Steampunk Printers' Tray - and more info on my Moulds Course

I quickly blogged this tray last night and thank you for the lovely comments. Here I am with a bit more detail. The 'Printers' Tray' was originally a wooden tray which had housed some (very sickly) sweetmeats such as marzipan fruits which were reduced in the French supermarket after Christmas last year, and this is the second resurrection of the tray. The reasons for making it were firstly that I wanted to enter Happy Daze's 'Dangling Things' competition because I love to have things that dangle on my projects, and secondly because I had already cut into the beautiful papers (Graphic 45 Steampunk Debutante) last week so I thought I would use them up. I did a PVA crackle first with some peach paint. You can just see a little crackle round the edges.

1. This section has the men from the Tim Holtz Steampunk stampset (thank you to Alison for letting me stamp them up). When I cut them out I cut a little ledge so I could glue them down to the front of the tray to add some layering. The photo corner is one of my home-made moulds, made up in clay. The teal-coloured clockface is from DezinaWorld, with some cogs and watch springs added.

2. This section has some vintage pen nibs, and in the middle a piece from the papers popped behind a Fragment. On the right is an actual mini pocket watch (it has a butterfly on the front which goes well with the design). I removed the watch mechanism and back of the watch and cut a circle of one of the paper designs and then popped the back on again. On the opposite face I made a clay watch face from a mould, glazed it, and added a game spinner.

3. For this section I popped some shrink plastic cogs onto the background paper and added the butterfly strip at the bottom. I painted and gold embossed a grungeboard flourish and cut out some of the tiny butterflies to add to it.

4. For one of my dangly bits I used some Primark chain and added a birdcage charm, a ring of keys, and a tiny deep recess frame - wonder if anyone can guess where the tiny image in the frame came from? You probably won't, but I will throw down the gauntlet anyway! I then filled it in with Glossy Accents. The butterfly to the left is another mould, and bottom left are some home-made flower and leaf moulds made from some Primark charms off a charm bracelet. Ok, now the Charlotte doll, not my best decision. It is a home-made mould and I stuck it on and added the home-made angel wings. So far, so good. Then I remembered I had seen a number of these on Vintage sites where they have very black hair and very rouged cheeks. So I decided to do this, 'in situ', after I had already glued it down, which made it fiddly. Unfortunately it looks a bit like Friar Tuck. I may take the whole section out and re-do it, but it's good for a laugh, for now. Added more shrink plastic cogs.

5. I love the paper in this section, so I kept it simple! I added a top hat, and as another dangly bit, a clock charm from a Primark charm bracelet. To cover the hook I carefully cut out some flowers from the paper and glued it across the corner of three sections, to give the effect that the lady is in a 'shady bower'.

6. I framed the beautiful lady's face with a heart shaped frame, a home-made mould made from a set of Poundland plastic frames. I gave her a bit of lippy because I never go out without it! I cut a hot air balloon from another piece of the paper and raised it on silicone glue (actually I used a lot of silicone glue on this project to utilize the depth of the sections and create layering). I thought she looked like she would wear a string of pearls so I just draped some bits of Primark pearl necklace around, and added some triple gold embossed die cut cogs and another shrink plastic one.

 

7. Centre stage for a bit more dangle, is this stunning bird cage which was a gift from Brenda as I fell in love with it when we went shopping together, and she popped back to get it for me on her way to the car as it was the last one. I was so touched, and I am going to move it back and forth across projects for now, so I can keep using it. Can you see the little birdy inside? Then I added two brown glass apothecary style bottles, decorated with 7 Gypsies labels. The smaller bottle is a 7 Gypsies one, but the one on the left is a Tisserand essential oils bottle. I use a lot of these so it will be a good source of bottles. I just put gold memory foil around the lid. I popped another of the images from the papers behind microscope glass and edged it with memory foil, and added a home-made mould crown. Crossing over the two sections is an ornate frame I cut from the TH tag die, cutting it in mountboard and them in some of the papers, and putting the lady on the chair behind it, and added two screwhead brads.

8. Very simple section as I wanted to balance the rather cluttered overall design. Just some shrink plastic and grungeboard cogs on a cog background.

9. Some of the corset design paper from the pad, with a corset image on the right behind a Fragment. The feathered birdy is bought, and I gave him a top hat and glazed it with Glossy Accents. His bird cage is a mould made from a shrink plastic version of the Tim die, then made up in clay and glazed. I had a tiny mirror charm sat on my workdesk and I thought he might like to look at himself, like canaries do, or is it parrots!

