Altered Art: Etched Brush Pots

Posted on 3rd January 2018 by perfectly4med

Happy New Year! I have a new year intention (I don’t do resolutions, too much pressure) to have a studio clear out and tidy up. As a first step, I decided to replace my water pots for use in classes. Inexpensive Ikea smoked glasses caught my eye – stable and weighty, perfect! Of course, I couldn’t just leave them unadorned…

A little work on some typography, vinyl cutting on my Silhouette and a generous dollop of Armor Etch and my etched brush pots are complete. One features a caution symbol and ‘contains paint’, specifically targeted at one of my studio guests who can mistake her glass of water for the painty water pot. Another has the steps required for cleaning a brush. The third has all the words I could find in the thesaurus connected with cleaning a brush. And the fourth has phrases playing around with the whole brush pot concept, such as ‘clean brush, cloudy water’ and ‘colours in suspense’.

Bearing this in mind, tidying the studio is going to take forever if at each point I have an idea I then implement, making a mess in the process…

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Tutorial: That’s Crafty! Art Shrine

Posted on 10th October 2017 by perfectly4med

I don’t know how much of this art shrine sample was shown on TV last week… I certainly didn’t have enough time to demonstrate how I put it together, so here comes a tutorial to follow if you want to make your own 🙂

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Art Journal: Despite the dark

Posted on 10th September 2017 by perfectly4med

I’m a subscriber to Art Journaling magazine from Stampington, and every now and then a featured article catches my eye. Reading the fine print revealed that this particular journal was based on a mixed media class available online from Donna Downey (Metamorphosis).

Between TV shows I can normally fit in a couple of weeks for my own projects, subject to other calls on my time. This time round I managed to take some quality art time for myself, signed up for the class and completed my journal.

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That’s Crafty! Show Samples: Christmas

Posted on 22nd August 2017 by perfectly4med

Following on from yesterday’s post, here are the Christmas demo samples I made for the live Hochanda shows. Unfortunately, we seemed to enter a time warp for the final hour, and there was not much time to go through all the demos I had lined up.

Merry Christmas Wreath

That’s Crafty! Surfaces MDF Wreaths and Baubles Set
That’s Crafty! Surfaces Bits & Pieces Greyboard: Christmas Sentiments 2
That’s Crafty! Surfaces Bits & Pieces Greyboard: Holly & Mistletoe
That’s Crafty! Surfaces Bits & Pieces Greyboard: Christmas Florals 2
That’s Crafty! Multi Surface Paint: Christmas Red / Green / Purple / White
That’s Crafty! Multi Surface Paint: Antique Gold / Gold / Silver
That’s Crafty! Multi Purpose Craft Adhesive Pen

Try mixing different colours to make shades of green – red for a warm brown, purple for a rich evergreen. Use Craft Adhesive for a doming glaze over the berries, and a glaze for the leaves.

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That’s Crafty! Show Samples: Autumn

Posted on 21st August 2017 by perfectly4med

As always, a quiet blog usually means frenetic activity in The Studio. The start of this month has been no different, with not two, but three live hours of craft TV demos to prepare for. And, as usual, there was a press embargo on sharing the products, or the samples, until the live shows aired.

So, without further ado, here are my samples for the Hochanda shows that aired on 18th August 2017. Please let me know if you’d like fuller instructions on how to make any of these, I’ll see what I can do. Later this week, I’ll also do a review of the new That’s Crafty! Multi Surface paints based on what I learnt making the samples.

’tis the season

That’s Crafty! Multi Surface Paint: Black / Christmas Red / Yellow / Brown
That’s Crafty! Multi Surface Paint: Metallic Gold
That’s Crafty! Bits & Pieces Greyboard: Acorns and Leaves / Leaves
That’s Crafty! Bits & Pieces Greyboard: Christmas Sentiments 1
That’s Crafty! Surfaces Set of 2 MDF Shadow Boxes [small] That’s Crafty! Multi Purpose Craft Adhesive Pen

Use the Craft Adhesive as a doming glaze for the berries. The metallic gold adds a little bit of shine to the leaves.

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Magazine Article: Junk Drawer Journal

Posted on 1st August 2017 by perfectly4med

Today sees the publication of my first magazine project. It’s a Junk Drawer Journal, in association with That’s Crafty!, and is published in this month’s Mixed Up magazine. Mixed Up mag is an digital only publication. The digital format means that many articles can also include interactive elements such as videos and slideshows that wouldn’t be possible in a paper version.

I’m allowed to share little sneak peeks to whet your creative appetite, so I do hope they prompt you to go get your copy to see my step-by-step guide to making the project.
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Altered Art: Enamelled Mugs

Posted on 22nd July 2017 by perfectly4med

You know how it is… you’re idly scrolling through your Facebook timeline and up pops one of these videos. Five Minute Crafts. Crafty Mom. Tasty. I got drawn in by one on marbling (always something I have been fascinated by) using nail varnish on water. It looked so simple. So I had a go at doing some enamelled mugs.

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TV Sneak Peeks: teasers for Friday’s shows

Posted on 14th June 2017 by perfectly4med

It’s not long before I am on your screens again, demonstrating the latest release of products from That’s Crafty! To whet your appetite, here are a few more teasers…

I have to get up at silly o’clock on Friday morning, so forgive me if I’m not quite awake for the 8am show – but hopefully by the 2pm show I will have stopped yawning! There’s a lot to pack into the shows, so make sure you record them as I’ll be demo’ing rather fast…

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Art Journals: using acrylic covers – part 2

Posted on 2nd May 2017 by perfectly4med

I promised to share my ‘now you see me, now you don’t’ technique for acrylic covers that didn’t quite get finished on air during my last Hochanda shows for That’s Crafty!. Below are some instructions along side the pics I took prior to the shows, and below those is a short video I have done to try and explain it a little more clearly! Apologies for the outside noises on the video – they’re wind chimes and a radiator warming up, if you’re wondering.

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Art Journal Page: Marvellous Mandalas

Posted on 1st May 2017 by perfectly4med

The theme for tonight’s art journal session at The Studio is ‘marvellous mandalas’. I have played on various software platforms and drawn my own mandalas, but the example below is ripped out from one of the many ‘adult’ colouring books available. I remembered that I had a couple of sets of Chameleon pens, so used those to colour in the mandala (that’s how I got the shading). Bit of gluing and cutting out of letters and my sample was done… though it took a fair bit longer than I expected – I think it’s the pausing to do the whole Chameleon effect doubling the colouring time. Very calming though, all that pausing.

Colouring on white paper and then cutting and pasting onto the black background seems to make the colours pop far more. A little more thought and time would have resulted in better placement of the quote, but it’s not that bad.