Valentine's Memory Box Tutorial

Hello and welcome, it's Julie here from Juliz Design Post sharing with you my first tutorial at That Craft Place. I was lucky enough to attend an Andy Skinner Workshop last year where I learned lots of different techniques. You will see many of them on You Tube. This keepsake box uses some of his techniques and inspiration of my own, so let's get started.

I have had this little box that measures approximately 3 x 6 inches in my craft stash for a while and just knew it would look amazing teamed up with products and Bespoke MDF from Lisa's shop.

I started by giving my box a sand to get rid of any rough edges and applied my paint with a square of Cut and Dry Foam, which gives a much smoother finish.

I prefer to apply a thin layer of this product with my finger rather than a brush. Be patient waiting on this drying as using a heat gun it can start to bubble.

I next started to apply a medium layer of Crackle Paint with a brush, the magic begins almost immediately. Andy Skinner calls this his mega crackle technique.

Once dry I gave this a layer of varnish to seal the crackle.

Now where the fun begins to make this box look aged. I brushed over with a very watered down mix of Paper Artsy's gold paint and dried with my heat gun.

I rubbed over my whole box with my anti static bag (this stops powder sticking where you don't want it to) and rubbed around the edges with an embossing ink pad. Adding a mix of gold and bronze embossing powders and heating setting in place. Next highlighting the edges with a little more red paint to define. 

Next I pressed my embossing ink onto my MDF Hinges and added gold shades of embossing powder. I started to melt with the heat gun and kept adding and sprinkling Distress Powder in Vintage Photo and a Verdigris shade until I was happy with the result.

Finishing them off with a little black paint scuffed over the edges with a baby wipe.

I used Craft Consortium's Red Roses Decoupage papers to line the inside of my box. My MDF Hearts were painted with the same red paint, I then added some embossing powder around the edges of the hearts in the same way I did the outer box. Next I added a layer of Deco Art Clear Crackle Glaze. Once dry I rubbed over with Deco Art White Antiquing Cream to highlight the cracks and added Ranger Chit Chat stickers.

My Cheery Lynn Photo Frames ( B673 Film Set ) were die cut out in Black Cardstock and heat embossed with clear powder to look like camera film. I used my scratchy tool on my Tim Holtz Lost Relatives photos to shabby them up.

The flat button from Creative Expressions I highlighted with a little Gilding Wax and added some red paint to my MDF word and glued both in place with Cosmic Shimmer Glue.   

All the products used on my box are available at That Craft Place. I hope you enjoyed my tutorial and feel inspired to try out these techniques with the designs.

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I would love if you have time to leave a comment. 

Crafty Hugs,

Julie x

                                                   

Heart Wreath Tutorial

Hello everyone. 

It's NICOLA here today to show you a tutorial. I am going to show you how I decorated this beautiful MDF heart wreath.

First of all, here is the product list of everything I have used on my project...of course available from my favourite THAT CRAFT PLACE 

MDF Heart Wreath  ~ Gesso ~ Cosmic Shimmer Crackle Paint's in shades Saffron, Vanilla, Corinth Blue ~ Tim Holtz Distress Inks in shades Tea Dye, Antique Linen, Shaded Lilac ~ Creative Expressions Metallic Gilding Wax in shades Graceful Mustard, Cast Bronze, Pewter ~ Cosmic Shimmer Acrylic Glue ~ Collall 3D Glue ~ Petal Lu Flowers

The butterfly embellishment and the vintage brooch are what I already had in my crafty stash!

Step by Steps...

1. Paint the wreath and hearts with gesso.

2. Paint the wreath circle and large hearts with Vanilla Crackle Paint. Paint the heart frames with Corinth Blue Crackle Paint. Paint the smaller hearts with Saffron Crackle Paint. Leave to dry overnight.

When it's thoroughly dried you will be able to see the cracks that have appeared.

3. Use the Antique Linen Distress ink and a blending tool to dab over the Vanilla hearts. Use the Tea Dye ink and dab over the saffron hearts. Use the Shaded Lilac ink and dab over the Corinth Blue heart frames. You will see how this really shows up the cracks more. 

4. Use your finger to rub Graceful Mustard Gilding Wax on the edges of the circle and the Vanilla hearts. Rub lightly over the circle and the hearts with the wax too. Rub over the wax using kitchen paper to remove any excess wax, and to buff the wax up. Use the same techniques with the Cast Bronze on the Saffron hearts and the Pewter on the Corinth Blue heart frames.

*If you find your guilding waxes have dried out and gone quite hard, add a tiny amount of turpentine into the pot, leave for about 10 minutes. This should then have softened the gilding wax ready to use.

* A little tip for getting into small corners and crevices with your gilding wax ~ use a cotton bud. I stick the bud into the wax pot to pick up a smalll blob of the wax. I then force the blob into the corner and push it into it using the bud. If it is a smaller corner than a bud will fit into, I then use a cocktail stick. 

5. Now to glue the hearts onto the wreath. Depending on how you wish to hang your wreath, if you want to use a ribbon or twine, now is the time to thread it through the hole at the top. This is because we will be glueing a heart over the hole. I want to hang my wreath with the hole straight onto a hook on my wall, so I'm not going to use any ribbon.

Before you start to glue, lay all your hearts on the wreath until you are happy with the position. 

Once you are happy with the position, start to glue them in place with the acrylic glue. Leave to dry.

6. To finish, glue into the heart frames the flowers using the 3D glue. Glue the ornate butterfly to the top middle heart and the vintage brooch to the bottom middle heart. These two embellishements I already had in my stash, you could use whatever you already have. 

I love these colours together. I wanted to show you that you can mix cool and warm tones together and they can look really nice and pretty!

The great thing about crafting and art ~ you can use whatever your heart desires!

I hope you have enjoyed my tutorial, I look forward to the next one.

Lot's of love 

Nicola 

XXX

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