'To Dream Of A Fairy' Art Doll

Hello!
Yep, me again! Bet you're getting sick of me this summer eh?!
I did warn you... Art Dolls are my favourite thing right now....so here's another one!

Art Dolls can be constructed in as many ways as your imagination can dream up, and with this one, the body is a clear glass vial. I used the largest bottle from the Craft Medley Bottle Set as the body for this one!
I added tiny scrunched up bits of text paper to the bottom of the bottle, along with a sprinkling of turquoise glitter...

I suspended a punched out heart in the bottle, easily done by gluing thread to the heart, then using a needle to thread the other end through the cork. The 'wings' are also easy to construct, I created a triple bow using waxed cord, then simply tied the bow onto the bottle neck. As it's waxed, the cord holds it shape and the loop shapes don't go all droopy!
No apologies for using another Prima Mechanicals Pendant.... these are fast becoming a must have in every project! The medium sized pendant is exactly the right size for the bottle to sit in...

The pendant is great on lots of levels, fab petal shape, very easy to colour with paint, but best of all, it has a hole in the middle! This means its a doddle to use to create the base. I used a thick strand of wire to join the disc of the base and the pendant together. One end of the wire was glued into a hole drilled in the base, the other end was threaded through the hole in the pendant, bent over at right angles and then glued. The glitter/paper layer in the bottle help to disguise the wire, but I did give everything a coat of white gesso under the bottle as well!
The legs are painted paper...

Glued onto the front of the wire holding up the bottle!
The Art Doll face is a Stampotique favourite, the crown is a Stampotique design too!

Stamped onto text paper, glued onto card then cut out. I glued a short pin onto the back of the face, then simply pushed the pin into the cork to secure!
Hope you like her, a few ideas for you to try out maybe?!

See you soon!
Trish xxx

'To Be Happy' Shrine : A Tutorial

Hello!
Me again, back with another tutorial! I've gone for another 3D assemblage type affair today, a shrine. Here is the finished piece...

No pre cut shrine kits used, all done from scratch which means you can make them any size and shape you want! Easy too, really! I'll show you......
Firstly, you need to decide on a shape and size for your shrine. I knew I wanted a house with a pointy roof, so that bit was easy, but I wasn't sure about size. The size can depend on various things, maybe you have something specific you want to put in the niche, so obviously you need to create something that will be big enough for your chosen object. I knew I wanted to use a specific set of wings behind the roof, so that was the detail I needed to take account of. I roughly stamped out the wings, and sketched out a shape to fit...

Once you have a shape, you can trace it onto chipboard and cut out....

Next we need to cut the pieces for the niche. The back part is easy as it is exactly the same as the hole the the front part, so simply draw around the hole onto more chipboard. The sides will depend on how deep you want your niche. I chose a 2cm deep niche, so cut my sides accordingly...

As you can see, the sides are the length of each side of the back, and all 2cm wide. Next, tape the niche together with masking tape....

You could use sellotape if you have no masking tape! At this point, when you fold up the sides, you can see the box like niche appearing!

Tape up the corners so the box stays in shape...

Now, at this point I should say that you are not to worry about gaps, sturdiness or neatness! We will be covering the whole thing inside and out with gel medium and book pages, which will cover up and gaps or unsightly tape. Gel medium dries rock solid, so will give added strength to your niche. The only thing you need to do at this point is trim away any difference in height of your sides!
The general idea is that the pieces will look like this...

Again, don't worry if the niche looks too small! The book pages will add extra width to the chipboard, and you can add as many layers of pages as you need if the gaps are still in evidence!
 So, cover with book pages....

Decorating the inside of a box is tricky at the best of times, and trying to decorate once the box is attached to the front piece will just make things harder! Decorate the niche at this point....
I painted everything with Lime Dina Wakley paint, then added a touch of Sky over the top to give a gentle turquoise look in places. I then added a cut out figure with a magic wand and a star behind her head. As you do....

 I then put it behind the front piece to see how it looked, and decided it needed a pop of colour. Red to be precise! I made the border by painting some copy paper...

And then doodling a border pattern...

This can then be cut out and glued into the niche. Copy paper is way more flexible than card stock, so I always use the thinner base if I'm wanting to glue it into tricky places!
The finished niche can then be attached to the front...

This is done very simply by glueing on more book pages across the join. Two or three layers for a strong bond!
The shrine stand is made from a small wooden candlestick, and one of my new favourite things...a Prima Mechanicals Pendant!

These were thoroughly gessoed (is that a word?) and then had more Lime and Sky paint added!
Glue everything together, and you have....

Your shrine!
The Prima pendant adds a fabulous shape to the stand...

The candlestick was splatted with black paint, then had red cord wrapped around it for that colour pop!

The front of the house was simply decorated using a circle stamp, and a house number. The butterfly wings were stamped onto red painted card before cutting out....

All stamps are Darkroom Door.
In the end, I added some red moss into my niche....

