Thursday, August 26, 2010

Altered Cafe

Last week Angela and I went thrift store shopping which was amazing! We bought sooooo much! Well I found this sign for 49 cents and had to have it. I sort of started or rather wanted to start a coffee/café theme in my kitchen.


However the colors in my kitchen include blue, brown, orange and white. So I needed to alter this sign to fit well in my kitchen. My walls are blue so I didn’t want much blue in this sign. The mug on it has some blue in it….perfect….now I have to change all the black. I figured I could paint the frame in a white wash then around the mug I would paint orange and add in some brown detail. So to start I taped off the chalk board and mug area and used some white paint we had left over from when we moved into our house. I dipped my brush in water before dipping it into the paint to water it down. After 3 coats I got the coverage I was looking for. Then I distressed the edges with a sanding brick.


Next I removed the tape. I did have some paint that got under the tape over the chalk board area so I used some nail polish remover to clean it off. Then I used the same white paint without adding water as a primer to the black background and used a heating tool to dry it.


Next I began mixing colors to get an orange that I liked..to be honest it’s a little brighter than I was looking for but I’m not too worried about it. Now the surface is very smooth which left me with brush strokes and removal of paint of areas that were still wet. To remedy this I used my heating tool to dry it (after I put one coat of orange paint on) and I appliedpaint in small areas and dried it with the heating tool then moved on..this really worked out well. Then I just used some brown paint and randomly formed a design. Finally I used a brown ink pad to ink around the distressed edges. Before I knew it I was done.


I think it turned out really well. I think this is the first time I really took an item to alter it and it turned out well without me getting frustrated and giving up…lol

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Admit One

So I’ve been practicing making mini albums…after discovering Marion Smith on the web (if you don’t know who she is check her out on you tube or her site www.pieceofcraft.com) I’ve been inspired to make mini albums. Because of Marion I’ve also discovered Tim Holtz who has been hiding under my nose for years. He makes a line of distressed scrapbooking material…to me they are both Gods! I’ve really enjoyed learning everything I have from Marion...my world of scrapbooking has grown which my husband hasn’t been too happy about when he saw the damage it did to our bank account. But I must say that I DID NOT pay full price for anything. I am a bargain shopper, always have been, and always will be. That should make him happy...but doesn’t...in any case...my discoveries have made my lonely, jobless summer fly by. But like they say, “all good things must come to an end” and my end will be in a few weeks as I have been officially offered a job! YAY! But I still plan on updating this, hopefully more than I do now, and will continue making my crafts that I sell on etsy. I’ve really had a lot of fun this summer discovering crafts, bargain finds, and myself. Anyways I just wanted to show you a mini album I made, that was suggested by my husband (shocked? Me too). He wanted an album that we could put our movie and concert tickets in. I have saved them since we first started dating so we have 5 years worth. With the help of Tim Holtz’s grunge board, some acrylic paint, mod podge and the zutter bind-it-all (another thing Marion has shown me) I made this mini album. I just have it put together and I haven’t started putting the tickets in yet but I will...eventually.