Hello everyone, Anne here and I am pleased to bring you the latest Destination Inspiration post here at A Vintage Journey. My topic this time is Recycled Packaging and I hope you will feel inspired to do some recycling yourself.
I am the first to admit that I hoard lots of Tim Holtz/Ranger goodies in my craft room but there are times when I run out of things. Recently I ran out of one of my all time favourite products - Ranger's Clearly for Art (CFA). I had to find a substitute for a project that needed to be done in a hurry - so I looked at my extensive stock of plastic Idea-ology packaging (I save it all!) - and just experimented - and it worked! I should say here that I am not giving up using CFA but if you need a quick substitute..... this does work.
This is a plastic case for some Idea-ology pieces, I cut it up into flat pieces, along with some other packages and put these to one side for die cutting later.
I took some colours of Distress Ink and put them directly onto the craft mat.
I dragged my card through the stains, do this more than once if necessary. You can see that my card 'bubbled' slightly but I quite like the effect and it will not detract from the finished result.
Add some more colour with Distress Inks and give it a spritz with a darker colour - in this case I used the new Distress Spray Stain in Walnut Stain. It gives a lovely 'aged' look.
Cut a variety of leaves from both the plastic packaging and your coloured card. I did them separately because my pieces of plastic were all quite small.
Glue the plastic to the paper/card leaves and run these through an embossing folder - surprisingly the embossing was still very pronounced even though the plastic is quite thick. I used the Jumbo Leaf embossing folder for all of the leaves.
Heat the leaves with your heat tool. At this point, by using plastic packaging they do get VERY HOT, so be very careful!! Before they cool down completely, shape them with your fingers to give them a more realistic look.
Create a background for them to sit on. This background was created using Distress Spray Stains in Mowed Lawn and Walnut Stain onto a piece of recycled Kraft card. It is so very easy to create a background quickly with the sprays.
Here is my finished autumnal/thanksgiving card. I was not too worried about the depth of the leaves because this card will be placed in a card box and given by hand.
I was enjoying myself so I carried on ......
This time I took a large piece of plastic and covered it with Tissue Wrap (Composer) using Ranger Glue and Seal to adhere it to the plastic. I sprayed the whole piece with Fired Brick and Mowed Lawn Distress Spray Stains. I use a large pizza box as a 'spray station' to avoid covering my whole desk with the stains.
I used Tim's Tattered Poinsettia and die cut three sets of flowers.
I used a small shot glass and heated the flower over this to give it some real shape. Don't forget it gets really, really hot so you need to leave it for a few moments before lifting it off or shaping it! Do the same with all the pieces.
This is how the flowers look when assembled. They are quite stiff and strong and hold their shape beautifully. They are not really practical to put on a card (unless you are putting it in a box) when they are shaped like this but they do look good.....
....as a Christmas decoration on a parcel (along with Tim's Jumbo Pinecone and some of the new Holiday Greens die cuts) to give as a gift.
I think that if the petals were given a coat of Ranger Glue N Seal then they would be perfect to add to a Holiday Wreath too - I may just try that next.....
Well I hope you enjoyed my experiment and that you might give it a try - just remember though, the plastic gets very hot and needs a moment or two to cool before you touch it. Thanks for looking!
All of the products I used can be purchased from our wonderful Sponsor, Country View Crafts and I have put links at the end of this post. Susan, the owner, gives the most amazing service, she is always well stocked with Tim Holtz and many other products, so do please visit.
Product List from Country View Crafts:
