Altered Sewing Box

I had been given a large Altoids box (about 6" x 4") and I decided to alter it into a sewing kit.  I started off by painting gesso all over it and letting that dry.  As I knew I was going to add a crackle finish to it, I didn't worry about making it perfectly smooth.

Once the gesso was dry, I painted it with Distress Paints (weathered wood, stormy sky, vintage photo), again not worrying about streaks.  After going over different areas a few times, I stamped some of the images from the Stampers Anonymous/Tim Holtz Haberdashery set.  I wasn't worried about the entire image being stamped onto the lid either - it made it look more worn out to me.

The final step for the lid itself was to add Ranger's Crackle Paint and let it dry overnight.  I did add some Distress Inks after it was dry to enhance some of the cracks and a bit of Tim Holtz Ruler Ribbon was adhered along the edge of the entire box.

Next came out some dies and grungeboard hinges.  I used the rusted enamel technique for the hinges.  Although I learned it from Tim's Creative Chemistry 101 online class (highly recommend), it can also be seen in several You-Tube videos.  The sewing machine is a die from Die-Versions and I applied the tarnished silver technique to it (from Tim's Creative Chemistry 102 class).  Love how pitted it looks.  The spools and needle and thread are Memory Box dies.  I wrapped embroidery floss around the spools of thread and also threaded each of the vintage buttons with embroidery floss.

For the inside, I adhered a magnetic strip to the inside top of the lid to hold loose items and then added your basic sewing kit supplies into the inside.

Now all the basics for sewing on a button (about the extent of my sewing ability) is all in one place.

Dress Up

Sparkle N Sprinkle released four new rubber stamp sets this month, including this one - Dress Up (#525).

To create this card, I used both of the dresses as well as one of the sentiments.  The dresses were stamped onto watercolor paper and then colored with Distress Markers.  I added adhesive to the front of each and then covered them with Cloud Nine velvet glitter.

For the tall dress form, a Memory Box die, I die cut it out of Super Adhesive Sheets and cut away the top layer of the pole and knob.  I used the tarnished silver technique by Tim Holtz for the this part and added Vintage embossing powder over the main body part.  Silver and Super Thick Clear embossing powder was used for the tarnished silver technique, along with a touch of Black Soot Distress Paint.

The "scarf" is actually part of the Memory Box Tiny Bow die.  (I wish I could take credit for thinking up this clever way to use this die cut, but I saw it on someone else's blog and liked it.  If you know who thought this up, please let me know so I can give them the appropriate credit.)  The purse, also a Memory Box die (Terrific Tote), is covered with Blue Lightning and Peruvian Lily glitters.

The open background die, by Taylored Expressions (Quatrefoil cutting plate) was somewhat randomly covered with VersaMark and then Stickum Powder.   I wanted a few areas to remain white.   Once the powder was heated up, I quickly covered it with Spirited Green glitter, for even more sparkle.

As you might know from previous projects, I love the look of distressed embossing, but I wanted to use another glitter on this project.  So I got out my SNS brushable glue and distressed the edges with a brush and then applied Bubblegum  glitter to the edges.

Finally, the sentiment was created by die cutting the Spellbinders Fancy Tags Two die from a piece of the Super Adhesive Sheets.  I used an exacto knife to cut the top layer around the oval and then covered the center oval with Cloud Nine velvet glitter and then the outer scrolls with Peruvian Lily velvet glitter.  This cute sentiment was stamped over the Cloud Nine with StazOn (Jet Black).