12 Tags of 2015 -- July

Well, I'm here with, not just one, but two tags for my take on Tim Holtz's July 2015 tag.  Such a cool technique using Distress Micro-Glaze and water color paper.  I won't go into details here since Tim did such a fantastic tutorial on his blog; however, as I was making my first tag,  I realized how amazingly versatile this technique is.  My first tag (made when I was thinking about the summer coming to an end and going back to school) has a very vintage vibe to it.  My second tag is very vibrant with some of Tim's new Distress colors for 2015 (Abandoned Coral, Mermaid Lagoon, and Twisted Citron) for a very special person's birthday card.  Basically it's the same tag in composition, but each has a completely different feel because of the color choices.

It has been a long day and so I don't have much energy to type right now.  I'm going to leave with a couple of pics of each tag individually.  Wishing you all a great week!!  -- Mary Elizabeth

 

Adventure Awaits You in 2015 -- CC3C #33 Tag

I'm really excited to be able to participate in the second-to-last Compendium of Curiosities 3 Challenge #33:  Altered Surfaces (p. 45).   If you have not already checked out Tim Holtz's latest book, you can order one directly from him and he will even autograph it!  The lovely Linda Ledbetter at Studio L3 is hosting these challenges and there is plenty of inspiration from the very talented Curiosity Crew.  Seriously ... drop by and see what they've been up to.  They all are amazing crafters!! 

 

I made a tag for my entry.  This year I am doing a "scrap calendar" for my Mom.  Each month, We are choosing a favorite event that happened to her during that month and taking a photo.  I'm making a tag to accompany the photo for that month's calendar page.  We will fill the days on the calendar with special memories.  My mom turned 80 in February, so I created an 80th birthday tag for the month of February.  This tag going to decorate January 2015.  It is celebrating some new beginnings for both of us.  My mom spent the majority of 2014 taking care of me.  Starting in January 2015, my mom got to lead her own life for a change :)

I've got to confess, this tag is one of my favorites.  I love the altered surface technique and I really enjoyed making the background to show off my altered elements.  I started the background with a piece of scrapbook paper (you can see part of the 12 by 12 sheet that I used in the pic to the left) that was pre-printed with some copper metallic embossing.  I used Tim's #8 tag die and die cut the paper.  I adhered the paper to a manilla tag with Glue and Seal for stability.  Then I got to have some fun!  I stenciled some Ranger Transparent Gloss Texture Paste through Tim's Flourish Stencil and let it dry.  Then I took Broken China Distress Paint and lightly swiped the paint horizontally (left to right) directly onto the tag.  I wiped the paint off of the clear embossed flourish pattern (also wiping left to right) and I could see the pattern paper underneath!  A heat tool was applied to completely dry the paint (careful not to overheat the embossed areas and bubble it). Then I went back and inked the entire tag with Walnut Stain Distress Ink. It really made the Broken China pop because all the non-painted and non-stenciled areas were filled in with that rich, dark brown.   Finally I used a Black Soot Distress Marker to add some shadowing to the embossed flourish.  Oh my goodness!  I loved the final result.  Here is a close-up of the background:

You can see that the copper embossing on the patterned paper also acted as a partial resist.  It added to this cool background.  Here is a close up of the top of the tag with one of Tim's Custom Fasteners that I colored with alcohol ink and added to my tag's bow.  The bow was colored with Broken China and Walnut Stain Distress Stain then spritzed with some water.

Let's take a look of the stars of this project -- the altered surfaces.  I can't go into details of the technique used because it wouldn't be fair to Tim and all the hard work he did to put together Compendium of Curiosities 3.  I will tell you that I applied the technique to the hammered ring charm below that surrounds a tiny custom fastener.  I used Broken China, Walnut Stain, Picket Fence, Mustard Seed, Black Soot and Ripe Persimmon Distress Paint on the ring charm to achieve the effect. In the background you can see that I embellished the bottom of the tag with a strip of Recollections trim tape.  Another strip of this trim tape was added to the right side of the tag.  You can't see much of the vertical strip because it is mostly covered with my altered pieces.  To mark the many possibilities that 2015 holds for my Mom, I added the sentiment "adventure awaits you" from Tim's Small Talk Stickers.

