2013 Christmas Cracker Video #1 {Sanded Foundations}

Hi Everyone, Leandra here

Don't you think the days after Christmas are often the perfect time for getting creative?

People generally have a few days off work, and the frantic madness of the lead up to Christmas celebrations fades into a few welcome days of rest and realxation. The kids are happy chilling, playing with new toys. Christmas TV is littered with movies or special shows, teenagers disappear to friends houses and older family members bury their noses in books, or come to grips with new technological toys. Family visits are over with, and it's the blissful calm after the storm. With the family settled and plenty of leftovers in the fridge, its not too hard to escape to your craft space and try out some ideas.

Normally at the end of a semester we would have a 3UP or some other crazy week-long blog idea that I dream up, but this time we are doing a series of short videos that you can quickly watch and hopefully have a go yourself.  Some are ideas that I have wanted to do all year, others are versions of things you might have seen before, but all use our favourite PaperArtsy products of 2013 and a wide variety of techniques.

We are calling this series our 2013 Christmas Crackers, so grab a hold of the other end of this cracker, and take a look at what's inside - I promise...no cheesy jokes! You will have had enough of those already! It's going to be a nice round-up to the fabulous year we have enjoyed here at PA HQ!

You can sit back and watch, or if you prefer, you can pull the cracker with me, and play along. At the end of each blog post there is a place to link your version of this technique, the links on each post will all close 17:00 Sunday Jan 5th 2014 (London time).

The linked entries from each 2013 Christmas Cracker Video Blog have a winner drawn. The prizes will be brand new sets of limited edition paints and a brand new sets of stamps. These products are new for 2014, and won't be available until mid February, so join in the fun and start experimenting with some of these ideas!

2013 Christmas Cracker #1 : Sanded Foundations

The beginning of any project for me is generally to contemplate the possible layers I might build on. Foundations can be created in numerous ways with endless products. 
For example:

• patterned or plain papers, torn, cut, punched
• die cut layers cut from paper, smoothy or heavyweight smoothy
• stencilled texture
• embossed patterns in paper, card, foil, crunchy waxed kraft paper
• grunge paste applied various ways
• resist techniques
• puff paint

Many of these layers are unmovable. Once you have laid them in position they are there. This may impede the direction you want to explore, for example how do you stamp a detailed image over a lumpy clear shiny resist, or puff paint, or a paper doily? Textured foundations may kick your muse into the range of possibilities that develop thereof.

You don't know what might happen until you have a go and find out, so let's try a new foundation technique today, and see what happens!

I'm using tinted Grunge Paste to highlight different parts of a stencil. But after application and drying of the GP, I am sanding back to reveal the many colours within. 

Taking this idea a step further, the ability to sand tinted grunge paste means you are not sanding OFF any colour, and you are in control of the height of the Grunge Paste which gives you options should you wish to add further stamped layers.

Cracker Ingredients:
Grunge Paste
Craft Tools: Palette Knife
Stencil Girl: Blackbirds in trees
Fresco Chalk Acrylics: Tinned Peas, Hey Pesto, Nougat, Lake Wanaka, Space Cadet, Green Olives, Holly, Pumpkin Soup.
Old Postage Stamps
Wooden Prima embellishments

Cracker Method:
In today's video we are using tinted Grunge Paste through a stencil, then layering paint gently over the top with soft shades of Fresco to create a soft background. This is a great starting point for a journal background, or it could be used on the front panels of a wooden triple icon, or perhaps down the side of a Scrapbook layout or as a card. Sanding back the GP, and adding details with postage stamps, wooden embellishments and white washing helps create a cohesive piece with depth and interest. Most other texture pastes cannot be easily tinted, and are generally too plastic in nature to be able to sand back, so these are unique features that makes GP different to other texture products. 





Play Along:
Link how you have been inspired by this technique below. Play along and you will go in the draw to win a set of Limited edition paints and a brand new 2014 PaperArtsy A5 stamp set.

Link closes 17:00 Sunday Jan 5th 2014.

Winner for Christmas Cracker Video #1 will be announced 19:00 Sunday January 5th 2014.
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