Take a leaf out of my book...

Hello all, Alison (butterfly) here with an autumn mini-journal for you.  There's time for a last breath of autumn before we kick into gear for Christmas, isn't there?!

I had great fun altering this little papier mâché book (8 x 11cm, and there's an even tinier one still to come), and creating a mini-album to go inside.

I started by covering it with some Tim Holtz tissue wrap, leaving the "edges of the pages" just with a coat of gesso (thick enough and on a hard bristled brush, so you get some "pages" showing - I'll see if I can find a picture showing that later).

Next step was to stamp the new Leaves Background onto the front and back covers.  I used lots of Archival inks on the stamp: Sepia, Sienna, Coffee and Plum, all blended on there.

Distress Inks next: Vintage Photo, Gathered Twigs, and probably some Rusty Hinge if I remember correctly.

I ended up giving it a coat of medium to seal it, which meant some of the Distress Inks faded a bit with the brush strokes, but I'm fine with that, as it brought the leaves to the fore again.

Time to create what's going inside.  I cut some pages to size (pretty much ATC-size) and did some wrinkle-free distress technique with lots of warm golden brown inks and stains.  I also added a couple of spritzes of Perfect Pearls Heirloom Gold to the craft mat before smooshing through with the pages, so you get a lovely golden shimmer in places.

I used the gorgeous new Journalling Words #5, one per page - it's the US version of "journaling" with one "l", but I guess I can work with that!  Just love all those fonts.

On the reverse sides I used some of the new Katy Fox stamps - the Leaves...

... and the Dates, again stamped in Archival inks, mainly Coffee and Sepia.  Apologies, this was all done after dark - how early is it getting dark already?! - so these are flash photos.

So, enough of the process, let's see some photos of the finished thing by daylight, shall we?

I love that the spine looks like a real old leather volume, burnished with age.

I added some Tim Holtz Remnant Rubs to the cover.

And look how the mini-album nestles just inside the book.

Here's a close-up of that cover, also using the leaves background and some Rock Candy crackle paint.

More crackle paint inside the cover of the box, with layers of autumnal paint shades.

And here are some of the internal pages.  I interleaved them with some hand-made paper pages, and added some stamping using my all-time favourite Calligraphy Mat, number 19!

Oh, almost forgot... here's the promised shot of the "pages" - click for a close-up if you need to!

So that's probably my farewell to autumnal crafting for this year - it's always a sheer pleasure to play with these colours and images, but with the temperature dropping rapidly and Advent Sunday almost upon us, it's probably time to let go soon!

Thank you for stopping by, and I hope you enjoyed taking a leaf out of my book (sorry, appalling pun, but it tickled me!).  If you've already moved on to sparklier times, you could come and play along in our Christmas challenge this month at The Artistic Stamper - you've still got about a week to go.  Hope to see you there!

Ingredients used:

Artistic Stamper Stamps: Katy Fox - Leaves, Dates; Backgrounds - Leaves; Calligraphy Mat #19;

Papier Mâché Book

Tim Holtz Remnant Rubs

Distress Inks - Vintage Photo, Gathered Twigs, Rusty Hinge

Archival Inks - Sepia, Coffee, Sienna, Plum

Perfect Pearls Mist - Heirloom Gold

Tim Holtz Tissue Wrap

Claudine Hellmuth - Multi-Medium and Gesso

I am creating

Hello all, it's Alison (butterfly) here, with a hanging to share.  I've used some of the brand new Journalling Words stamps on this one.  If you haven't seen Jennie's fabulous new releases, check them out here... and don't forget there's a brand new line of Artistic Stamper masks too!

Back to the hanging... this was one of those makes where I just sat down and let it flow.  It was made in 5 minute segments, over several days, in between sorting and packing boxes, but oh my word, those minutes were lovely!  And I even like the finished piece too!

Because of the five-minute-flow-process, and the fact that my brain is really elsewhere at present, I'm afraid I haven't got any 'making-of' photos, but I'll show you some details and let you know approximately what I got up to as we go.

I started with the tag, doing a Distress Paint and Distress Stain combination with the wrinkle-free distress technique.  You get lovely swirls of combined opacity and translucence - solid paint colours and glowing inks - and all in my favourite blues and greens.  I then used some Broken China and Peacock Feathers Distress Inks to ink over the top, and then spritz and flicked with water to add extra texture to the layers of colour.

Next step was some Picket Fence Distress Paint applied through one of the new Tim Holtz stencils.  (I started the hanging before the new Artistic Stamper releases were out or I could have used one those new masks!)

And I then stamped the lovely Tim Holtz meadow grasses in Cornflower Blue Archival (one of the new Wendy Vecchi colours).

I used Fresco paints to add some extra detailing to the flower heads, starting with Snowflake and adding South Pacific for some turquoise colour.  Then I added some even finer detailing using the Inkssentials white pen.  I love how they've ended up.

I stamped the Tim Holtz bird in Wendy Vecchi's Potting Soil, and used the white pen again to add highlights to the image.

The final step with the tag was to add some texture stamping, for which I used the TH Postcard stamp and one of my favourite Pink Paislee music advertisement stamps from my stash.

Next, it was on to the background and what else but corrugated cardboard?  I started with a good coat of white paint, and then added Grunge Paste through the same Cargo Letters stencil as on the tag.

I blended some Mowed Lawn and Broken China Distress Ink over them, and then added some texture stamping using the fabulous Artistic Stamper Mini Dots and Sequin Waste.

I used Distress Stains and a water brush to add some 'watercolour' inky detailing in the grooves of the cardboard - really love this!

I added some Tim Holtz Remnant Rubs, matching the Postcard to the Postcard stamp on the tag...

...and generally "keeping an eye" on things.  I didn't want the Remnant Rubs to be quite as vibrantly black as they were, so I put a light wash of white paint over them, as well as inking them to blend in with their surroundings.

I was delighted to find that I could get these flourish transfers (sorry, that's what we used to call them when I was little) down into the grooves of the corrugated card too!

The words are stamped onto another tag that I'd done some wrinkle-free distress technique on - again with the combination of paints and stains.

The big create is embossed in Bright White over Versamark ink.

The new stamps - I am creating - are stamped in the Cornflower Blue Archival and then clear embossed.

I never tire of how the light catches on the glossy embossing - I love embossing my words!

So, a bit of Paper Distresser action around all my spare edges, and some torn, inked edges in other places and, of course, some Distress Stain dyed seam binding (but of course) and we're done.

Can't tell you how much joy creating this provided in the midst of chaos and turmoil all around.  I hope it gives you just as much pleasure to look at!

Thanks so much for stopping by today.  Do come and play along in our Alter Something challenge this month,  We'd love to see you there... but for now, I'll just wish you happy crafting, and go and get on with some more box-shifting.  At least the end is in sight now... only a week to go, and then we have to be done, like it or not!!

Ingredients used:

Artistic Stamper Stamps: Journalling Words 2 and Journalling Words 5, Mini Polka Dot, Sequin Waste Open Size
Various Tim Holtz stamps by Stampers Anonymous
Cargo Layering Stencil
Grunge Paste
Distress Paints
Distress Stains
Distress Inks
Idea-ology Remnant Rubs
Fresco Finish Paints
Inkssentials White Pen
Seam Binding