Faux cracked glass, Challenge #30, Compendium of Curiosities 3

It's been a few months!!! Where have I been! I missed my creative friends! 

So I am once again participating, and this time it's Challenge 30 of the Compendium of Curiosities iii Challenge on the Studio L3 blog by Linda Ledbetter. Challenge 30 was so tempting because we are using the faux cracked glass technique as found on page 54 of Compendium of Curiosities 3 by Tim Holtz. 

Challenge 30 is sponsored by The Funkie Junkie Boutique who will provide a $25 shopping spree for the winner of the challenge, with more prizes courtesy of Tim Holtz and Mario Rossi for the fabulous Curiosity Crew's choice winner!

My cracked project is an old and mysterious jar of Wisdom. See how cool the cracked glass technique is. Makes the jar look straight out of Harry Potter or something! The faux cracked glass technique is so cool and it is so easy to get a nice effect!

I actually used an antique jar I got at a flea market a few years ago. I love the squatty shape of the jar. My daughter brought back the gargoyles for me from her Theater Study Abroad program to London long ago...to thank me for sending more money after she used all of her food money to buy theater tickets, which she promptly spent on more theater tickets. She lived off of biscuits for 2 months. She is a drama teacher today, which gives me many opportunities to make theater props...usually at midnight...in a panic...to help her...even though a long time ago she spent her food money on theater tickets...I still help her...because the show must go on!

Potpourri Stopper Tip

Here's an excellent tip for you. You know the bags of potpourri that have big pods and other seeds included? Well, my stopper is just an item that was in a bag of potpourri that just happened to fit the jar perfectly. I use potpourri elements for stoppers on bottles all of the time! At the end of the post I will include some photos of jars where I've created similar stoppers.

For my jar label, I found a label on the internet and photo-shopped my own words on the label. It says vics creations, Druggist. No. 2015  Dr. h.n. life. WISDOM. I put the label on the jar during the first step of the faux cracked glass technique. Go read about it in your copy of the Compendium of Curiosities 3 book!

So the past few months have been challenging and I haven't had much time to participate in the CC3 challenges which made me sad as I have loved participating this past year. So while I was thinking about this project I realized that even though things don't always go the way you expect or when you experience difficult or challenging events at work, home, whatever, that's when you gain that elusive Wisdom. Gaining Wisdom isn't always fun, and so I place my gargoyles to protect my Wisdom and to ward off any more events that may lead to Wisdom for awhile!

Back-off Wisdom, my jar is already full! If you look closely you can see my little pearls of wisdom peaking through the cracked glass on the back of my project.

Here is a close up of the stopper. On top of the potpourri seed pod wrapped around the hay-rope dealy, I slid an owl bead onto a very long pin. I topped the pin with the faux cracked glass technique as well.

I love how the cracks turn out differently on all the sides.  I thought it needed a little bling on the side.

The rope and the pod just happened to come out of the potpourri bag that way! Accidental creativity is the best! Gargoyle is so pleased!

Here is the original label I created for the jar.

I'm happy I was able to participate this time. It's been a fun experience participating in these challenges, the CC3C challenges, not the life challenges! Don't make me get some bigger Gargoyles!

Here are some jar stopper ideas! Mr. Skellington on the left was a large pod that was in a bag of white Christmas potpourri. I stuck a pin in the pod, and cut the head off the pin and stuck it into the cork with some added glue. I drew the face on with a pencil, then went over that with a black fine-tipped marker like a sakura marker or micron pen. 

The seed pod on the right was just the right size to fit into the spooky jar. 

Next time you are at a store where they sell bags of Potpourri, especially after Christmas, peek inside to see if there are any "cork-worthy" items!

Congratulations to the fabulous curiosity crew on your up-coming crafty cruise to Costa Rica in 2016!!! Talk about the ultimate Creativity Cruise with the experts of Curiosity...the Curiosity Crew! Wish I could go! Someday...

My young grandmas - My May Tags - Tim Holtz 12 Tags of 2015

I'm playing along with the Tim Holtz 12 Tags of 2015. This months tag was fun with lots of memorabilia.

Here's my May tag. Instead of random photo booth people, I used photos of my grandmas. Grandma Eva, and Grandma Grace in their youth. Both are very pretty! Now I know where I got my lumpy hair. =)

I used what I had for this project. I used Tim Holtz Ephemera and the new tokens are awesome like little coins. Love them. I didn't have some of the other supplies Tim used so I used similar items that I already own. (Trying to stay on my budget.)

I loved Tim's tutorial and I love how my grandma's tags turned out. I think I will put them both together in a shadow box frame.

