That's Life: Lucky Man...

Hello everyone...

Hope you've all had a wonderful weekend and as we head into a new week, it's time for the new Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge to begin. This week our theme is all about adding A Bit O' Green to your projects and we hope you'll join us and play along.

For my make, and with St. Patrick's Day in mind, I chose to go full on green and used a combination of Tim Holtz products from Sizzix and Stampers Anonymous to create my project which features plenty of layers.

So, let's get started and it's time to share all the details of how I created this lucky man...

To begin with I used a Size 8 Stampers Anonymous Etcetera tag and a Facade which I twisted around to have the point at the bottom.

FACADE

The facade is covered with some of the Large Collage Strips from Tim's idea-ology range. I cut the strips down into smaller sections, so that they fit the facade perfectly and then attached them using Matte Collage Medium.

I applied a coat of the medium over the top, and once this was dry I used the Walnut Stain Distress Crayon to add a vintage touch, applying it around the edges of the facade and in between each of the joins of the collage strips.

At the bottom of the facade, I placed a Machinery Head which I painted green with Rustic Wilderness Distress Paint. I then added a touch of gold Gilding Wax over the top.

TAG

Moving onto the tag and for this I used a Size 8 Mixed Media Heavystock Tag and the size 8 Etcetera Tag.

To begin with I lightly misted water onto a Heavystock tag before applying the colour using the following Distress Stains and Oxide Spray.

Distress Spray Stains: Speckled Egg, Rustic Wilderness, Black Soot

Oxide Spray: Speckled Egg

Once I was happy, I heat dried the tag before inking the numbers strip stamp from the Stampers Anonymous Curiosity Shop Stamp Set by Tim with a Versamark Clear Embossing Pad. I stamped the numbers down the right hand side and then sprinkled the ink with gold embossing powder. Heat set the powder until molten.

To add more detail to the background, I used the Botanic Collage stamp set and used Black Soot Archival Ink to stamp the print from one of the stamps in this set down the left hand side.

After machine stitching a border around the outside edge, I mounted the tag onto the Etcetera Tag using Matte Collage Medium and then mounted this onto my covered Etcetera Facade using the risers from the facade pack to add height to this piece.

COLOUR WHEEL

Now to create the colour wheel and using the round viewfinder dies from the Picture Show Die Set, I cut the solid piece and the top layer, together with the smaller inner pieces that will become the shades of green that sit around the wheel.

I added colour to the main wheel with Old Paper and Frayed Burlap Spray Stains, and once these were dry, I inked the edges with Walnut Stain Distress Ink. Adhere the top layer to the bottom layer.

I inked the small die cut squares with shades of green Distress Inks. You can choose which colours of green you prefer for this.

I then inked the edges of each square with Walnut Stain DI before placing each one into the wheel.

To complete the wheel, I attached Screw Heads and altered these with Black Soot, Antique Bronze, Crackling Campfire to add a rusty finish to the metal.

With the colour wheel complete, I wanted to build up the central section and used the Sizzix Vintage Labels Die Set by Tim Holtz (unfortunately this is now retired and if you don't own it, then you can replace this layer with a circle cut from red card), and the SSS Basic Shapes Circle Die Set to cut 4 circles, 3 from Mixed Media Heavystock card and 1 from gold metallic Kraft stock. The size of the first circle needs to fit in the centre of the wheel and the remaining 3 circles are in descending order.

After inking each circle, I layered them and attached the completed layers to the centre of the picture wheel using foam pads.

Mount the wheel onto the tag using foam pads to add height and dimension.

TAILORED

In the centre of the colour wheel, I used the bowler hat and the suit and bow tie from the Tailored Die Set. I cut all my pieces from inked and stamped cardstock that I have in my scrap box. This is such a great way of using up these tiny pieces of scrap card, and of course you can choose to create unique designs to the clothing.

All the pieces were assembled them to create the two pieces of clothing.

After adding the button from my stash to the centre of the bow tie, I mounted each piece onto the layered circles, again using foam pads to add even more height.

I then placed the 13￠ piece from the Junk Drawer Baseboard pack in the centre before attaching a screw head to either side of the piece, again altered with the same colours of Distress Paint as used previously.

LUCKY CLOVER

For the clover leaves, I used the stamp from the Curiosity Shop stamp set, together with coordinating SSS die.

I stamped four separate images of the clove leaf with Versamark clear embossing ink onto card inked with Rustic Wilderness Distress Ink and then sprinkled the gold embossing powder over the top. Heat emboss until molten and glossy.

Die cut each of the four leaves and then layer them over one another, attaching them by the centres and shaping the leaves to create two dimensional pieces.

Attach the two leaves to the tag, placing them in the bottom left corner. In the centres of each leaf, I added a gold Metallic Droplet.

I had the Air Mail label, stamped and cut from the Correspondence stamp and die bundle leftover on my desk from a previous project and I thought it was perfect for this make. I attached this to the clover arrangement using foam pads.

FINISHING DETAILS

We're nearly there and all that's left is the finishing details...

I added a mini book ring through the hole at the top of the tag and a Mini Pin to the stitched section on the right hand side...

...before finally completing the project by adding a "Lucky" sticker to the top left hand corner of the tag.

So, that's my project finished and I hope you love the piece I've made and you've been inspired by some of the techniques I've used.

As always, if you make anything, or if you've been inspired by anything that you've seen here on my blog ~ then please, let me know by tagging me on social media or leaving a comment here and I will be right over to take a look!

Don't forget that every week, one lucky random participant has the chance to win a $25 gift voucher from Simon Says Stamp and you can join in up to 5 times, which means you could have 5 chances to win. You have until next Monday at 8am Ohio time. 1pm UK time, 2 pm CET to join in and good luck....