10. Getting to the end now! One of the papers is like a vintage newspaper and I liked this ad for paste to polish your trumpet (as you do!). I popped a circular Fragment over it but also carefully cut around the text above and below as I thought it added something. Of course I then had to add a trumpet. No, not a mould! I think it is a cake-decorating item. On the right to finish off is a cog made from a mould.

Phew! good job I didn't try to type all this up last night. Hope it wasn't too much boring detail. Thank you so much to those of you who have written to me in response to the on-line course on moulds. A few questions have arisen from this and I wanted to say that of course we are entering the holiday season but please don't worry as the course isn't timebound and you can do it at your own pace. If you are interested, please do get in touch at lucy@cedmondson.net - or just to say Hello!

Gingersnaps Challenge - Planes or Trains - Fob Watch

Today's make is embarassingly simple. The challenge starting today over on Gingersnap Creations Blogspot is to feature planes or trains, and I chose trains, and the over-arching theme for the month is Steampunk. I have had this steam train pocket watch for some time and wanted to decorate it simply so it could be worn as a necklace.

I prised the back off and removed the clock face and mechanism and replaced them with a sepia image of men in front of a steam train, from Crafty Individuals' People and Places book. I had to snip the word 'Locomotive' off the edge to make it circular, so I popped it back on beneath the train. For the facing niche I used a collage image I was lucky enough to get from Dezinaworld when I won a competion. It is a teal coloured clock with Roman numerals, and I added some watch springs and shrink plastic die cut cogs and then a layer of Glossy Accents.

This is a close up of the pocket watch when it is closed, showing the embossed steam train design, which I enhanced with rub-ons.

And then onto a chain to wear as a necklace.

Steam Punk Collage

I was delighted to receive the new Eco Green Paris Trunk Ink Pads and Eco Green Steam Punk Accessories stamp set for my Altered Element DT pack this month. These new ink pads have very soft colours and are easy to blend. They are not as wet as Distress Inks but that seems to make them stamp quite crisply so I was very impressed with them. I was delighted with the stamps as they combine very well with the Vintage Aviation set I already had, and the Playful Gents Artchix images I had left over from a previous month's pack. I found the Eco Green stamps very good quality and I liked the fact that they are already mounted and trimmed.

If you have been reading my blog for a while, you may possibly recognize the tray. Do you remember the marzipan and dried fruits in the New Year? Well, I had to eat my way through them all to empty this out. I could be very cool and trendy and say it is a printer's tray, but no, it was from a French supermarket!

First of all I cut pieces of mountboard to fit the sections and inked them up over Tim Holtz Cog and Compass masks, using the two Paris Trunk inks and a DI Dried Marigold, then did some water flicking. I stamped a selection of the images from both stamp sets, and popped the Playful Gents behind some microscope glass and added memory foil tape. I cut some Tim Holtz Alterations Cogs in both black shrink plastic and mountboard, and gold embossed the mountboard ones.

I had problems with painting the tray itself. I have been looking for a while for something akin to Tim Holtz Crackle Paint but I think I will just stick to the real thing. I bought this two stage crackle in France and the whole process took ages. The idea was to start with a pale colour, in this case white, then mix the coral acrylic paint with Step 1, then when it was dry, paint on Step 2, and wait for that to dry. The whole process took an age and all I was left with were some very, very subtle white cracks, which looked nice close up but weren't really that exciting. I went over it with sepia ink on a sponge partly because I wanted to soften the colour, but partly to emphasize the cracks, as you would with the Tim product. Unfortunately as you probably guessed, all that did was camouflage the white cracks completely so now it looks very bland.

I hope you like it. Overall I am ok with it, just disappointed with my crackles! Definitely love those stamps, though!

Steam Punk Double Slide Mailer

I made this double slide mailer (from Imagination Crafts) with some of the remaining items from a previous Design Team pack from the Altered Element, with a steam punk flavour. They have recently starting stocking the Creative Expressions Vintage range of rubber stamps which I love, and I thought the Vintage Aviation set would work well with this theme.

I started off by painting the whole thing with a grey/blue acrylic paint and used Weathered Wood Distress Crackle Paint on the corners of the outside, and added some Distress Inks and some shimmer sprays. On the corners I also rubbed on some Pebeo Gold Outliner, which is a new fave thing of mine. I used the Tim Holtz Sissix Alterations Cogs die to cut the grungepaper cog and the two black shrink plastic ones, and added some of the remaining items from my Professor Sprockett's Craft Emporium cogs and watch pieces box. I also used a small circle hole punch to cut a circular piece of the design from the Playful Gents ArtChix sheet and added it to the centre of the one of the cogs and filled the top in with Glossy Accents.

Then for the inside I used two of the Playful Gents images which were microscope slide sized, and popped them behind the slides in the apertures, and used the gold outliner around the edges, and on the corners of the mailer. I stamped a selection of the text from the Vintage Aviation set, and two of the hot air balloons.