Here is a close-up of some other altered surfaces.  The washers originally had a verdigris treatment on them.  I used some more Ripe Persimmon, Walnut Stain, Black Soot, and Picket Fence Distress Paint to complete the look.  The number 1 for the 15 (representing 2015) came from one of Tim's Alpha Parts sets.  It primarily was treated with Broken China Distress Paint and accented with Antique Bronze, Black Soot, Mustard Seed, and Picket Fence Distress Paints.  Underneath the "1" is a metal embellishment that I treated with alcohol inks as well as Ripe Persimmon and Walnut Stain Distress Paints.  After the number 1 was adhered to the metal disk with Glue and Seal, I added a layer of Glossy Accents to the metal disk (inside the ring surrounding the 1).

The same treatment was given to the number 5 in the pic to the right.  I love the addition of the Glossy accents to the metal disk behind the 5.

That's it for my CC3C #33 Altered Surfaces Project.  I just want to remind you all that there are some amazing Tim Holtz goodies up for grabs to the Curiosity Crew's Choice winner (from Tim and Mario!!) and a sensational $50 Shopping Spree from one of my favorite online crafting stores, Inspiration Emporium ,will go to one lucky random draw winner.   I hope you have time to play.  We are almost out of challenges (wow!).

It has been such a pleasure to get in my craft room and create this past week.  Thanks so much to Tim, Mario, Linda and each of the Curiosity Crew members for inspiring me this week.  I can't remember when I've had so much fun.  And most importantly, thanks to you for dropping by!!  -- Mary Elizabeth

Saying Happy Birthday!!

Hi everyone!!  Here's a quick post to celebrate my nephew's birthday and the fact that I actually finished this birthday card (yay me!!).   My nephew loves rodeo and cowboy boots, so I decided to go a "western" feel to his card.  The card is made out of a 12 x 12 Core'dinations card stock on which I used a wrinkled distress technique (yes ... I will actually iron a piece of cardstock and not my clothes).  Some red and white check printed paper and a piece of bandana print card stock were used to decorate both the outside and inside of the card.

 To go along with my western theme, I used Tim Holtz's stars and train track (to look like a fence on the bottom of the card) embossing folders to deboss the front of the card.  I swiped some black archival ink on the folders before I sent them through my Vagabond machine.  This gives the card the look like it has been "branded".  The debossed image didn't go all the way to the the center crease, so I used some tissue tape on the crease to cover the bare space.

I fussy cut Tim Holtz's jalopy truck (stamped in black archival ink on kraft paper) and used Crackle Accents on the windows and headlights.  A little Walnut Stain Distress Stain was used to highlight the crackles.  This was foam tape mounted to the front of the card.









I topped it off with a strip of denim material and a corrugated cardboard diecut that I treated with Antique Linen Distress Paint and Walnut Stain Distress Ink.  I began to wish my nephew a "happy" birthday with this  metal embellishment that I painted with Barn Door Distress Paint and some Ginger alcohol ink.  Love this grungy, cute piece on that bandana print!

As you can see in the pic below, I carried over the checked and bandana print paper to the interior of the card.

I used Tim Holtz's WISH die on the bandana print and backed it with more denim fabric.  I tied a cute cowboy ornament to the H and let him run along a strip of printed paper I added to the top and bottom of the interior of the card.  The kraft paper interior was kept to a very neutral palette with stamped sentiments in black and coffee archival ink.  I used a few TH stencils with Walnut Stain Distress Ink as well.

The star of the show is the denim pocket (real denim!!) that I found as a part of banner set at Michaels. Makes a great tag holder!!  I used Tim's stripes embossing folder on the bottom of the pocket and added a little Picket Fence Distress Stain/Paint mixture to the embossed stripes (to give them a faded look).  Some knotted rope, a TH stenciled coffee ring, and a metal "birthday" embellishment completes the look.  I hope you can see the Stampendous bandana print background stamp underneath the pocket -- such a great stamp!  You can see a little sheen on the paper here in the sun.  I used a layer of Matte Multimedium to seal the kraft paper interior.

