First up is a Halloween layout using the new Montage collection. I love how versatile these papers are - a little strategic layering to cover the more non-Halloweeny elements (in this case the fairy on the Fairyland paper), some thematic paint colours and you're off to the races. Paired with Blue Fern Studios' Halloween chipboard, and you have the makings of a spooktacular layout.
The Halloween Collage chippy is so cool - it just had to be the centrepiece of my layout. I treated it with a combination of painting (the moon, pumpkin and the green base of the grass) and heat embossing (for the ghost, bat, checkers and atop the painted grass) using one of my favourite techniques for the heat embossing - painting on the embossing ink with a fine paintbrush to allow me to use several colours on the same embellishment.
The Creepy House chippy was heat embossed black, and then sparingly with silverizing embossing powder for a worn, pitted appearance.
The Halloween Collage chippy is so cool - it just had to be the centrepiece of my layout. I treated it with a combination of painting (the moon, pumpkin and the green base of the grass) and heat embossing (for the ghost, bat, checkers and atop the painted grass) using one of my favourite techniques for the heat embossing - painting on the embossing ink with a fine paintbrush to allow me to use several colours on the same embellishment.
Once I'd painted the grass green I wanted to give it a little texture, so I use the same silverizing embossing powder I'd used on the bats, but sparingly this time, to give the illusion of dew on the ground.
Carrying over the diamond pattern of the Halloween Collage chippy to the background using a checker stencil rotated to create diamonds rather than squares and glossy black paint helped to marry the chippy to the Montage papers and give the whole layout a more Halloween-y feel. I added some sparkly orange watercolour paint and black and orange flowers to complete the transformation.
One of the Cobwebs chippies, painted white and heat embossed with a shimmery powder, was great for filling in a gap in the cluster while letting the details in the fussy cut piece from the Society paper peek through.
The Creepy House chippy was heat embossed black, and then sparingly with silverizing embossing powder for a worn, pitted appearance.
Blue Fern Studios Products:
Montage papers:
- Fairyland
- Society
- Now and Then
Chipboard:
- Halloween Collage
- Creepy House Set
- Cobwebs
Next up I have a card created from a piece of leftover pattern paper from the layout above. I am loathe to cut into a fresh piece of 12x12 paper to make cards, but I'm always eyeing my scraps to see what leftovers I can use for cards. When I was tearing the strip of Now and Then paper, I was sure to save the lovely fussy-cuttable image from the flip side of the paper. I wanted to keep the background fairly simple to highlight the incredible details from the paper, so I used a piece of watercolour paper which I painted with complementary colours, then added some stencilling and flicks of black ink. I left the Turkish Bits chipboard naked for a bit of extra contrast.
Blue Fern Studios Products:
Montage papers:
- Now and Then
Chipboard:
- Turkish Bits
My third project is a whimsical 6" x 12" canvas featuring the bottom half of the Olga's Balloon set. The two pieces are designed to be layered together, but I chose to go "off label" in my usage as I wanted to add crazy dimension to my canvas. Never fear, the top piece will find a loving home on another project!
To get the 3D balloon, I traced the shape of the balloon part (the second image in the graphic below) 8 times onto Charlotte's Dream paper (it took 2 sheets) and cut these out, then folded them in half, alternating sides so that 4 pieces have the blue side and 4 pieces have the flowered side showing. I then adhered the negative sides together.
Before I adhered my paper balloon to the chippy I set about altering the lines and the basket. For the lines I painted them with a couple of shades of brown, and touched them up with white gesso once dry.
For the basket, I trimmed a scrap piece of Ombre Dreams paper to the exact size of the basket, and then sprayed it with a gold/brown. I then set about weaving my basket out of wire thread. It was finicky work, and I'll admit I burnt myself several times on my glue gun. I adhered the thread to the left and the bottom and then wove each individual strand, fastening it to the opposite side at the end. It is imperfect, and I love it! A little touch of gesso for aging, and I was ready to adhere my balloon to the chippy.
To add detail to the top of the balloon, I created a net out of gauze coloured with mist, and adhered wire and flowers, as well as a banner from the Dream Cards paper.
To build my background, I started with a piece of Susan's Dream paper trimmed to the size of the canvas then set about creating my landscape by tearing hills from Ginger's Dream.
What would a scene of a hot air balloon be without drifting clouds? To create texture on the Cloudy Skies chippies, I used some snow texture paste.
Blue Fern Studios Products:
Ombre Dreams Papers:
- Susan's Dream
- Ginger's Dream
- Charlotte's Dream x2
- Dream Cards
Chipboard:
- Olga's Balloon
- Cloudy Skies
- The Optimist Word Set