Grandma Grace worked in a women's fine dress shop her entire life. She liked fashion, red lipstick, and the colors red and black. She used to be a dancer before movies at the local theater. She enjoyed the outdoors and liked to hike. She had a large collection of buttons that I remember playing with and a treadle sewing machine. She enjoyed life. She liked to read the newspaper, tell jokes, stay up late and watch movies on tv, and she made the best toast. She and my mom and her twin sister were always going out on adventures. I think this tag fits her.

Grandma Eva liked flowers and music. She played the organ in church and taught piano lessons. She liked marble statues as she went on a vacation to Rome. She liked flowers and ruffles, and her old house used to have doors with real skeleton key locks. In this photo she is wearing a dance outfit with ballet shoes with pointed toes. I had a small convertible when I was young and she asked me to take her for a ride to visit her friend May. She waved at all her neighbors on our convertible ride. She always asked me to take her to the flower shop to buy violets for a friend. She was always buying small flowers for her friends and neighbors. She would trade piano lessons for yard work so children who couldn't afford piano and organ lessons could learn to play.

I had fun making the tags in celebration of my young grandmas!

Thanks for checking out my May tags! Thanks Tim for the beautiful tutorial!

My April Tag - Tim Holtz 12-Tags of 2015

The April tags from the Tim Holtz 12-Tags of 2015 tutorial were so beautiful and full of spring-time blooms I was excited to try it.

Here are my April tags.

I didn't have the Tim Holtz flower stamps but I did have some very similar stamps that I used instead. I enjoyed playing with the water brush, markers, and the distress marker spritzer! I also like sewing on the tags!

I didn't have the Tim Holtz adventure words: block, or adventure words: script either but I do have the Tim Holtz alpha-numeric thinlits dies and they are my favorite. I cut out the words "SHINE", and "BLOOM" with the individual alpha-numeric thinlit letters. I hope to get the other dies some day. I have the Holiday Script words and I love them!

I have a tip for using the individual thinlit letters on the sizzix magnetic platform as the pesky individual letters tend to jump around and resist lining up next to each other because of the magnetic platform.

I put the tag on a table away from the magnetic platform. I put the letters on the tag where I wanted them and used regular clear tape to stick the letters together without sticking the tape down to the tag. Then I took the taped letters and rubbed the tape on the carpet so the tape wouldn't be as sticky, then I placed the taped letters on the tag. Then I was able to put the tag on the magnetic platform and run it through the vagabond machine without the letters moving and without the tape sticking to the tag very much. Then I removed the tape and letters to reveal my word. Ta-da!

Since I didn't have the Tim Holtz script word dies, I had to improvise so I used scribbles black glitter 3D fabric paint to just write out the script word.

I had fun making these happy tags in honor of spring! I love playing along with the Tim Holtz tags of 2015! The tutorial makes it easy to play along!

My March Tag - Tim Holtz 12 Tags of 2015

I'm playing along with the Tim Holtz 12 tags of 2015. Here is his cool March Tag.

Here is my march tag. It's very colorful. I had fun trying out the technique!!! It wasn't easy. The embossing powder kind of got away from me. After the texture paste dried with the embossing powder on it, (I left it to dry for a few days) the unmelted embossing powder slid right off the texture paste before I could melt it. The embossing powder was stuck to the texture paste while it was wet but once the texture paste dried, it went weeeeeee, sliding off the texture paste right onto the table. So I used embossing ink to add the embossing powder again to the dried texture paste, then I hurried and melted it.

When I try it again, I will pay more attention to what I am doing making sure the embossing powder is really sticking to the texture paste, then when it dries I won't move the tag before I melt the embossing powder.

Thanks for checking out my creation such as it is!

#23 Compendium of Curiosities iii Challenge - Jazz World Tour, Collection Folio

I am participating in Challenge 23 of the Compendium of Curiosities iii Challenge on the Studio L3 blog by Linda Ledbetter. For Challenge 23 we are using the Tim Holtz Collection Folio technique as found on page 34 of Compendium of Curiosities 3 by Tim Holtz. Challenge 23 is sponsored by Inspiration Emporium who will provide a $50 shopping spree for the winner of the challenge, with more prizes courtesy of Tim Holtz and Mario Rossi for the fabulous Curiosity Crew's choice winner!