Here are a couple of pics with the tag.  You might recognize the background from my Tim Holtz June Tag for 2015 post.  A piece of resist kraft paper (cut off of the cover of Tim's kraft resist Paperstash pad) was inked with Weathered Wood and Chipped Sapphire Distress Ink and stamped with a TH sentiment (black archival ink and clear embossed).  It made the perfect holder for my nephew's gift card.  The tag is topped with a rope tag tie and a "play" ideology charm on a safety pin.

 

The back really shows off the the wrinkled distress technique.  It works so well on the Core'dinations card stock.

I'm really not very good at card making.  It has taken me a few weeks to finish this one.  I hope my nephew likes it.  Anyway, it contains a heart-full of love and best wishes.  Since it definitely says something ... I'm entering it in Frilly and Funkie's Something to Say Challenge.  And since it's Anything Goes over at Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge, I'm going to enter it there as well.  

On a related note, I would love to give a warm hug to the DT over at Simon Says Stamp for spotlighting my Stars and Stripes burlap canvas.  I was floored!!  There were so many amazing summer projects.  I love that piece (it's hanging on my wall) but I really appreciate the fact that someone else liked it too.  Thanks again!!

Hope you all have had time to start (and finish) a project as well this week.  Looking forward to seeing and being inspired by your works of art.  -- Mary Elizabeth

Stars and Stripes

Happy 4th of July!!  We're celebrating our Independence Day here in the States and it's definitely one of my favorite holidays.   I love my country and so I created a bit of rustic patriotic decor for my house.

I started  by priming a burlap panel with a bit of gesso.  Then I used Wendy Vecchi's Crackle Texture Paste on a Heidi Swapp star stencil that I found at Michaels.  After it dried, I seriously grunged all those wonderful cracks and crevices with Walnut Stain Distress Stain and Soot Distress Marker (specifically around the star's outline).  I wiped off most of surface stain and ink with a damp cloth.

The star stencil came with its own mask, so I masked the star and used Barn Door and Chipped Sapphire Distress Paint and Tim Holtz's Stripes stencil to create some very rough stripes around the star.  I grunged around the star with Walnut Stain Distress Stain, Frayed Burlap  and Brushed Corduroy Distress Ink.  

I accessorized my star and stripes with some Tim Holtz Tissue Tape and Industrious Stickers (also grunged and splattered with some watered down white acrylic paint.)  Don't you just love Tim's box corners?  I added some Ginger, Latte, and black alcohol ink to age them a bit.

The panel was topped with some jute strings that I pulled from the back of the panel, a TH muse token, and another star.

I stamped some stars on the edges of the panel and tapped in some star tacks that I had grunged with more alcohol ink.

Since this is my favorite summer holiday, I am entering this in Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge: Summer challenge.  I remember celebrating with my family at my grandmother's house.  We had a huge picnic and swam in her pool.  Then at night, we had a poolside view of a nearby park's 4th fireworks display.  Great food, sunburns, the smell of chlorine and bright pops of color in the night sky ... some of my favorite summer memories.

Hope you are making some favorite memories today.  Happy 4th to you all!!  Mary Elizabeth

Around the World in 80 Years

Ok ... so my mom really has not been around the world in her 80 years, but I bet she feels likes she has run around the world a few times chasing her four kids during those years.  My Mom celebrated her 80th birthday in February and I made this seriously grunged tag to commemorate the monumental occasion.

I tried a new technique on this tag.  I started with a manilla tag.  I stamped the balloon from Tim Holtz's Remnant set with Black Soot Distress Ink and heat embossed the image with black embossing powder.  Next, I covered the entire tag with a thin coat of slow-drying multimedium.  I took a piece of Tim's Terminology Tissue Wrap (a piece bigger than the entire tag) and laid it gently over the entire tag.  I smoothed it out so there were no bumps, wrinkles or bubbles.   I was thrilled to see that my image showed through the tissue paper!! The edges of the tissue wrap were trimmed around my tag and the hole was punched out at the top of the tag. 

After the multimedium dried, I used Distress Markers and a water brush to add color to the tag.  Shading the image was pretty easy because the embossed image is still raised through the tissue wrap and I just followed the contours of the image.  It's so great to still be able to see the words on the tissue as well as the balloon through the watercolored ink.  I distressed the tag's edges and inked them with Walnut Stain Distress Ink and Distress Stain. I love the effect!!

