A Fun Friendly Challenge......Week 1 and it's Frames!

Hello Everyone,

A little group of friends and I decided last year was a very poor year for our creative endeavours so we decided to have our own private little challenge this year with a prompt each week to kick us off.  Not sure how long we will manage to keep it up before life gets in the way and we can opt out of the odd week if we don't like a particular prompt (drawn out of a 'hat') but I've really enjoyed this first one where the prompt was 'FRAMES' to be interpreted in any way we chose.

 I decided to decorate a large MDF tag (5.5" x 10")...I am determined to use up more of my unloved stash this year and this has been a very good start! 

First I covered it with a lovely designer paper I have been hoarding for several years.  Its from a pad I created our Daughter's Wedding stationery from 7 yrs ago.  I added some stencilling using Distress Inks and some light stamping using Versafine Inks (second generation) and PaperArtsy Mini stamps.  For once I remembered to ink round the edges before I stuck everything on.  My usual trick is to forget till the very end which is sooo tedious, lol! I then found the perfect use for one of my Tim Holtz Botanicals 😄

Unfortunately I forgot to take pics of the various stages I did to cover my lovely frames 

 which I have also had in my wood and chipboard embellishments for an age.  Both were from the Basics range at Hobbycraft.   Click on the pic for a better look but I was really chuffed with the way they turned out.  I used a couple of coats of DecoArt White Tinting Base followed by their crackle medium (can't remember which one, lol) and finally their Antiquing Cream, first a brown one rubbed back with a wetwipe, then the same with grey.  I backed both frames with co-ordinating paper (from the same pad) having first stuck the TH Paper Doll image to the larger piece.  I added a very light hint of colour to some areas of the image and added the butterflies which are also from the Botanicals.

Before I stuck the frames to the tag I added some shadowing down one side of the flower with a carbon pencil then raided my stash for suitable flowers and flourishes.  I think the flowers were old Prima designs and the flourishes were from Ally Pally last year from a company I had never come across before miszmaszpapierowy.com.pl.  They had some beautiful designs but they are extremely delicate and cut from a thickish paper product so I knew they wouldn't take much wet medium like sprays so instead I used PaperArtsy Fresco Finish paints to colour them. I then stuck the frames and other elements down with Heavy Gloss Gel Medium.

I then rooted around for a suitable quote and found this one on a Wendy Vecchi set  (another sadly neglected item in my collection).  I stamped it twice on a scrap of the background paper with grey Archival Ink, cut it up and inked the edges before sticking it to the tag.

A final look at the dimension on the bottom of the tag.

I love watching Marta Lapkowska's YouTube videos (Maremi's Small Art) while I am crafting and there's quite a bit of inspiration from her in this tag not least of which is to 'USE YOUR STASH'!

Well, that's it for today!  I hope you like my tag and I'm now wondering what our prompt will be for this coming week.  I'm scheduling this post so we'll find out the next when this goes live just after 1:00 pm today 😀.  See you again soon!

Hugs

Lesley  Xx