Xmas 2014 #3UP {Texture}

Hi everyone Leandra here, only a few more  #3UP posts to go this week. Hope you are finding time to play along too. 

3UP volunteers are given a brief to follow, this time they were asked to show us their favourite techniques. We have seen wonderful examples this week of how much personal interpretation of the same theme can vary so much.

Tonight is all about texture.  The next 3 ladies are using completely different surfaces, and the thing they have in common is generating texture in different ways. Enjoy!

First up it's Corinne, also known as Coco online. From France, I have met Corinne at Version Scrap many times, she is an absolutely delight, so enthusiastic and warm. We love to catch up with her when in France. Tonight Corinne is using Treasure Gold.

My name is Corinne (aka Coco) and I have been crafting since 2009. I am a mum of 5 from 24 to 7, also working part-time in a small research lab. But first and foremost here, in my arty life the rest of the time, I am a stampaholic and love any kind of messy crafting. Even better when it tells a story...

So for my project tonight I decided I wanted to play with some of my Eclectica {Darcy} quirky stamps (EDY08, EM07, and fabulous EM06) to create a whimsical Christmas scene on a 6.7 x 10.5 inches canvas. It was also my plan to introduce lots of different colours and textures to this creation, and I used several techniques to do this.

Step One:

The starting point of this canvas was a great video by Leandra herself. It is all about ‘Grunge Paste Stencil Stamping’, she shows us how to create fabulous stamped and distressed texture, and I really encourage you to look at it if you have not done it to date. It was published more than one year ago, but I do not mind applying well-known techniques when they are so great and give such wonderful results! I’m not particularly a fan of new trends; I just follow my wishes and feelings. In addition, old techniques can reveal to become very fun when used with new products sometimes.

Step Two:

Basically the technique consists in pushing a wet stamp into the freshly applied grunge paste, and press a bit to get the design of the stamp into the texture. I used EM06 to put different images into my GP here and there… For more texture, I also put Grunge Paste through some stencils;a ‘burlap’ and two ‘snow’ ones.

Step Three:

Once the Grunge Paste is totally dry, you apply a few layers of paints over that. I chose a mix of 4 Fresco Acrylic paints that blend beautifully on the upper part of my background: Stone, Sky, Ice Blue, Snowflake, and three others for the bottom section: Dusty Teal (from JOFY limited edition paint set #1), Limelight and Space Cadet. once the paint layers are dry, a light sanding at the end to pull some paint away from the raised areas reveals the Grunge paste below. (I love the white emerging through like snow, perfect for a Christmas project!).

By the way, to the right you can see one of the sheets of paper (I used Smoothy Heavy – White Stamping card), roughly painted using Limelight, London Bus, Holly and a bit of Chalk ready for stamping...

Step Four:

I also added a few stenciled snowflakes using Golden Glass Bead Gel. I was really pleased with the lovely glittering effects in complement to those achieved with the Grunge Paste, I love the combination!  

Step Five: 

First, I stamped on PA Crackly tissue paper (now replaced by Waxed Tissue) the stars from EDY08 (because of my surface has become irregular due to the snow) and adhered it with matte medium gel. I gave a light spritz of Perfect Pearls Mist in Heirloom Gold over it to add some colour and shine, and also added droplets of Snowflake here and there as snow.  

Step Six:

I stamped various images from EDY08, also the very lovely house from EM07, on my prepared papers. I fussy cut out everything and put a bit of paint or ink on the edges with a small piece of cut 'n' dry, and set aside.

Step Seven:

My quote was hand-written on scraps of painted papers and, and I had fun to glue and arrange everything at the top of my canvas. I used piece of linen fabric with also fringes finely cut first to adhere the words, some pieces of cardboard of various sizes to create the dimension before glueing my wonderful pine border made also with a beautiful border stamp from EDY08, and a lovely beads glass chain offered recently by my friend Lynne that was lying on a corner of my table, not yet hidden in a cupboard or at the bottom of my overall stack of boxes totally crammed with tons of various stuff!! 

Step Eight:
At the end, I played with my favourite waxes, of course my Treasure Golds . Using a small colour shaper tool (a flat chisel 0), I put White Fire and Olive Bronze at the top of the burlap texture, Sapphire and a Limited Edition in the middle, and covered parts at the bottom in Sapphire and Emerald in addition to create a raised shiny, bumpy, textured surface… It was great to go over and in-between the lines and small squares of the burlap texture using the small colour shaper, this tool is fantastic in complement of TG!! It’s hard to explain all the shades of the final shine, but in the sun it’s just wow!

Hope you like my offering to PaperArtsy today, crafty hugs from France! Coco xx   

Next we have Judith Smith (@JudithSmith), she has a wonderful idea for fabric embellishments .....

Step One: 

Cut a piece of white cotton fabric 13" x 19", and a piece of patterned material 11" x 17" and 2" x 10". Spritz the pieces of material with water and paint them with your chosen colours ... ensure that the fabric is nice and moist while you are painting, it helps the paint travel further and smoothly.  Use a watered down strength of paint, blending the colours as you go along. Dry the fabric thoroughly and set to one side. Paint the ric rac to match your colour scheme and allow to dry.

Step Two:
Cut two pieces of chipboard 7" x 10", and four pieces of felt the same size, plus a piece of felt 2" x 10".

Step Three: 
Prepare smaller sections of  white fabric in the same way, using pale green, lemon and cream, drying the fabric, before stamping the Lin Brown leaves, flowers and butterflies in archival ink. Attach iron on adhesive to the back of these pieces of fabric, and then back the sections with oddments of patterned fabric. Cut out the images, and then add more colour using translucent paint for shading.

Step Four:
Add some stenciling to the main background, using Snowflake, and then dry this with a heat gun. Using one of your translucent colour options, add a wash of colour over the top of the stenciling.

Add the spine to the centre of the outside, using iron on adhesive as before. Attach all of the leaves, flowers and butterflies, and then attach the ricrac.

Step Five:
Glue the felt to the chipboard pieces, and lay them down on the inside of the cover, with the felt side down, and the chipboard facing up towards you. Lay the smaller piece of felt in between them. Fold the edges of the fabric over and stick it down. Fold a small allowance of the patterned fabric over all around the edges and then stick the patterned fabric onto the inside of the cover, by adding glue onto the folded allowance.


Punch three holes in the spine 2", 5" and 8" from the top.

Finally... 
Create pages for the journal using any suitable paper and ephemera that you like. I used medium weight cartridge paper, as this takes a reasonable amount of water and is nice and thick. I have added tags, music paper, envelopes and bits of stash in between my pages to add interest in my journal. There is also room for another signature (set of pages) to be added at a later date. Using ribbon or string, thread through the holes, first from the outside holes, and back up through the middle, to then tie a bow on the outside.

I love using fabric in my projects, the feel of a completed book like this in my hands afterwards gives me such pleasure. Working on fabric is just as easy as paper, and the possibilites are so varied. You can shred the edges, go shabby and grungy, add some sewing, and lace, the choice is yours. My inspiration for this project has come from classes taken with the lovely Lin Brown, and you will see her influence in the design of the outer cover any of you who have taken a class with her. However, I have adapted it a bit to allow me to create my expanding journal. 

 I hope that you have enjoyed my project, Judith.


Finally tonight it's a familiar face, Jo Myhill (@jomyhill). Jo has spent a lot of the latter part of the year using Grunge Paste on fabric with dusky tones, so if you like texture and subdued tones, then you need to be stalking Jo! ...

Hi Everyone, Fabric and Grunge Paste has been my thing of late, really loving the texture that you get with it, and with paint, the layers can look so interesting...

Step One:

I made a tag with some hessian backed with felt using Bondaweb, I did sew round the edges but the joy of Bondaweb is no sewing on fabric!.

Step Two:

Added some paint layers of Nougat and French Roast using a baby wipe to move it a round, although it does sink in quite fast.

Step Three:

Then I scraped a layer of Grunge Paste on the tag, the hessian adds a layer of texture under the thinner patches of Grunge Paste.  Once this has dried I took a scalpel and scratched lines in the Grunge Paste to make a frame.

Step Four:

Next I added some watered down Antarctic in places very lightly to add depth. A swipe of Caramel in the centre panel with a dry baby wipe.

Finally I...

Stamped Mini 69 in Potting Soil Archival ink and finally drew some brown pencil lines around the scratched frame.

See you back here again tomorrow! The end of the year is nigh!

Leandra

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