I liked the way it spilled out, creating more depth.
So, another tutorial, and I hope it has given you a few ideas....go make a niche!!!
Love Trish xxxxx

Super Speedy Paint Backgrounds: A Tutorial

Hello!
After my last tutorial using ink to make a background, I thought that today I would go back to my 'go to' medium, paint! 99% of my backgrounds are made using paint, and I'm going to share a very quick and easy technique that will get you a fab background in a couple of minutes!
First up, the finished project.....

Right...the background! The main thing to remember is speed. Don't stop to think, just do it! We want a little blending/mixing going on, so no drying between colours with this one!
Get all your paint squeezed out onto a palette (or a bit of acetate!!), so you don't need to stop to change colour. Add your first with broad strokes of the brush..

My 'brush of choice' is a make up brush! A foundation brush to be precise. Love the feel of them, they're cheap as anything and the bristles don't fall out and stick to your work!
White is great to add in between colours to blend....

I don't stop to clean the brush either, just keep going! Pale purple next...

To stop it looking too 'blocky', add in more purple over the blue...

Plenty of white to bring the colours together! Up to now, I have used vertical strokes. Add in a few horizontal too...

I use less horizontal strokes when applying wet colour over wet colour because these tend to mix up the colours and make things a little too muddy for my taste. Up to you though! Now I add in my dark 'pop' colour...

Still wet over wet, and still not cleaned the brush as you can see! Less of the darker colour as it will obliterate everything otherwise. Colour needs to be a bit balanced though, so add a little more dark on the other edge of the piece...

I love the blue/white/purple scheme, but decided to add in a bit of pink for a change!

By now, the paint is starting to dry off, so you get nice texture as well as colour as the wet paint drags over the drier paint underneath..

That is the base layer finished...and should have taken about a minute and a half!

Now we need to add the details, so clean your brush and dry off the wet paint on the background!
This next set of pictures look very similar.... Each layer of detail is subtle, but it all adds up!
I stencilled a little through some sequin waste..

Next, print a few lines here and there..

Dots and circles...

Stamping...

And the final touch, sewing the background to a bit of black card! I also did some stitching over the paint to add more detail..

This is now very nearly done, just focal images/embellishments to add, and then text. Sometimes I add more to the painty details too, if I feel the end look is missing something! In this case I added red accents to tie in with the red hearts.
I created a flower look from some rather awesome Prima mechanicals pendants...

I covered the metal with gesso, then just flicked purple paint at them! The hearts are Fimo clay, painted red and with tiny blue dots added. Wire stems, with coils around them to make them a little more substantial! The deep pendants make wonderful 3D flowers..

Final touch, words cut from a book..

Phew...are you still with me?!!
I hope you have a go at the speedy painty backgrounds....great fun and a great base for any page!

Love Trish xxx

Drippy and wet.....

No, not me personally!!!
Hello!
I have an messy inky background technique to share today, the background I used to make this...

Make sure your work surface is covered, and put gloves on if you don't like getting very inky!
We need to prepare the surface first. As we are going to be using lots of water and ink, the surface needs to be sealed, so give a chipboard square plenty of gesso layers to begin with! I wanted a little texture and pattern on the background, so got out the texture paste and the stencils......

(Yes, I know, white on white makes for a great picture.......)
Next, get out your inks! Now, you can use any ink for this technique (paint too), but I much prefer acrylic inks. They dry to a permanent finish so you can layer them without any mixing and muddying of colours, which is a very good thing! The other benefit is that I find they are much more light fast than other spray inks can be. I like to look at a project months down the line and for it to still be the same colour as it was when I made it!
So....drip on a drop of ink...

Then spray with water. As you play about with this technique, you'll get a feel for how much water you want on the surface. I would say, start out with a little bit at first, then you don't drown the project! You can always add more....

Now tilt the surface so the inky water moves about...

Move it about until you're happy, then dry it off. Add more of the same colour to fill in some gaps....

Again dry it off. Drying in between layers not only stops colours mixing and running, it also stops the surface from getting too waterlogged!
Second colour...

Add the water...

This time I added a little more water, and let most run off to colour a larger area..

Dry off again, and add another colour...this time I used red to complement to yellow and pink...

Once that was dried, I thought it needed a 'pop' colour.....turquoise!

Squirt on the water...

Let it run off....

Add more if you feel it needs it, then dry off for a final time...

Once it it totally dry, you will notice the colours lighten slightly, you can see this if I put a finished pic next to the just inked pic above..

For some reason, the red seems to lighten the most....weird....
Anyway.... I did a little printing and stamping on the background...

I also painted white circles, and melted white UTEE for a splattered look...

Because the background is so busy, I wanted the focal image to stay black and white...

My 'go to' Stampotique girl, with added text stamping in her dress!
Lots of messy detail, and a nice way to play around and make some backgrounds!
Have a nice Friday everyone!
Trish xxxx