It's a Creative World

Scrapbooked Ornaments!

I've always enjoyed making little Christmas ornaments and keepsakes incorporating different photos of my son and family. In the past this has always been time consuming, involving glass and metal tape and soldering.

I know I'm way behind the times, but recently I went to a lovely craft store which is local to me, The Craft Den, and I picked up some of these lovely little frames.

I had a play with them today and they are fab - you just unhinge them, put your artwork inside and clip them up.  No burnishing, no soldering, nothing! They make the whole job so quick and easy.  Here's what you need to do if you want to have a go.

Make two layouts or pieces of artwork measuring approximately 1 3/4" x 1 3/4".  You could use favourite snaps of your children, your wedding, or just make a little collage. 

I cut two pieces of acetate measuring 1 3/4" x 1 3/4" from a 12" x 12" sheet of Stampin' Up! thick acetate and sandwiched my layouts between them, back to back.

Attach a lovely matching ribbon to the top and there you have it!

I love this idea.  Using these frames makes the whole process so quick and easy, and yet they make such wonderful, thoughtful and yet inexpensive presents.  They could be used as ornaments for Christmas or just as general keepsakes for decoration all year round.

I hope you like this idea and it gives you a bit more inspiration for your Christmas gifts!

TFL! Joanne x
 

Homemade Frames

I bought some frames from Ikea a while ago.  They were in packs of two and made from mulberry paper.  Very nice and very cheap, but a bit bland.

I have loads of buttons from scrapping and cardmaking and I thought it would be nice to jazz the frames up a bit using these buttons.  The colours I've used for this one match my lounge. 

You could use all sorts to decorate this type of frame - Prima flowers, beads, felt, material, glitter.  I think it would be a great idea to get some for the kids to decorate.  They would make great gifts for family members with their latest school photo in for Christmas. 

If you haven't got an Ikea nearby, you could always use Papier Mache frames which they sell at Hobbycraft and most other craft shops.

Have fun experimenting! TFL! Joanne x

Embossed Mirror

Hi there, it’s Angela here again with another messy project!

Northern Ireland has finally got it’s own Ikea, so when I was visiting the other day, I came across this fabulous mirror for only 99p! So of course I grabbed a couple of them.

First of all I used Model Magic, which is a modeling clay made by crayola, which is extremely lightweight. Using the swirled embossing folder in the cuttlebug, I flattened out some pieces of Model Magic in random shapes. If you do this remember to place the folder with the join going in first, as the clay does flatten and extend, and could break the join in your folder (Voice of experience speaking here).

This produced fantastic results! I layered these onto the mirror, wrapping some over the edges, and left it to dry for 24 hours.

Once it had dried, most of the clay had adhered itself to the mirror, but some pieces were still loose – I added a small amount of PVA glue to stick them down, and again left this to dry.

Next I painted the entire frame with turquoise Lumiere Paint.

Once this was totally dry, I painted over the top with a Dark Blue Lumiere Paint, and while this was still wet, rubbed it over with a baby wipe – this removed some of the dark paint from the raised areas on the frame.

To add a little more sparkle, I sprayed the frame with Frosty Night Glimmer Mist. This tended to pool in some areas, so I dabbed them dry, as they would have taken ages to dry, and would not have given the look I was wanting.

I then over-stamped this all with a script text using purple stazon.

Once this was all dry, I adhered some microbeads randomly using baby blue liquid pearls.

Finally, I rubbed over the edge of the mirror and some small areas with Pewter Treasure’s gold (a type of rub-on wax) and the buffed it up with a soft cloth.

I hope this has inspired you to try something different with some of the tools you might already have around the house.

~angela~