Halloween Inspiration

In the last few weeks I have been doing some experimenting with new materials and was inspired to make some Halloween tags and backgrounds.  I have access to a photocopier again, so the first thing I did was blender pen image transfers!  The three images I used are cabinet cards from the store.  The transfer process is really easy:

1. Photocopy the image . I usually make multiple copies while I'm at the machine.
2. Cut out the image- this step is not necessary if the background of the image is white with no toner.
3. Place paper image side down on tag (or whatever you are transferring to.)
4. Color the paper with a blender pen that contains xylene to saturate the paper.  Do this in a well ventilated area.
5. Rub with a bone folder or other tool to make sure the entire image transfers.

I love using this technique for image transfers because it can be imperfect and unpredictable which lends an element of spooky-ness that is perfect for Halloween tags.  The old clothing and imperfect transfer brings to mind ghosts and haunted houses.  After doing the image transfers, I added color with Dylusions ink spray and Faber Castell Gelatos.  The Gelatos are still new to me, so this was a great chance to experiment with different techniques.  I mixed the gelatos with water in mini spray bottles to create my own color sprays, drew directly on the tags and blended the colors with a foam blending tool, used the gelatos with a waterbrush like paint...

Afterwards, I added washi tape and other embellishments.  The keys are tag board cut-outs from Coffee Break Design, and the "Boo" banners are my own creations.  Then I added some of my favorite ribbon in coordinating colors.

My other Halloween experiments used alcohol inks, stencils, and Golden Soft Gel in gloss.  I was inspired by the Tim Holtz tag tutorial for September.  I tried his method of dribbling different colors of alcohol inks and blender solution onto a craft mat and "swiping" the cardstock over the surface of the craft mat to get a unique background.  Then I applied the Golden gel over a spider web stencil to create a glossy raised image.  The Golden gel took a long time to dry, so I worked on these backgrounds over several days.  Later I added distress ink to darken the background, leaving the areas under the dried gel the original background color.

I tried this technique with Gelato backgrounds too and it worked great.  For the purple spider web in the upper right hand corner of the photo, I tinted some of the gel with a few drops of acrylic paint for a completely different look.  Overall, I had a lot of fun experimenting and got a few cute Halloween decorations out of it!

Fun With Gelli Plates

A couple weeks ago I decided to experiment and play with using a Gelli Plate.  The Gelli Plate is a brand of reusable, non perishable gelatin printing plate.  It allows you to do monoprinting at home without needing a printing press.  (Remember when I did monoprinting during my printing class in college?)

I used colorful craft acrylic paint, a brayer to apply paint, and a variety of stencils to create patterns.  The process is similar to the monoprinting I had done before, but using a variety of colors instead of only black ink makes a huge difference.  Using the gelli plate was a lot more experimental.  I would often mix colors using the brayer, and print multiple times on the same piece of paper to create depth.

I used one of my favorite prints to cover a small paper mache box from the craft store.  I traced the top of the box and cut a circle of paper for the lid, and cut two paper strips the same height as the side of the box.  Before covering the box with paper, I painted part of the lid blue to coordinate with the print.  I brushed Glue N Seal onto the back of the paper and pressed it onto the box to smooth out any bubbles.  Once all the paper was on, I brushed on another coat of Glue N Seal to protect it.

Every month at my store, I have a group of ladies from a local senior living center come on an art "field trip."  This was their third time out, and I wanted to do something a little different.  So I showed them how to use the gelli plates, and then they covered boxes with their prints.  The ladies had a great time and the boxes turned out just darling.  They are going to use the boxes to hold their "bingo money."  How cute!  I want to go play bingo with those ladies, they are a ton of fun.

Olympic Costumes

Last weekend I went to Toronto for a social ice dancing weekend.  The event was Olympic themed since it took place during the first few days of the Olympics.  I traveled with two of my skating friends from the Ohio/Pennsylvania area and we decided to put together a group costume!  My skating partner had the idea to have the Olympic rings spread across three white sweatshirts.  Since I'm the crafty one, I took his idea and ran with it.

I started out by getting three plain white sweatshirts (which turned out to be the hardest part of the whole process...) and figured out how much space I had on each shirt for decoration.  Then I cut a piece of freezer paper big enough to go over all three shirts.  (If you are unfamiliar with freezer paper stenciling, check out my other blog post about this technique.)  With a little bit of simple math I was able to figure out how big the rings needed to be.  So I set my drawing compass to make the correct size circles (in this case I think about 9 inches across, so 4.5 inches for the compass.)

I started by drawing the circle in the middle top row of the logo.  The other two circles in the top row are about an inch away from each other.  Each circle for the bottom row has the center halfway between two of the upper rings, and the top edge lines up with the center of the upper rings.  Once all the large circle were drawn, I set the compass slightly smaller (about half to 3/4 of an inch smaller.)  Then I put the point of the compass back in the same place for each circle to make sure the smaller circles were centered.  From there I erased a few lines and added a few lines to separate the different colored rings where they overlap.

The next step is cutting on the lines and getting rid of the "rings" (the part that will be filled with paint.)  I always cut my stencils with an x-acto knife because I'm a cutting ninja.  But you can also do the cutting with scissors if the shape is big enough. Then I cut the large piece into 3 sections, one for each shirt.  Freezer paper is great for stenciling because it can be ironed onto fabric and will peel off easily when you are done.  Sometimes ironing the stencil can be a little fiddly, especially when the stencil has small strips that can bend and get misaligned.  Then it is just a matter of painting the open spaces with fabric paint.  (Unfortunately, the photos are not very dramatic for this project since it is a white stencil on white fabric.)

Dress Refashion

I got this pink jersey dress from Target earlier this summer.  I love the ease of jersey dresses, but this one was a little on the plain side.  So I pulled out my trusty freezer paper to jazz it up a little bit!

I decided to add a stenciled border along the neckline and the bottom of the dress.  After measuring how long my stencil needed to be I cut two pieces of freezer paper and taped them down to my cutting mat.  I always cut two stencils at once, even if I don't need both right away.  Then I used a pen to draw a floral design for my stencil, and went at it with an x-acto knife.

Several hours of cutting (and numerous Netflix tv episodes) later I had four completed stencils!  The next step was ironing the freezer paper to my dress.  If you have never done freezer paper stencils before, this is a link to a great step-by-step tutorial.

I attempted to mix up some pink and purple fabric paint... But it ended up more as a nice brown, blue, and gray.  After the ink dried I peeled off the freezer paper and heat set the ink with an iron.  Now the pattern is permenant, washable, and ready to wear!