On the  bottom of my tag, I used Rangers Sepia archival ink to stamp the checkerboard pattern.  I had some die cuts left over from previous project (a Sizzix button, some of Tim's flowers out of an old book page from his tattered floral decorative strip, and branch out of cardstock from another Sizzix decorative strip).  I colored the flowers and branch with Distress Markers and added some white dots on whim on the flower with a Ranger Inkssentials White Opaque pen.  A couple of strips of patterned paper were used to create a grungy sentiment banner.  I stamped "just celebrate" from Tim's "Just Sayings" stamp set on the banner.  I put together the flower with a jeweled brad and stitched the button onto the sentiment banner with embroidery floss.  I layered flower, button, branch and sentiment together at the bottom of the tag with Glossy Accents.

While that dried, I grabbed some 7 Gypsies Chipboard numbers and partially painted them with some Brushed Pewter Distress Crackle Paint.  I let them dry over night to get the most out the crackle process.  I adhered them to my tag with Glossy Accents and used a Black Soot Distress Marker and Walnut Stain Distress Stain on a small paint brush to add some shading to the tag around the numbers.  I saturated the top of the numbers with Walnut Stain Distress Stain to bring out all the crackles in the paint.

The tag tie is a piece of Tim's ruffled trimming topped with a pink ribbon.  I painted a wooden button with Peeled Paint Distress Paint, grunged it with Walnut Stain Distress Stain and stitched it to the ribbon.

 

Well, that's it for now.  I shall now close with a belated birthday wish to my best friend ... my Mom.  Love you Mom!!!  -- Mary Elizabeth

Summertime Frappuccino with Tim ... Holtz 12 Tags of 2015 for June

Hello to all of you my wonderful, creative friends!  It has been way too long since I have been to crafty blogland.  I must confess to just being too tired to do anything but physical therapy and work.  My bedtime was often before the sun went down in the evening.  I am glad to say that I am much better for it though and now I am able to return to crafting.  I can't tell you how wonderful it has been to have inky fingers again :)

I thought it would be nice to celebrate with my version of Tim Holtz's June Tag for 2015.  Please check out his blog for details on how he created his marvelous tag.  This has to be one of my favorites simply because of Tim's "fresh brewed" Sizzix die.  I also share Tim's love of Starbucks and I am thrilled to make a tag that celebrates my Frappuccino Fascination.

We are in the middle of our summer here in the United States and it's time for all sorts of outdoor fun and summer celebrations.   Next weekend will be our Independence Day (July 4th) and with summer temperatures soaring above normal, even here in the mountains of North Carolina, I am definitely going to be celebrating with a Venti Mocha Frappuccino.  So here is my tag that combines my love of all things vintage, patriotic and coffee.

I started this tag with trying different backgrounds using Tim's stripes stenciling technique.  You can see some of my trials along with the one I chose for my background.  Like the technique illustrated on Tim's blog, I used three colors of Distress Ink (Barn Door, Chipped Sapphire and Aged Mahogany) for the middle background in the image below.  Although I love this idea, I ended up choosing a background for this tag that had just one color, Barn Door, on the vertical stripes and another color, Chipped Sapphire, on the horizontal stripes.  Never worry ... the middle background is already being transformed into a birthday card.  Ah ... don't you just love the creative process?!

Here are a few other details about my tag.  To go along with my patriotic theme, I pulled out some of Tim's Natural Red and Cream Trimmings to create the tie around the cup and tag tie.  I frayed the ends of both and added some stamped stars on the tag tie.  I was trying to think of an appropriate sentiment for the tag.  As soon as I saw the "hello friend" stamp in Tim's "Simple Sayings" stamps, I knew I had found a winner.  That is exactly what I say when they hand me my ice cold Frappuccino!!!  (Either that or "my precious!" when I'm channeling my inner Tolkien).  The sentiment is backed with a great denim banner that I found at my local Michaels.

I wanted to give a shout out and sincere thank you to the lovely Linda Coughlin over at the Funkie Junkie Boutique.  She gave me this amazing Statue of Liberty button in a recent shipment of some backordered stamps.  It was absolutely perfect for this tag.  Thanks Linda ... you are the best.  Also ... I want to point out the authentic green Starbucks straw below.  Yes, I just had to go buy another Frappucino this week to get that straw.  It was such a difficult task and I just couldn't burden anyone else with it :)

Well, I leave you with one last view of my entire tag and a big smile.  It's great to be back.  Hugs to you all -- Mary Elizabeth

Happy Birthday Mr. Holtz (better late than never!)

