rusty Tag

I've used some of the old Tim Holtz vintage photo distress embossing powder to create part of the rusty feel as well as a rusty painted embellishment and punched hearts ona rusty effect masterboard I had created with the decoart media paints.

Seal the tag with gesso.

Make three watery washes, viridian, burnt umber and titan buff, dip, drip and dry twice.

Dip and dry with titanium white wash twice.

Using an Andy stencil apply embossing ink and the distress embossing powder.

Stamp the arch image. text and some smaller number prints using coffee and black archival ink.

Add some embellishments that all look rusted in some way these were all taken from my rusty leftovers box.

And there we have it - a trio of three. Which is your favourite and which style do you like to work in?

Thanks for joining me along my new 2018 journey with Andy. I'm off to Stitches today to meet up with him and quite a few of the team and will take these and a few other bits I have been making as samples when I am demonstrating on the stand. I'm sure there will be a few photos posted on Facebook and hopefully I will be able to add some here when I get back.

hugs Brenda xxx

Distress Oxides stamping more pretty butterflies

You know how I love my butterflies so I was so pleased to find this little technique using distress oxides to create these quite realistic looking creatures. If you missed my first experiments a while ago you can find them here and the project I used these on is here.

Begin by dipping a piece of card and drying into distress oxides several times - I used worn lipstick and spiced marmalade. 

Punch or die-cut several so you have a stash of them when you've finished for other projects as well.

I have this little butterfly stamp that was free sometime ago on the Craft Stamper magazine, I love the markings it has on it and the clear veins.

I used the stamp with watering can archival ink and stamped over my punched butterfly as I wanted the detail to show up, but I was very disappointed with it. The contrast is much too harsh.

So I went back to my oxides and stamped using the same colours I had created the background with and the results were amazing. 

These lovely little creatures look so soft and delicate, perfect for a shabby project.

See you on Friday for the beginning of a new challenge at A Vintage Journey and my CG project.

hugs Brenda xxx

Late Mother's day easel card

I'm sharing a late Mother's Day easel card I made for the Packhouse. Unfortunately it didn't sell but I can easily remove the sentiment and add a birthday one lol. It's the same design as the one I made for a workshop here.

The gorgeous image in the centre is from the Graphics Fairy and how I created the layers can be found in the linked post above.

I was so happy playing with the new distress oxides again when I found a way to create these beautiful delicate butterflies. I am sharing a quick post on Wednesday to show you how I made them.

The colours of the flowers in the image and the butterflies blend perfectly.

I am really going to have to check out some of my friend Jennie's tutorials on how to make beautiful handmade flowers, her's are incredible but at the moment I have lots of these bought ones I need to use up first.

I hope your week is going well. See you on Wednesday with the quick tutorial.

hugs Brenda xxx