You start with the plain Tim Holtz Collection Folio

What the heck is that?
I had no idea what to do with the Tim Holtz Collection Folio until reading about it in the Compendium of Curiosities Book! I still wasn't sure what the heck that layered spine dealy was. After seeing all of the amazing Curiosity Crew creations using the Tim Holtz Folio I was inspired to create a scrapbook that I had been putting off since 2005. I finally did it! It's all ready for the photos, and I already have the photos printed out and ready to go! During the summer of 2005 I went with my son on his "Jazz World Tour" where his jazz band played in New York, Sweden, Denmark, on their way to the North Sea Jazz Festival in the Netherlands where they were invited to play. Very fun memories and now I have a little folio to store photos and memorabilia from our trip.

For the inside pages I used a tutorial from Kathy Orta at Paper Phenomenon. I wanted an old school scrapbook with just paper and photos. I used mostly Tim Holtz paper. I will fill up each page with photos and journaling. In 2005 we didn't have facebook, and youtube. My camera was digital but it was enormous! It took photos onto a mini cd. I wanted to go old school with my folio. Paper, glue, and some distress ink.

Here is a small movie I made of all the pages ready to go.

I used a closure from the hardware store, I think it was Home Depot. I also used some images from places we went.

The additional pages idea is from the genius of Kathy Orta at Paper Phenomenon. It was from her kit club 10 bonus project tutorial.

Each page on the right has a pocket.

Each page on the left has a tab where I will put some text on the labels.

Love all the Tim Holtz paper designs.

Looks like I threw in one piece of graphic 45 paper.

Love this Tim Holtz paper with the birds and flowers too!

Lots of room in the small folio now for photos!

Thanks to the Compendium of Curiosity iii challenge as I now have a fun place to store all the photos and the stories from the trip! Thanks to Tim Holtz for inventing such a cool product that I had no idea would be such a fun way to create memories. Thanks to Kathy Orta, the paper genius!

Have to tell a funny story about 'Apotek'. During the trip while we were in the Netherlands I got sick and had to go to the doctor. I caught some kind of bronchitis type infection plus a sinus infection. They have National Health in the Netherlands so I went to the doctor who was assigned to the neighborhood that included our hotel. By then I was delirious and slightly lost but my son helped me find the right place. The doctor wore a turban and his wife ran the office. They spoke English and were very nice. I was prescribed some antibiotics. We wandered around Utrecht on foot looking for a pharmacy and we became lost. I was very sick, and my son who was only 15 years old dragged me by the arm around the city asking everyone he saw 'Apotek?', 'Apotek?' He had one year of Junior High German under his belt so he was the language expert. I was so sick I don't remember much. Plus I was having a bad caffeine headache as they don't sell 'Big Gulps' full of ice cold diet coke in Europe. So we finally found the 'Apotek' (Pharmacy) and I was so surprised that my prescription only cost about $10.00. The pharmacist laughed at us when we asked how long it would take to fill the prescription. We told him that in America we have to wait for at least 30 minutes or more. He thought that was hilarious and didn't believe us. Everyone kept snickering at my son as they thought he sounded like a John Wayne cowboy or a kid from American TV. I felt much better after a few days, and the show must go on so I just kept on going throughout the sickness and eventually found some warm pepsi in a bottle to tide me over. Thank goodness my son saved me that day!!!

In my delirium I can still remember the "Mama Mia" billboards all over the city as a touring play was in town and we kept ending up at the theater again as we went round and round being lost. I laughed when they made the movie "Mama Mia" as any song by Abba now makes me think of my trip to the doctor in Utrecht, Apotek, and the Mama Mia billboards.

They loved American jazz in the Netherlands and some people even cried as they listened to the performances. It was fun to go on a world tour with my son!

#22 Compendium of Curiosities iii Challenge - Tin Moose Hotel

It's challenge #22 over at the Compendium of Curiosities III Challenge on the Studio L3 blog by Linda Ledbetter and the fabulous Curiosity Crew!!! For Challenge #22 we are creating a project using the Tim Holtz Dimensional Cutting Pad technique found on page 62 of Compendium of Curiosities 3 by Tim Holtz. The Challenge #22 prize is sponsored by The Funkie Junkie Boutique, with additional prizes donated by Tim Holtz and Mario Rossi!

I had never used the dimensional cutting pad before. I was surprised at how easy it was to use! I made a vintage card that I will probably use for my dad's birthday or Father's day. I wanted the cardboard to look like an old tin lodge building with lots of corroded paint and rust. The antlers are hanging over a mantel. There are other bits of traveler embellishments and ephemera.

The Moose antlers are from the Antler/Lantern set of movers and shapers by Tim Holtz. I used a blank card from a corrugated blank card set I have. Each corrugated card comes with an envelope too. The card is about 5 3/8" X 5 1/2".  I also used some Tim Holtz Ephemera from the Expedition Pack. I used many different paint colors and walnut distress stain. It's hard to see but I crackled the antlers.

