Claire Selby Eco Birthday Vintage Banner

Here is a fun and addictive Eco Party Craft to make that is also Acid Free!  I made my Banner using vintage papers and acid free cardboard, the kind that comes on the backs of scrapbooking paper! The 12×12″ cardboard was the perfect size for these large Pennants. For my Banner I printed out the pinky peach Vintage Sheet Music Download from pinkdilla, cut them out in Pennant shapes and glued them to the acid free cardboard with Aleene’s® Acid-Free Tacky Glue™.

For decorating the Banner I covered the tops with ribbons and trims, and embellished with Close to my Heart adhesive pearls. The middle of the Pennants are decorated with vintage paper, crimped party paper stitched into flowers, and ribbon roses. I then finished off the Pennants with pom poms, Collage Stuff vintage paper, and pearls folded into flowers, an Art Chix butterfly, and vintage scraps. Just have fun with this step, you really can use anything unique like old book pages to decorate with.

Lastly, punch one hole on the top corners of each Pennant and string  together with seam binding ribbon. Now just hang  in a window or over a door for a gorgeous, one of a kind decoration!

Claire Selby Eco Birthday Vintage Banner

Claire Selby Eco Birthday Vintage Banner

Claire Selby Eco Birthday Vintage Banner

Pinkdilla Lord of the Rings ATC Swap background demo

For those who have wondered where to start when making ATCs or for someone looking for a new technique here is my Easy to Make backgrounds for Artist Trading Cards. I have been inspired by the release of the Lord of the Rings extended edition movies to Host my First ever Pinkdilla Swap! This will be a Lord of the Rings theme, I will post all of the info with photos coming soon. I covered my work surface with Tim Holtz’ craft sheet and have taken some of my extra Lord of the Rings trading cards to demonstrate with, they are the exact size of ATCs, 2.5″x3.5″.

First, I lightly hand sanded with fine sandpaper on the fronts of the cards to take away the glossy finish, (You don’t have to sand away all of the ink or down to the paper, just the glossy finish).

Pinkdilla Lord of the Rings ATC Swap demo sanding

Pinkdilla Lord of the Rings ATC Swap demo finished sanding

Next, I generously covered one of the sanded cards with Claudine Hellmuth’s Studio medium in glossy with a paint brush. I used background paper from my Lord of the Rings ATC Kit to cover the card with. Firmly press down the paper from one edge and then slowly press out any air bubbles all the way to the opposite edge.I place my card on a paper towel to dry under a very heavy book, I use a huge Bible for 2-3 days to make sure the cards are dried and flat.

Pinkdilla Lord of the Rings ATC Swap demo Studio medium adhesive

Pinkdilla Lord of the Rings ATC Swap demo paper background

Pinkdilla Lord of the Rings ATC Swap demo pressing out air bubbles

For the second card, I liberally applied Gesso to the top of the card. I let it air dry 15 mins and then placed under a heavy book to dry for 2 days

Pinkdilla Lord of the Rings ATC Swap demo applying Gesso

Pinkdilla Lord of the Rings ATC Swap demo liberally apply Gesso

Once the Gesso is dry I used Twinkling H2Os in rainbow and watercolor paints to cover the card, it only takes a wet paintbrush and no water to make the H2Os and the watercolors vibrant, thick and creamy.

Lord of the Rings ATC Swap demo Twinkling H2Os

Lord of the Rings ATC Swap demo Twinkling H2Os

For my third card I used paper from my Lord of the Rings ATC kit and pieced paper around the pretty sky scene using the Studio Medium adhesive in glossy. Let dry for 2-3 days under a heavy book for the best results. I have 2 Arwen and the Elves Kits available and 2 Men of the rings kits available they are $12 each and included several cards and several ATC papers all ready to be decorated! Have fun making backgrounds and don’t forget to come back for the Swap Sign up!

Lord of the Rings ATC Swap demo pieced paper background

Lord of the Rings ATC Swap demo pieced paper background

Men of the Rings ATC making Kit $12

Arwen and the Elves of the Rings ATC making Kit $12

Men of the Rings ATC making Kit $12

Arwen and the Elves of the Rings ATC making Kit $12

I had such a great time playing with the watercolors and making the mermaids for these Mermaid ATC Swap cards for the Art Chix Studio Mermaids and cats swap.  My cards originally started out monochromatic but soon I started adding accent and complimentary colors so they all ended up with a little blue and green on each card but with some more purple, orange or red. If you want to see my background demo check out my earlier post HERE.

I have been playing around with my watercolors for the upcoming Mermaid ATC Swap by ARt Chix Studio for next month. I used a wet on dry technique for the backgrounds and then used Claudine Hellmuth’s Studio Medium in Glossy to adhere the vintage papers and Transparencies.  I love this medium under transparencies and I’m so glad I found it! I just wanted to show the backgrounds before they get decorated and covered up. That’s the thing about backgrounds, you usually don’t get to see the whole thing once it is finished.

I’m always so inspired by the Swaps hosted by Collage Stuff every month! Especially receiving the pretty ATCs from other artists around the USA. The ATC Swap theme for May is Time. For this challenge I wanted to create a visual message that conveyed something that takes time, and not just time passing on a clock, but a moment in time. My cards are ” Time to Smile”, “Time to Change” and “Time to Grow”.  I used watercolor paints as the background for the Smile card, the Grow card is a gel medium and Pearl Ex pigments, the Time card is a simple dry brush of Acrylics. I only used Claudine Hellmuth’s Studio gloss Medium as my adhesive. It was perfect behind the Art Chix Studio transparencies and completely disappeared behind it!  I hope you like them, I definitely had a blast making these!