Hi there my sweet crafty friends! Happy Friday! I hope you had a great week! I am beyond excited to share this project today! I finished it a couple of weeks ago and I've been waiting for the day to come to finally show you! My project is for TGIF over on The Greetery Blog today (The Greetery Inspiration Friday!) Woot! Please grab some coffee or tea because this post is long and has tons of photos! I think this is in my top ten favorite projects I've ever made!! The idea was in my head and when I sat down to make it, it came out exactly like I imagined! It was a joy and pleasure to make this! All the stamps and dies are from The Greetery and everything all worked together like a dream!
I made this project as a present for Betsy, actually! I really wanted to make her something special to show my gratitude and love for her as a friend and mentor. It has safely been received at The Greetery HQ so now it's time to share! I hope I inspire you to make different projects besides cards with your beautiful Greetery stamps and dies! The sky's the limit!
Today's make is a botanical/entomological shadow box frame, filled with bugs and plants and wonderful things from nature…. Only it's all paper! The shadow box frame is 9"x9" and I bought it at Michaels. I used dark kraft tags as the basis for the project scale, and amount of things to put into the box. It worked out perfectly to make eight different tags. I used loads of dies from The Greetery curio collection, and pretty stamps and labels. I used the new Honey Bees and Honeycomb Corners Dies for one of the tags….and the postage stamps….and two of my other favorites – the Toadstools and the Mighty Oak!! Basically, I dumped out all my Greetery Dies and picked out all these fun things! Here is my finished box….
Here's a side view of the finished box under the glass. I reeeeeeeeeeallly love how it came out!!! Each tag is like it's own little art piece in the frame.
To start this project, I die cut everything out of watercolor paper first. I really wanted an illustration type of feeling. And watercolor paper always looks so rich. I laid out all the plain pieces on the tags to decide which items to use. Once I had my layout set, I used my favorite watercolor paints to color all the elements. It was really fun to paint all the die cuts, and bring them to life! Every tag has a bit of green on it to tie everything together.
Here are some of the tags before I placed them in the frame. I got the dark kraft tags at Michaels also. (All my supplies are listed at the bottom of my post)…
How adorable is that tiny snail?? I used the Plucked Dies for the greenery on some of the tags. I think it made it look nice to start with all white watercolor paper + watercolors instead of die cutting the pieces from colored cardstocks.
I set the all painted elements aside to dry and went to work on the tags themselves. I splattered on some black and white paints. I used Pretty Postmarks, Destination and Curio Labels stamp sets to stamp on the tags and also stamp the small banners. I let everything sit overnight to dry, and finished the project the next morning. In this photo you can see all my tags lined up on the frame backing – so I could make sure to get them all lined up correctly. I used a clear sewing ruler to lay them out as pictured.
I can't decide which tag is my favorite one….but it might be this bee one! I am literally obsessed with these Honey Bees Dies!! And I love those golden yellow watercolor tones. It just makes me happy!!
And what about these Toadstools??!!! OH MY. Betsy gives us such amazing things to play with, doesn't she?? For this one I used lots of vivid red paint!
This tag has bits and bobs of stamping, and a tiny word banner….
And that sweet bird's nest…
Here is the finished frame standing up straight. It would look so nice on a bookshelf or hanging on the wall. Maybe I'll end up making another one for my studio? I used foam tape to attach the bugs and plants and other pretties to the tags. I also used foam tape to attach the tags to the shadow box backing piece. I added a few clear drop embellishments onto some of the tags and also a few bits of twine.
These Mighty Oak Dies get used a lot around here. I always use olive green tones for these dies, to mimic our mighty California Oaks in my neighborhood. Heck, my town is called Fair Oaks! The oak trees have a special place in my heart.
Just a wee garden snail rolling by….
Beautiful feathers and more oaks…. Some twine, and a compass from the Destination stamp set!
And this moth from the curio collection….
That, folks, is my project! I hope you liked learning about how I made it! And I hope I've inspired you to get out those watercolors and play! So… I'm totally laughing because I want to say "think outside the box" but I literally made A BOX! Ha. If you don't want to make a shadow box, you could definitely make some of these watercolor tags and put a few on a card front, or into a scrapbook, or tie onto a gift!! No limits on art!
Thanks for spending part of your day with me! Have a wonderful weekend, and happy crafting. From my studio to yours! See you soon! XOXO
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