Dream On

Good afternoon!  I hope everyone had a great weekend!  We are finally getting some gorgeous fall weather, and I just want to get out and decorate for Halloween.

But before I start that, I want to show you what I have made using a yard sale find--a little wooden house.  I had to clean it up a bit before I could distress it to creepy, run-down perfection. Craft Hoarders Anonymous wants us to drag out our hoarded fall-themed (mine is Halloween) items to make a project to share with them for their challenge Happy Fall, Y'All. I have a few of those!

The latest challenge at Frilly and Funkie is A Haunting Halloween. Be sure to stop by the blog and check out all those fantastic scary works of art by the design team. Everyone who enters the challenge will have a chance to win a generous $25 shopping spree at The Wonderful Funkie Junkie!  I made this project as a Halloween haunted house, in honor of my daughter, who loves miniatures and Halloween.  This measures approximately 15 x 7 inches. The inspiration behind it is my departed Dad, but he did not believe in nor celebrate Halloween because of his religious beliefs, so there is no written reference to Halloween on it out of respect to him.

 I painted the outer walls and bottom with gesso. When dry, I inked with Distress ink. I then swiped texture paste through a stencil by Prima, and allowed this to dry.  Again, I inked with a variety of Distress Inks. My intent is to mimic old stone walls with mildew on them. This is on the bottom, also.

Next I papered the interior walls.  For the attic I used a spider web printed paper from my stash.  For the parlor, I used a patterned paper from Recollections and dirtied it up a little with Distress inks and curled it to look like it peels away from the walls. I glued some trim between the two papers and added the  owl from my stash.

The paper I used for the "basement" is a Michael's receipt I accidentally ran through the laundry this summer. (Michael's just oozes arts and crafts!)  I thought it looked like cobwebs and  saved it for a Halloween project. Perfect for this!  I slopped in some glue and sprinkled some embossing powder over it to look like dirt.

I had not added the "dirt" yet.  This looks red, but must be the flash.  There is no red!

I painted my "hardwood floor" using my finger to blend Distress paints and using a dry brush technique over that.  It's a shame to cover the hardwoods up with a rug--a crocheted doily stained with Distress stains.

I installed Tim's Idea-ology lantern and ran the cord through a hole in the back. The light seemed too bright for my haunted house, so I layered over some vintage lace I had in my lace hoard--no altering needed!

Next,  I made my chimney.  I embossed card stock with Tim's brick wall Texture Fade, and swiped on some gesso in random areas using a piece of cardboard.  Once dry, I inked with Distress inks and glued this onto the chimney.  I applied black texture paste to the top.  I made "flashing" with copper ink on orange paper and wiped with metallic rubs.  Most of it ended up being covered by the shingles, but can be seen here.

I made about 150 shingles out of a cereal box using Tim's Effect Powders technique from his  Compendium of Curiosities Vol. 3 (Tea Stain and Peeled Paint powders). I painted the backs and edged each with black soot.  Each shingle was curled a little and glued into place.

I wanted to hang some portraits on the walls, sinceI found some great miniature frames in my stash hoard of frames. A new fun challenge over at Linda Ledbetter's Studio L3 Compendium of Curiosities 3, Challenge 12 is to use Tim's Distress Photo Tinting technique found on page 41 of Compendium of Curiosities Vol. 3.  Entries to this challenge must use the technique as it's presented in the book.  I can't tell you how it's done out of respect to Tim.  You can order your copy of the book directly from Tim, and he will autograph it for you, and you can try this technique for yourself! You'll love what you can do with it!

A Curiosity Crew Choice winner will receive an awesome assortment of Tim's products courtesy of Tim and Mario.  The Funkie Junkie Boutique is sponsoring Challenge 12, and Linda Coughlin,  the generous owner of the Funkie Junkie, has a fabulous $25 shopping spree to one lucky CC3Cer! Be sure to check out all the inspiration over at Studio L3, as the design team has worked their magic with this technique!

Here are the portraits I made using Tim's Distress Photo Tinting technique. I used photos out of a book on Bonnie and Clyde, and followed Tim's instructions exactly as they appear on page 41 of his book. The paper  in my Bonnie and Clyde book was perfect for this technique. I framed them in the plastic frames which I altered using Distress paint and metallic rubs to make them appear to be metal.  The "glass" in them was made using another technique out of CC3, using throw away (ha!) plastic from some item or another.