I find with slide mailers you get that pretty little shape at the top and bottom of the slide aperture but you can't use anything too dimensional as the mailers don't have a deep spine so you want it to close neatly. This was where another new fave of mine came in - Deko Ice glass glitter from the Altered Element! I only have this in one colour, Amber, and I found that if you pop a teaspoon full into a little jar, add one drop of alcohol ink colour of your choice, and swirl it around, you can have any colour you want, to match your project!

Steam Punk - A Light Bulb Moment!

For one of my Altered Element DT projects for May I have made this little Inventors' Shadow Box. The Shadow Box is by Twiddleybitz and can be found here. I was also sent this sheet of Playful Gents by Artchix, and a box of cogs, a light bulb, watch faces, and other ephemera which I have used in this item. When I received this pack I also received some other gorgeous goodies for other projects, but immediately put these items together for a Steam Punk theme. Sorry I should have photographed the sheet of images before I cut the two out I was going to use, but I'm sure you get the idea. Some of the men are 'playful' as the name suggests, but I chose the most serious ones with the handlebar moustaches for my Inventors, Professor Hydraulious Hornblower, and his friend, Dr Luddite Sprockett.

I was very impressed with the shadow box, which comes in very solid pieces which you just pop together in a tongue and groove sort of way, so you can decorate the pieces before you assemble it if this is easier. I started off by making an A4 sheet of background paper, using the Tim Holtz Timeworks masks, Distress Inks, a background stamp, and sequin waste. I covered each piece with some of this paper and edged it with gold paint and Vintage Photo Distress ink. I made two large cogs up in black shrink plastic, and adhered the two images to my microscope slides. I stamped the frame with some phrases from Creative Expressions Vintage Aviation set, and also used some computer-generated words, some of which I added to the frame and some to the slide images. My student, Jude, said that the technique we had been doing recently with image transfer worked a treat with computer text, allowing the background to show through, so this is what I did. I made a clock from one of the watch faces with a gold cog surround, and brad legs for hands, and adhered this to the hanging section. I stuck the whole box together and stuck the cogs from the set, and the shrink plastic ones to the frame. I then stuck the microscope slides to the base of the frame, and added the words 'A Lightbulb Moment', as my inventors have just made a wonderful discovery (they didn't tell me what it was). To finish off, I punched a hole through the top of the back of the frame and dangled a light bulb above their heads with invisible thread.

There is such a choice of steam punk elements at the Altered Element, and it is great fun to look back on this period in history.

What's the SP? A first attempt at Steam Punk

I thought I would have a little play around with some Steam Punk ideas but I am not sure I have properly got my head round this genre! The wooden frame is from Paper Artsy, and I painted it, then added Crackle Paint and Cosmic Shimmers, and dropped some silver EP into it whilst it was wet and heat gunned it, then added some metallic rub-ons and a little Distress Ink. I recently bought some Tim Holtz Sprockets and Gears and as they are a bit expensive, I thought I would use them as masks first, to create a background paper, before adhering them around the edge of the frame. I dabbed Distress Ink over them, and then sprayed the whole sheet with Cosmic Shimmers to blend the whole thing together and just get a shadow of the sprocket shapes (later in the day I realized Tim does sell these in the form of masks, and the new die, but wise after the event as usual!). I then added some tone on tone stamping to the background with images and words mainly from the Artistic Stamper Clocks and Keys Plate 1, which is such a versatile set. The tiny bits of gold hardware round and about are just the pins pulled out from the dominos, when I made the domino box. I just blobbed some Glossy Accents and then sprinkled them on.

The two Victorian lady images are cameo sheets from Debbi Moore, which I love. I punched circles from them and the larger one has been edged with black lace, which I ruched with a running stitch, and then added a pin with a pearl pushed on the end. The other image has been glued to a gold button, to create a frame, and I then covered both pieces with Glossy Accents.

In the bottom right corner I have used a piece of Victorian Mamelok, which I embossed a little with an embossing stylus, and then added a touch of Stickles. Bottom left is a zip, which was white and I coloured with a permanent marker. I opened it out, and did a running stitch along both edges, so that it formed two coils, and then added a pearl to the centre. I made a shrink plastic clock with German Scrap wings at the top, and the hands were a piece of jewellery finding which was lurking on my work space, which I broke in half. I made some shrink plastic keys from the Clocks and Keys plate, and hung them from a piece of chain. I made a clock from Fimo and Cosmic Shimmer Gold, and another shrink plastic clock, and linked all the pieces together with the remainder of the chain and glued it down with strong glue.

Sorry for the lengthy explanation.