I tied some hemp cord onto my arrow embellishment and then braided it. I added some distress paint to the arrow. For the Sunshine, I used a bead and colorized it with alcohol ink pens. The little squares were cut using the Tim Holtz window die, the squares are the left-over panes.

I used all 4 left-over squares. I used the window box as my mantel.

 

I sewed the car charm on with a needle and black thread.

I had fun with the technique making this dimensional more manly card/project! I haven't made that many cards so I'm learning! Is the poofy green ribbon too much for a manly card? Not sure. I put domino patterned paper behind the antlers making a pocket inside the card. I haven't decided if it's a birthday card or a Father's Day card so I didn't finish the inside completely yet.

Thanks for checking out my project! I know all you visitors are expert card makers! I enjoy seeing your cards. What a gift to receive one of your cards as they are such works of art!
Have a Great Day!

Valentines Shrine - #21 Rock Candy Glitter Compendium of Curiosities iii Challenge and Feb. Tim Holtz Tag

I am participating in Challenge 21 of the Compendium of Curiosities iii Challenge on the Studio L3 blog by Linda Ledbetter. For Challenge 21 we are using the distress rock candy glitter technique as found on page 55 of Compendium of Curiosities 3 by Tim Holtz. Challenge 21 is sponsored by Inspiration Emporium who will provide a $50 shopping spree for the winner of the challenge, with more prizes courtesy of Tim Holtz and Mario Rossi for the fabulous Curiosity Crew's choice winner!

Combined Projects
Before starting this challenge, I was really liking the February Tim Holtz 12 Tags of 2015 collage background technique! I decided to use the collage background for my Compendium of Curiosities iii Challenge project along with the distress rock candy glitter technique!  So I combined the two projects!

Old World and Vintage
I wanted to make something old-world architectural so I stuccoed my rock candy glitter panel to the background with crackle paste. For the background I followed the February Tim Holtz tag almost exactly using Tim Holtz Ephemera.

The Shrine Panel
Here is a close up of the Rock Candy Glitter Technique on the shrine red/pink panel background. To find out how to accomplish this you have to read page 55 of Compendium of Curiosities by Tim Holtz.

All I can say is I started out with this.

The Heart
I can tell you about the heart as it doesn't use the Rock Candy Distress Glitter technique. It's just a thick foam heart. I cut the edges of the foam heart with scissors to make it look carved then painted it white. I stamped it with black archival ink. Then I used distress stain and paint to antique the heart. The cherub is a resin doll head painted with alcohol ink and antiqued with paint.

Background Embellishments
Here are some of the embellishments. The arrow and heart charm is from the February Tim Holtz tag.

I used a Tim Holtz Industrial Frame Sticker. Instead of a felt heart I created a heart cut out of 2 sections of lace. I created a patina on the crown charm with distress paint.

This 14 charm is a metal jewelry finding that I added a paint patina to. For the number 14 I used plastic clock face numbers. I put gold stickles into the little gem cups on the jewelry finding.

This "V" (for Valentine and Vic) embellishment is a jewelry charm along with a paper rose in a tussie mussie jewelry finding. I like how the charm looks like a wax seal. There is a chit-chat sticker and some lace and burlap ribbon.

Here's a side-view of the Tussie Mussie so you can see the dimensional objects and the crackle paste stucco. I made the chain tassel out of jewelry supplies.

 

I used a Tim Holtz clock key on the side of the tomb panel. There is a small glass bottle that I decorated with a round brad that I cut the top off of and glued onto the bottle. I filled the bottle with some glitter.

Here's top view so you can see the dimensional objects better.

All Framed
I had a lot of fun making this old world project. I like the combination of old world and the new vintage like the old cathedrals I visited once on a trip. There were many layers of history as the old and new were combined over the years. I decided to frame it so I can hang it up. All of the elements are symbolic to me in some way and tell a story. I could tell you my story, but it's better for you to find your own story in the project. =)

 

Fueled by your projects
Thanks to Tim Holtz for the awesome collage background and embellishments from the February tag tutorial! Since I have been participating in the Compendium of Curiosities iii Challenge, I am delighted now to have taken the time to create many interesting projects practicing so many different techniques! Thanks to all of you who have inspired me to keep going when I can't think of anything to make or when I'm just too pooped to be creative!!! I see your projects and they give me the will to keep on!

Eat some chocolate
Now go eat some Chocolate in honor of Valentines Day! The first rule of Valentines Day is to love who you are and eat some chocolate! Only then are you free to share!