Time does fly!

I have thought of several posts since my last but getting them from my head to the computer has been a challenge. Winter in Southern Oregon is very rainy. I mention this because taking pictures of my project indoors just doesn't work very well. Outside natural light is much better, however it can be difficult when it is wet.

Anyway, spring is arriving and hopefully that will help in getting decent pictures of my projects. Right now I will start by showing a few Christmas presents I made. (I know Christmas was 4 1/2 months ago. Sorry!)

The first was a necklace for my sister-in-law. The design was based on this necklace I had made while playing around with soldering:

I tend to wear more silver, but she loves autumn colors and they suit her so I wanted to make something simliar in goldtone. I still haven't figured out how to use solder on gold tone jewelry, so I used polymer clay to make the medallion inside the box (same as above) and I used it to make the box.

These pictures were taken indoors, after all it was a Christmas present. There is glass on the front of the pendant, so the odd angle was to avoid glare. I made bead links for the chain; one chain with smaller beads and one with larger ones. Anyway, I think she liked it.

The next present I made was for my friend and best crafting buddy, Jackie. It was a tin message board, that started as one of those cheap, (ahem... inexpensive) silver trays from one of my favorite craft sources The Dollar Store. Here's how it ended up:

After using gesso to prime the tray, I painted it with an off white. I then used Vintage Photo ink by Ranger to lend an antique feel. Once that was dry I glued the paper down. The top paper I designed from scratch in Photoshop. Love, love, love, that program!

The magnets I made from vintage photos that I found at another one of my favorite craft sources, The Salvation Army Store. I really scored when I found a whole pile for 25 cents each. Yeah!! I scanned the photos into my computer, cropped the faces and made them all a similiar size. Then I printed them so they would fit on the flat backed glass marbles. I always spray my printed images with Krylon Workable fixative or Matte finish to seal them so that when I glue them to the marbles the ink won't run. When they were dry, I did the beading around them and added magnets. I just made up the beading patterns as I went, so I really don't know how to explain the process. Don't know if I could repeat it at this point, although I did keep a prototype to look at it case I get the urge. Here are the close ups:

The heart design at the top of the board was going to be the hanging mechanism, but I found it would not hang straight. So, it became a decorative element and I used epoxy to attach a picture hanger to the back of the tray. Epoxy is my new go to product--another post on that later.

Well, I hope you have enjoyed. I have been up to several projects lately so I will try to get them posted in a more timely fashion. But for now I will leave you with the photo I took this afternoon in my back yard as proof that spring has sprung!

Happy Crafting! Denise

Dollar Store Treasures

Hello all, today I thought I would show some items that I purchased at the Dollar Store and turned into art. One is in process and one is complete. This first one is one of those little puzzles for kids where you try and get all the little metal beads to fall into the little holes. Here is a picture of what it looked like to begin with (size is probablay 2 in across):

I found that I could remove the top clear part fairly easily. Once that was done I pulled out the cardboard background. I then painted the orange base with Krylon hammered metal spray paint. This took several coats. When that was complete I created a collage using vintage paper, an old family photo of my grandfather when he was a boy, and some rusty washers. I glued that in and replaced the top and this is what it looks like now: Love these kind of projects! Of course I bought out the inventory of these little toys so now I have enough to last for a long time. I thought they would look cool incorporated into the cover of a book someday but that project is still in my head.

The other project is the one in progress. I came across these canvases at a dollar each and couldn't pass them up. I figured I could gesso them and go from there. However, I could not get the gesso (white) to completely cover the LOUD colors. (black gesso may have done it, but I was on to another idea). Here is the canvas as it was:

So, I took pages from an old book that I got at Salvation Army store and ripped them up and glued them so that the entire surface was covered. Then I aged the canvas using acrylic paints, gesso and inks to get the following look:

A great background, but now I got to figure out where I want to go with it. Some projects come easy and some just take a little mulling over. Course with me I am probably on to 6 other projects before (if) I get back to this. Showing it here though should give me incentive to finish it and post what it looks like! Enjoy!

Finally, an update!

Sorry if anyone checked back here and still found nothing new. I have had a baaad case of bronchitis and have been very slow for about 6 weeks now. Hopefully, I have seen the worst of it.

Anyway I am putting up some pictures of projects I have done using the gel media transfer method. The first one is a cover on a handmade book.

This is a small book about 4.25 x 5.25 with hand stitched blank pages. I really am not one to journal, but I LOVE to make all kinds of books. Now I just need to figure out what to do with them. For the cover I had taken a photo of a statue left at our house by the previous owners.

I then turned the photo into a high contrast black and white image using Photoshop (one of my favorite toys!) and paired it with a graphic background I had created from one of my drawings. Once I printed it on the inkjet, I made a toner based photocopy and transferred that using gel medium.

Here is a jar I did in the same manner. I have saved all kinds of jars to repurpose and this is one technique I was playing with. To get the background color I painted the glass with gesso, then a couple of coats of turquoise, and then sprayed with a clear coat. When that was dry I proceeded with the gel medium transfer.

The top center piece is made of polymer clay and crystals. This turned out, maybe, a little over the top, but I still kind of like it and it was part of what I call R & D (research and development); so usually things get better after the first piece.

I have one last image to share for now. It uses heat transfer instead of gel medium. It is still taken from a toner based copier. I then used one of the heat transfer gadgets that looks like a woodburner, but has a round flat tip. This was an image of lace that I transferred to thin copper sheet. It will be the perfect thing for some future project I'm sure.

Well, I could go on and on, but I must save something for another day! Hope you all enjoyed my babbling and hope you have as much fun with this stuff as I do.

Note: I am still trying to figure out all this blog stuff and hope to get some of the blogs I visit onto my list soon.