Nuts About You

Hello!  I hope you have enjoyed a fun and restful weekend.  I'm happy you are visiting my blog.

Frilly and Funkie is challenging us to create a vintage project that has hearts as the focal image.  They will draw a random winner from the entries who will receive a wonderful $25 shopping spree at The Funkie Junkie Boutique.

Use a flourish on your project which shows a strong Tim Holtz influence is the current challenge at A Vintage Journey. The Creative Guides will choose a winner, who will receive a shopping voucher from Country View Crafts on-line shop.

So here is the project I made to include the hearts as my focal image and flourishes on a Tim Holtz inspired project. I believe I have shown a strong Tim Holtz influence on this piece through using many of his different products and techniques. Because it is made for my husband, I wanted it to be more grungy and masculine despite the hearts and flourishes.

I started with a brown wood frame from my stash, sanded it down, leaving just a hint of the brown.  I distressed it with Distress Inks and added 2 metal sentiments from my stash. I wiped some Distress paint on then wiped it off after a few minutes so it would stay in the indentations only. I used Tim's Alterations On the Edge Brackets die and paper from his Crowded Attic paper stash to make the layers at the very top and very bottom.  These were distressed with Distress Ink and layered on over the background using cardboard to separate them and give them depth.

 I painted some nuts from my husband's stash (shhhh!) with alcohol inks, and put a few in Tim's Idea-ology bottle along with a grungeboard heart. (I love these bottles, and I have an old Mason jar full of them) I glued the cork in and wrapped with some scrap fibers. A scrap of mesh ribbon backs it. More nuts added to the background layers.

The hearts and flourish are from Grungeboard Elements, which I must have had for a zillion years. I ran some pink paper through my Big Kick with a Cuttlebug embossing folder, traced the hearts and cut them out. I glued them to the Grungeboard and distressed with Distress Inks and edged in gold  paint pen. (I used a nail file to sand off any excess paper on the edges.) I did this for all four hearts.  I stamped the flourish die cut with tiny script from Tim's Urban Grunge stamp set in Archival ink, distressed with Distress Ink and edged in the gold pen.  I backed the entire piece with a vintage dictionary page, which you can see peeking out in the next photo.

The letters are from Tim's Ransom Alpha Parts.  I painted them with Copper Paint Dabber using my finger to apply, dried and covered with a generous layer of Glossy Accents. "About" is a Chit Chat sticker edged in Walnut.

 The background is Tim's Kraft Core card stock run through with his Damask Texture Fade (I couldn't find my Flourish Texture Fade, but I know it's around here somewhere--just no time to look for it now).  Sanded off the high spots.  I used various thicknesses of foam adhesive squares to give different depths to the various embellishments and in some cases I used layers of cardboard to build up the layers.

close up to show detail of distressed frame and  card stock layers

 On the back, I attached a vintage dictionary page with the definition of love--the entry "circled" with the heart stamp from Tim's Heartfelt  set . I  stamped a flowery flourish image and sentiment from the same set and added a little Distress Ink for color.  All images stamped in Archival.  I finished with a coat of Matte Mod Podge.

I think I have a head start on my Valentine's "cards" this year!  I hope I can remember I already made this for my husband!

Thank you for stopping in!  I enjoy sharing my work with you and look forward to reading all your comments! They always make me smile and inspire my creativity.

I am entering this into the following challenges:  Frilly and Funkie From the Heart Challenge and A Vintage Journey Challenge #14 With a Flourish.