Hi everyone!  Wow!!  It has been an exhausting few weeks.  This has been my first full week back at work (as a faculty member at a local university) after my surgery.   On top of all of that, when I'm not at work, I'm in the gym for a couple of hours of physical therapy.  My trainer has the nickname "Dr. Pain".  Yeah ... it fits.  He is a former marine and he makes me work hard.

With all that going on, it is no wonder that I'm a little late with my wall hanging birthday wish for Mr. Tim Holtz (his birthday was January 7th).  Also, this project is completely outside my comfort zone.  The current Compendium of Curiosities 3 challenge (Challenge 19) over at Linda Ledbetter's blog is Frayed Fabric.   I really don't sew. Although  I have a sewing machine in my basement that my mom gave me,  I've actually never used one.  I didn't think I could learn how to use a sewing machine this week. So ... there were several times that I laid the project down and said "I quit!".  I was so afraid of making a mess.  However, I actually thought about Tim and his idea of "embracing imperfection" and carried on.  I'm pretty happy with the result. Regardless, this project was all about wishing Tim a happy birthday and thanking him for all that he has done to inspire this community to create.  I hope you had a fantastic birthday Mr. Holtz!

My project started with some of Tim's fabric "charms".  These wonderful fabric squares had some of my favorite Tim designs on them.   I wanted a substantial but pliable backing for my wall hanging.  Since I don't know how to use a sewing machine, I decided to do some hand stitching.  That got me to think about some cork squares that I had in my stash.  I could actually sew through the cork!  It worked fabulously!

I stamped "happy birthday" with Barn Door Distress Paint and added Tim's birthday with an archival ink pen directly on the fabric.  The word "TIM" was cut out of the Subway Signs fabric charm.  It was the one that had "TIMES SQUARE" on it.  I added a little stuffing to the back, used the frayed fabric technique and voila ... a personalized wall hanging for Tim's birthday.

 The fabric squares came bound with some ribbon that had Eclectic Elements and Tim's name on it.  I thought it would be fun to include this in the design and even frayed the ribbon :)

My decorative stitching was really free-form.  I didn't have a plan or pattern.  I just sat and stitched with embroidery floss.  This is what happened!  I ended up with some "half-flowers" at the bottom and  I added some buttons for the centers.

I used Tim's Weathered Clock die to create the clocks around the edges.  I wanted something that sort of looked like rusted wrought iron.  I started by die-cutting the two clocks out of grungeboard.  Black Soot Distress Paint was used to paint each clock.  I then inked up both with Distress Embossing Ink and applied a thick coat of Ultra Thick Embossing Enamel (UTEE).  After heating the UTEE with my heat tool, it leaves some holes in the embossed surface.  I rubbed some Rusty Hinge Distress Paint into those holes.  After the paint dried, the rust color was a little lighter than I wanted.  I went back over the Rusty Hinge paint with a Rusty Hinge Distress Marker.  Perfect.

I had fun with the other embellishments.  There is one of Tim's compasses (painted with Barn Door Distress Paint). 

The die cut butterfly and rose needed some "bendable" backing for the fabric so I ended up using some thin aluminum from Spellbinders Media Mixage.  The fabric was lightly adhered to the metal using Rangers Multi Medium.  I used Tim's butterfly and pinecone dies to die cut the fabric-covered aluminum.  I was able to fray the edges of the butterfly (above) and make a pretty amazing rose (below).

Well that's about it.  I'm so glad I didn't give up on this project.  Happy Birthday again Tim!!

I hope you can play along sometime over at Compendium of Curiosities 3 (CC3) Challenges.  There is always a great prize pack from Tim and Mario for the Curiosity Crews Choice and since this is an odd-numbered challenge, Joy from Inspiration Emporium is giving away a  FIFTY DOLLAR SHOPPING SPREE for one lucky CC3C entrant!  If you haven't shopped there, please drop by.  Fantastic online craft store!!

Thanks so much for dropping by.  I hope to get by and visit with you all soon.  Have a great weekend!!  -- Mary Elizabeth