There is no blue on this; that is a shadow from the candelabra!

My chandelier is  new (!) from Paper Studio, which I painted with Distress paints, inks and Stickles.  I popped it up using a slice of the foam insert that comes in Texture Fades and adhesive foam.  I used a section of ball and chain from my stash to "hang" my chandelier; it already was the perfect shade of grunge.  I glued it onto florist wire to give it rigidity and then to Rexlace before gluing it to the background. My owl sitting in the "rafters" is repurposed from an old "cute" Halloween project from years past.

I glued two black glittered pumpkins together from a spray I had in my stash and added them in a corner.

The candlestick is a game piece from my favorite game (I have a box full of old game pieces--they just don't make them like they used to!), and I made the candle from melted wax and Distress ink.

Mr. Skeleton is relatively new to me from a local craft store, toned down with a little Distress ink--  his dreamy eyes popped with Liquid Pearls and Stickles. I have many skeletons in my Closet.  I fell in love with him the first time I set eyes on him, and knew he had to be a part of my Closet skeleton collection. Well, he's out of the Closet, now!

I made my poison bottle using a technique  from Tim's CC3 book, and the "poison" label was cut from his Seasonal Paper stash.  My poison is a homemade concoction using Lumin Arte paint. The bottle is an old innoculation vessel from a veterinarian.

In the "basement", I added a rubber rat I dug out of my Halloween "creepy closet". I inked him with Distress ink to make him really grungy. The three tarantulas, which started life as tiny harmless plastic spiders  are also from my Halloween hoard. I used a little clay embossing powder and hit them quickly with my heat gun.  When I applied the heat they started to move!!! Eek!  The spider web is from my stash of Halloween papercrafting stuff, which is different from my Halloween hoard. (Big smile--you should SEE my Halloween closet!) You can see the tiny headstones I added to the bottom of the basement using texture paste and a stencil from Hampton Arts and inked with Distress inks.

Sorry for the blurries.  Didn't realize it when I took it.  Maybe it's best...way too creepy!

No haunted house would be complete without a full moon and a bat.

                                       

 A Vintage Journey has a new challenge--Heavy Metal.  The design team would like us to share our artwork with anything metal in it in Tim's style. For the winner there is a 10L shopping voucher from Country View Crafts.

  In addition to the metallic look to the frames, the "copper flashing" around the chimney,  the ball and chain, the metallic painted chandelier, metal candlestick, Idea-ology,  and the curled wire attaching the bat, I have also used  the metal foil  liner from an artificial sweetener package which I have glued onto a cereal box to back my vellum "moon".  My intent was to use foil backed paper, but it was too small for my needs. This worked just as well, and provided a nice glow to my moon. The moon itself was cut from metallic gold vellum and highlighted with Perfect Pearls in violet, swiped on over Perfect Medium.  I stamped an owl from Martha Stewart using Staz On ink, and highlighted his eyes with Stickles.  The black glittery bat is from my stash, and I attached him to the chimney with wire which I curled around a pencil. I also attached one wing with foam tape to the moon (he kept trying to fly away!).

Lastly I've glued on an Idea-ology word plate and 2 metal brads, which I've clipped the ends off and glued onto the plate.  I highlighted the words using Tim's technique of swiping on Distress paint and after drying some, wiping off the excess.

I think I've used Tim's style quite a bit in my project through use of many of his techniques and products.

I hope you have enjoyed looking at my haunted house as much as I did making it.

I would like to enter this into the following challenges:
Studio L3 Compendium of Curiosities 3, Challenge 12
A Vintage Journey Heavy Metal-Challenge #16
Frilly and Funkie "A Haunting Halloween Challenge"
Craft Hoarders Anonymous Challenge #17 "Happy Fall, Y'all"
Country View Challenges "Sparkle and Shine"
Rhedds Creative Spirit "Halloween or Not?" (Definitely Halloween!)
Artist Trading Post Exchange Anything Mixed Media Goes
Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Falling in Love With... (Mr. Skeleton!)
Inspiration Journal October Challenge "In Disguise" (My cereal box  and artificial sweetner packaging is disguised as a moon, my cereal box is also disguised as shingles, my store receipt is disguised as the walls, floor and ceiling of my basement...etc, etc. etc.)
Please visit all these blogs to see the wonderful, creative inspiration from all the design teams!