Paint Pots & Cats

 

Finished a couple of coffee tins which I've changed into paint / pen pots.

And the other sides.

Added the resin and metal pieces.

I used bronze powertex.

Made a couple of cats using bottles and polystyrene ball.

I coloured them with gold and silver powertex pigments and the varnish, added some metallic buttons and made them each a pair of specs.

Day 18 - More Tag Clusters

Firstly I arranged the leftover tags from yesterday into more clusters.

Again I started to play around with some vintage ephemera.

And finally came up with these.  I really enjoyed making these, especially the upside down ones.

So these are for day 18 of the #fabtag30day challenge.

Day 16 Tags - Vintage with a Dangle

After watching Andrea's day #8 tag youtube video I set off on a mission.

These are for the dangly bits.

I started putting some clusters together on the two tags.

Completed tags, three tags on each tag.

Second set completed.

Two butterfly themed sets.

And the last two.

Used a couple of mini safety pins for the bodies.

I put some threads behind this butterfly.

And some more threads around the mini postcard.

And these threads are wound around the tag.

And the same with this one two, it's wrapped around two tags.

And these are the tags with the dangle.

And the flower and number embellishment.

And this one looks like a rose inside a brooch casing.

And lastly all eight together.

So these are for day 16 of the #FABtag30day challenge.

March Secret Art Loft Powertex Box

"The March hares danced and leapt around as the moonlight shone golden on the lush Spring ground" by Claire Ivins

I started off with the two solid wooden hare shapes from out the box.

Next I took some household items, garden wire, masking, tape, a small glass coke bottle (other brands are also available), wire cutters and strong catering foil.

Using the tinfoil and the wire I created a pair of arms and legs. I also covered the bottle in tinfoil and padded it out at the front.

I created a head and some ears, also using tinfoil. I covered everything in masking tape and taped the arms and legs onto the bottle. The head and ears are not yet attached to the body.

So here are my trio of hares ready to be Powertexed.

Firstly I painted the two wooden shapes with bronze Powertex, cut manageable lengths of yarn, covered them in Powertex and wrapped them around starting from the base. I left the heads plain. On the right, taller one I wrapped around t-shirt yarn on the ears, but on the left one I covered them in Stone Art.

Close up of how I've wrapped and covered the wooden hares. The right one looks white as I blew off the excess Stone Art from the ears!

Once dried, I coloured the left one with rich gold pigment and the right one with white. I gave the ears on the right on a coat of varnish, over the Stone Art.

Next I covered my bigger hare completely with bronze Powertex and pressed on the Stone Art powder. I kept pressing it on until all of the Powertex was covered. The head/ears and body are still not attached yet as it was easier to do this process in two halves. After a few minutes I took a clean paint brush and lightly brushed off all the excess Stone Art powder. I repeated the process until I liked the look of what I had. Once I was happy I attached the head just by painting powertex on the top of the bottle neck and base of the head, it can be used as a glue too.

I sprayed it with brown Bister to blend colour of the Stone Art into the bronze.

The Stone Art has absorbed it, it's still made it slightly darker. However, it's hard to tell from the photo.

So here are my family of hares all finished.

Gnome / Wizard

Gnomes seem to be the in thing at present, so I didn't want to get left behind. However, once he was finished, Martin said he looked like a wizard and needed a staff.

He was made from a mini Schweppes lemonade bottle (other brands are available), tinfoil, paper tape, fabrics and yarn. His beard is cut from a mophead and his nose is a polystyrene ball.

I wanted to show you this because I used the remainder of the blue Powertex from the bottle in the subscription box. By mixing it with varying degrees of white and black Powertex I was able to create different shades of blue.

January Powertex Box

"We wish you bluebirds in the spring to give your 

heart a song to sing"

https://youtu.be/44vV98vpuQ0 - Click here to see all the contents of my box

** Your box might not be exactly the same, but you will have similar items**

I cut a 6 cm polystyrene ball in half as I wanted to fatten the bird up and make him more 3d.

I stuck one on each side of the wooden bird shape. 

Next I arranged some sort of platform for everything to sit on. I used part of the cardboard from the box as the base.

I painted the mdf birdhouses with blueberry pie acrylic paint.

I started to compile pieces to make a tag using other items from the box.

So as not to cover up all the background paper, I traced round and cut out the shape.

I placed the mdf bird shape in the cut out background space and put the cut out piece back on top of the bird shape.

I dismantled one of the paper flowers as I wanted to use it to try to represent feathers.

Next step was to cover everything with Powertex. I used the blue from the box and some bronze that I already had to paint the branch top left. The bird is covered in t-shirt fabric and I used a couple of pieces of hessian to create wings. You can easily use the paper decoration for this too.

I just wanted to show you how far the Powertex goes. I covered all of the above pieces liberally and I've still got half the bottle left.

And this is how I assembled everything together and coloured it up with the blue curacao and golden olive Secret Art Loft pigments.

I think they look very fitting outside in the garden in the middle of the bush.

I used the golden olive pigment on the body of the bird and on the flower feathers. I painted the leaves on the wallpaper background with blueberry pie acrylic paint.

This actually looks better in real life as the colours are more defined, but unfortunately, my camera doesn't appear to be a fan of blue!

I hope this has given you a bit of inspiration. Don't forget to show us what you make with the contents of your box and don't be shy in uploading them to the Powertex Studio FaceBook page. For further inspiration, visit the free online Powertex magazine here. 

All Powertex, Secret Art Loft products and subscription boxes can be found here.