No.13 ~ Amelia Hardy

Hello everyone!

Now, as many of you know I LOVE all things Halloween, so combine that with my other most wonderful time of the year, Christmas ~ I think you can definitely say, I am in my element when September approaches and I'm surrounded by all the wonderful new seasonal product from Tim Holtz! If you've followed this blog for a while, you'll also notice that I love creating home decor pieces that I can add to my collection and display around the home at this time of year and this year was no different because today I'm really excited to be sharing this project, created using a plethora of Halloween idea-ology.

I welcome you to No.13 ~ Amelia Hardy's Drug Store, a place of no return....

This was a piece that I had in mind as soon as I saw the latest release from Tim and saw those Zombie hands and I just knew I wanted to include those baubles in Halloween colours, it was something that i did in an earlier project which you can see here and loved the effect it created!

To start this project I took the largest vignette box and the matching vignette panel and painted them with Black Soot Distress Paint ~ inside, out and back and front. Once I'd got a good coverage on the wood, I allowed them to dry before dry brushing them with a little Picket Fence Distress Paint. There is quite a lot of drying time with this project, so you will need to have patience but it will be worth it in the end!

Setting these aside to dry thoroughly I moved onto the papers that would cover the box and for this I used Halloween Worn Wallpaper, cut into panels that would fit the back and front of my vignette panel and the inside back wall, top and bottom of the box. All the papers are different patterns but I just think they all work so well together.

On the front of the vignette panel, I used a black and white damask design, which I added some machine stitching to around the outside. On the other side of the panel, which will eventually be sitting on the inside, I used a second design again machine stitched around the outside and then on the inside of the vignette box, I used a beautiful paper, definitely one of my favourites which was green and ivory.

I adhered all these pieces into place using Vintage Collage Medium, which also added a more aged feel to the piece.

Now to move onto my embellishments and I would suggest that you probably need to work on this before you add the door onto the cabinet, it does make life easier and less fiddly.

So for this I started by using a photo from the Framed Portraits set from last year, which I removed from the cabinet card. I then added some Vintage collage Medium around the edges of the photo before inking it with Ground Espresso Distress Ink.

I mounted the photo onto the smallest vignette panel, again painted with Black Soot Distress Paint and added Hex Fasteners to each corner and then placed the Amelia Hardy Clippings Sticker across the photo. I attached the photo to the vignette panel and placed a halloween quote chip beneath it.

On the inside of the large vignette box, I used a piece of Halloween Ephemera which I mounted onto chipboard, added a few rips and tears and then attached to the back wall using foam pads and placing it over the top of a piece of dyed Mummy Cloth.

At this stage I now attached the door onto the front of the cabinet using the small hinges and just attaching them with Matte Collage Medium to hold them into place. Set the box aside to dry completely and ensure the hinges are attached before even thinking of touching it again for a while, lol!

Now moving onto the front and I took another vignette box, the smallest this time and once again, painted it with a coat of Black Soot Distress Paint.

Whilst that was drying, I started work on colouring all those little pearls using four colours of Alcohol Ink ~ Valencia, Mushroom, Pitch Black and Gunmetal Mixative. Placing a selection of various sizes of the baubles into three small containers, I then applied each colour of ink to the pearls, gave them a swish and made sure they were covered in the alcohol ink. With the black pearls, I also added a touch of the Gunmetal Mixative.

Now for the zombie hand and I placed this in the centre of the small box, using Matte Collage Medium to hold it in place and allowed this to dry.

I then moved onto his or her's little bottle and for this used one of the small Corked Apothecary bottles and added a layer of Matte Collage Medium over the top. Once the medium is dry, I then used Rock Candy Crackle Paint, coated the glass with the paint and then allowed it to work it's magic, before adding a vial label to the front of the bottle. Once the crackles had appeared and the paint was dry, I then lit a candle...no, this wasn't to relax with, it was to melt the wax for the next stage.

Once I had the melted wax, I dipped the bottle into it and then pulled it out, allowing the was to form a drip. I then basically held the bottle until the drip had become solid and voila, I had a perfectly formed drip coming from the bottle.

Now to put that small box together and for this, I placed all the coloured baubles inside my small vignette box around the zombie hand and added them one by one, adhering each of them in place with a touch of Matte Collage Medium.

I also placed some skulls into the mix and added some Boneyard findings. Once the baubles had set, I waited overnight for this ~ I then placed some moss along the bottom and added two nails from the Vignette Hardware pieces into the top of the box.

To complete the box, I added a Halloween Word Band across the bottom, and placed hex fasteners into the band.

Now all I needed to do was add the bottle to the zombie's hand which fit perfectly.

I now have my box ready and all that it needs is to be mounted onto the front of the panel, which I did using Collage Medium.

Once the box is in place, allowed to dry and it's holding, I then added the Mini No 13 Plaquette.

Right, we're nearly there and you just need to get those bottles ready and using a selection of vials from Tim's idea-ology range, I gave them the same crackle treatment as I did for the one in the zombie's hand.

Once all the labels were added, I wrapped twine around the necks and then filled them with tiny beads and stones.

On some of the bottles, I dipped them into the hot wax to seal them.

I also dded a 'newspaper', tucked into one of the bottles which I took from Tim's paper stash from last year and I added a story stick on chain to the neck of the largest bottle.

I attached all the bottles into the box over a bed of mummy cloth and sisal fibres and again, yep....allowed it to dry and set into place.

As a finishing touch, I added a bunch of keys to the back of the cabinet and hung them from a Vignette Hardware finding piece.

So, that's it from me for today and I hope you've loved the creative process behind this project  ~ it sure was a great one to make and I loved every minute of assembling it and bringing Amelia's Drug Store to life.

Thanks for stopping by today and....

...and thank you to Tim, Mario and Paula for all you do to bring us these wonderful products!

see you again later this week with another spooky project...

Have a great day...love Emma x

Recipe for project:

Distress Paint: Black Soot, Picket Fence
Distress Spray Stain: Antique Linen, Pumice Stone

Distress Inks: Ground Espresso

Idea-ology: Halloween Quote Chips, Boneyard Findings, Worn Wallpaper, Hex Fasteners, Skulls, Metal Gate, Apothecary Vials, Tiny Corked Vials, Zombie Hands, Mummy Cloth, Framed Portraits, Baubles, Hardware Findings, Hinges, Key Adornments, Halloween Story Stick, Halloween Ephemera, Mini Plaquette, halloween Word Band
Structure:Vignette Box, Vignette Panel

Mediums: Matte Collage Medium, Rock Candy Crackle Paint,
Alcohol Ink: Mushroom, Valencia, Pitch Black and Gunmetal Mixative

Tim Holtz Media Glass Mat

Tim Holtz Guillotine

Heat Gun

Moss and sisal fibres from my own stash