September 2025 - With 3 Things - Woven book {by Dounia Large}

Hi friends, 

It's Dounia from PaperArtsy HQ with you for another 'With 3 Things' challenge post. 

For this feature on the PaperArtsy Blog 3 identical items are sent to 3 members of the PaperArtsy Blogging team. Typically we will receive a stamp, a stencil and a couple of Fresco Paints.

We have no clue what PaperArtsy HQ is going to send, the whole idea of this challenge is to do something crafty in our personal style with these 3 items. We can incorporate other PA products into the mix if we feel it is necessary.

So let's take a look at what I 'received' from PA HQ ...

We had a very autumnal kit this time: a lovely stamp set full of textures from Lin Brown (ELB34), a choice of leaves in a fun stencil from the archives, PaperArtsy Stencil PS002  (also from Lin Brown) and two gorgeous warm Fresco Finish acrylic paints from the Seth Apter range: Kiwi Gold and Rusty. I also added a couple Fresco Finish colours from my stash for contrast and variation: Mahogany and Toffee.

With all of that I made a little sketch book with a fun woven cover.

The base for the cover of my book was a series of Regular Smoothy card bands, as well as a full A4 sheet for the inside cover. I worked simultaneously on all of them, without thinking too much, treating each like a mini master board.

I started with the texture stamps from ELB34. I used them quite randomly all over the bands, stamping in coordinated, water resistant inks.

Once dry, I added a layer of paint all over using Kiwi Gold, Rusty, Mahogany and a range of mixes. As all those paints are translucent, you can partially see the layers beneath, creating lovely and subtle textures. For an ever lighter coverage, I diluted some of the mixed with a bit of water.

I cut the finished bands into strips of varying width and it was time for weaving! 

I kept the more textured backgrounds quite large to show them off and the cut the brighter and darker ones one much thinner. I took inspiration from plaid for the weaving sequence but I think a random one would be gorgeous too! I tried to keep everything square with the help of a grid but the end piece is not exactly rectangular...

Now for the stencil, PS002 by Lin Brown. I really love the group of little leaves on it and wanted them to run along the whole cover. I secured the ends of my woven panel with masking tape and turned it over. I positioned the stencil under it and marked the groves with a stylus to create embossing. It is a technique I love but here it was not the easiest to achieve a clear image because of the thickness of the woven substrate and the breaks between the strips.

I then gave the whole cover a wash of Toffee Fresco Finish paint, making sure to push it in all the crevices and them wiping the excess on the raised parts. This disguised the white cut edges of the strips and helped all the colours work together .

I re-did the same technique with pure Toffee paint on the leaves to accentuate the relief. I also lightly sanded the raised parts  to make them stand out even more.

I love the overall effect! Then I 'only' had to glue on the inside cover and sew on the signatures. However, once I had the book completely constructed, I was not convinced the leaves were visible enough, so I dry brushed a little bit of Gold on the raised pattern. It was the final touch I was missing! I reminds me of a sunny autumn day!

The inside cover was done just like the bands with Kiwi Gold and Rusty, just on a bigger size.

I had a lot of fun with this project and love the result. It was a pretty safe bet as the colours are among my favorites! 

I hope this helps you travel toward autumn and maybe inspire you to try your hand at paper weaving.

Stay creative!  

Dounia x

September 2025 - With 3 Things - Autumn Book & Box {by Helen Ranger}

Hello, Helen Ranger (butterflywings_beautifulthings) here with you today on the PaperArtsy blog. I was surprised and excited when PaperArtsy asked me to be a guest blogger for the September 'with 3 things' challenge. Some of you may have seen some of my creations on the PaperArtsy People Group on Facebook. I haven't been creating for very long compared to some and still consider myself to be a beginner with a lot to learn. 

For this feature on the PaperArtsy Blog 3 identical items are sent to 3 crafters. Typically we will receive a stamp, a stencil and a couple of Fresco Paints. We have no clue what PaperArtsy HQ is going to send, the whole idea of this challenge is to do something crafty in our personal style with these 3 items. We can incorporate other PA products into the mix if we feel it is necessary.

When my parcel arrived, I carefully opened the beautiful bird paper wrapping to find a autumn inspired selection of Fresco Finish acrylic paints with Rusty and Kiwi Gold, a lovely Lin Brown stamp set ELB34 and PaperArtsy stencil PS002, also by Lin Brown. Ideas began to race through my mind.

Today I have made a mini book and its box, inspired by nature in the fall.

I have to admit nerves set in a little at this point along with a little self doubt for good measure. My usual style is to have delicate stencil backgrounds with very defined focals but this selection was possibly the opposite of that? 

I was feeling a little overwhelmed so I started with some exploration before taking any decision. I began to test the beautiful colors of paint with ink colours and paints that I thought might work well. All those rusty leaves gave me the idea to create a box with an autumn walk themed mini booklet inside.

I began my project by enjoy myself using my gel plate to make some backgrounds. I added small blobs of the two paint colours and used my brayer to blend them, then removing paint onto a spare sheet of copier paper through the stencil. This created a beautiful distressed textures.

I pulled the prints using the Heavy Cream Fresco Finish which toned down the colours a little. Perfect for a background!

Next I trimmed two of the backgrounds to the height of the reclaimed box I had chosen and glued the strips together to create a snippet roll. I used most of the stamps in the stamp set in various colors of ink all the way along the snippet roll. I did a lot of overlapping and some partial stamping. I finished it off with stitching along both edges.

I also needed to decorate the base of the box. Using embossing ink, I stamped onto one of the gel printed backgrounds using the distressed floral stamp. I coated this for two colours of embossing glaze then I added additional stamping and stitching. This way the base coordinates perfectly with the sides but has more texture!

I cut the snippet roll to size and painted the edges of the box in French Roast Fresco Finish I then glued the snippet roll inside and out fitting the base into the bottom of the box.

With the bow all pretty, it was time to begin creating my booklet. I sprayed some Distress stain and oxide through PaperArtsy stencil PS002 onto some card, adding water splats and drying. I brayered on a little of the Kiwi Gold Fresco, mainly around the edges. I glued another piece of the gel printed paper to the back. This will be the cover for my booklet

I wanted the booklet to fit snuggly in the box so I used the measurements of the box reduced by half a centimeter to determine to size of my covers. I cut a strip of the right height in the stencilled card and marked the covers width on each end. I glued on a second piece of card to the back of the booklet along the three edges, as shown above, to create a little pocket then inked up all the edges.

Then I began concertina folding the remaining strip between the covers. I wanted five pages so I created 5 peak folds, but you could have as many as you like. I finally glued together the valley folds on the outside of the booklet, stopping the concertina from opening. This created raised flaps inside the booklet to adhere my pages to.

I think I should have made the folds larger as folding the doubled card was hard on my hands and gluing the small folds was a bit tricky.

For my pages, I cut five pieces of the gel printed paper to the height of my cover minus half a centimeter and double the width. Each was to be folded in half and glued together sandwiching a flap of the cover, thus creating 5 pages.

Those pages now needed to be decorated! I brayered on matching ink to the one on the cover. I added scraps of the lovely tissue paper used to wrap my parcel (PT11 - Birds) and textures stamps to decorate the background.

I stamped many of the main leaves in the ELB34 set on card using different colour inks then painted them layering the two colours Rusty and Kiwi Gold. I also added a little bit of Claret Fresco Finish paint just around the edges as they felt a little "flat". I fussy cut these out and inked around the edges and the back as I knew that I wanted to bend some and I didn't want any white showing.

The next bit is intuitive to me as I love using fragments of fabric, string, book page and card/paper scraps to my nature work. Very often it can be the smallest of pieces. This process began when I created a junk journal for a year it was a period of healing for me.

I added these to the pages arranging the leaves, stamped words, scraps of snippet roll and text from a digital download.

I then added simple doodles, lines, dots and circles to each page.

Nearly there... I added leaves to the box and set about creating the finishing touches. I added some rusty paint to a metal token with a sentiment fitting the project. I let it partially dry and dapped it with kitchen towel. I glued the string inside the back cover so that the metal token dangled on the outside.

I fussy cut a moth and coated it with frosted crystal for my cover. A process I really enjoy!

I put cut off pieces of the base into the back pocket to use as a mini tag. (You didn't think I could create all this without a tag did you?).

All done! Here is a look at the different pages:

I loved all the processes to create this mini booklet and box which I can now fill with projects inspired by the upcoming season. I look forward to filling it and sharing my makes with you on PaperArtsy People!

Helen xx

Facebook: Helen Ranger

Instagram: butterflywings_beautifulthings

Pinterest: butterflywings_beautifulthings

Sept 2025 - With 3 Things - Dreams Card {by Liesbeth Fidder-de Vos}

Hi friends, 

It's Liesbeth here with you, welcome to this new round of 'With Three Things´!

Every time, three members of our PaperArtsy Blogging team receive the exact same set of supplies. This time: a stamp set, a stencil and some Fresco Paint. Exiting!

We have no clue what PaperArtsy HQ is going to send, the whole idea of this challenge is to do something crafty in our personal style with these 3 items. We can incorporate other PA products into the mix if we feel it is necessary.

So let's take a look at what I received from PA HQ :

When I opened my package I was very happy to find this beautiful combination: PaperArtsy stamp set ELB34 and stencil PS002, both designed by Lin Brown. The two PaperArtsy Fresco paints are Rusty and Kiwi Gold. So nice! I immediately started thinking of possibilities....

And I came up with this big (A5) card ....let's take a closer look.

To create the card, I started with a piece of PaperArtsy Smoothy Heavyweight cardstock (almost A5: 14,4 x 20,5 cm) I tore a strip of masking paper in two pieces and masked the upper piece of the card with one of them, as shown here. I used the two paints the way they are and for a bit more contrast I also mixed both of them with a few drops of black and white ( PaperArtsy Fresco paints Little Black Dress and Snowflake) so I ended up with 4 colours.

Using small sponges I painted the first strip with the 4 paints. The mix with the black paint became very dark green, so I used that one in moderation. With one of the stamps I built up the background. I used Tsukineko StazOn - Saddle Brown, Mustard and Olive Green.

I removed the masking paper and covered the painted strip with the other half of the masking paper, and another torn masking paper a bit lower...to make the second area. 

I hope the picture below makes sense:

And so on.. Painting and stamping strip by strip, every time another stamp...I used them all!

Sometimes some white remained visible...I like it!

When al the painting and stamping was done I connected everything by using the stencil PS002  and the two Fresco paints Kiwi Gold and Rusty.

Using the white PaperArtsy Fresco paint Snowflake and the stencil, I sponged the large branch.

Onto a separate piece of paper I stamped the text and the hinges with dark brown StazOn ink (Timber brown), cut them out and sponged them a bit with Saddle brown (StazOn).

I glued the card onto an A5 white cardstock (a double A4)

I punched holes in the hinges, added some small brads and glued the hinges and text onto the card. I also outlined the white branch with a black fineliner.

This was so much fun! I love the images and the warm feel of the colour combination! And of course, I can´t wait to see what the others come up with! I will be fun to see how different three projects with the same Three Things can be!

Hope we inspired you with this!

Have a wonderful, creative time!

LiesbethXX

 

Blog: Liesbeth´s Arts & Crafts

 Facebook: Liesbeth Fidder-de Vos

Instagram: liesbeth_fidder