Mixed Media Album Cover

Hi everyone!!!  Donna is here again with another mixed media tutorial using a fun product that I haven't used before.  I have had this jar of Liquitex Glass Beads gel medium sitting on my shelf for some time now so I decided to try it.  After a couple of practises with it and a failure or two I came up with a great way to use this product.    But first I had to create a background on my piece of chipboard.  This project is going to be the cover page of an album that I want to work on.  So to start with these are the products that I used for this project:  a piece of chipboard (mine is 8 1/2" x 11"), 3 colours of kraft paint, 3 colours of sprays, gesso, moulding paste, glass beads gel medium, staz-on black ink, a vine stamp and a border stamp, paint brush, spatula, black scripto pen, stencils.

Here is the completed cover.

So to start with I painted the chipboard piece with a good coat of white gesso.  This will give it a good foundation for the kraft paints.

Next I painted the kraft paints onto the chipboard starting with the green almost covering the entire surface but leaving several sections of the white gesso showing through.  You don't have to be fussy, the sloppier the better.  Then I randomly put the yellow on, then the blue here and there.  I dried between each colour with my heat gun.

Next was the sprays.  I started with a pink spray, just here and there.  I let the colours run down by sitting the cover on its end and tapping it onto the table.   You can see the run marks in the picture below just at the bottom right side.   I did this with each colour.   Next  I applied a green spray, again here and there then a turquoise spray here and there.  You notice on the left side of the picture below there are some blotches.  Well this was not my intention but how I achieved this was I sprayed some water with a mister (when I applied the green spray) to do some blending and this effect started to happen.  It is actually in the centre of the finished cover.    So I let it go and did not do my blending.  I was happy with the result  which proves that mistakes can sometimes turn out after all.

I did add a little bit of pink gelato here and there to make the pink pop a little more.

I let the surface dry really well before proceeding with the moulding paste.  I took the Tim Holtz "burlap" stencil and applied my moulding paste to the cover as shown below.  I dried the paste first with my heat gun to speed it up then I sprayed the paste with the turquoise spray that I used prior.  See below.

Now I took my black staz-on ink and stamped around the outside edges using a funky border stamp then I stamped  the top portion of a vine stamp here and there.

Now for the glass beads gel.  This gel actually has very tiny glass beads in it.  To apply I took the Tim Holtz "rays" stencil placed it onto the cover and applied it with a spatula the same way that you apply the moulding paste.  Make sure that you hold the stencil down firmly and only apply the gel in one direction.  When you remove the stencil at first the gel looks a little cloudy.  But it completely dries clear and the wonderful part of this is that the colours from underneath comes through the gel.  Below is the gel before it dries.

And this is when the gel is dry.  Those glass beads actually do sparkle when the light is on them.

I used a black Scripto pen and did a bit of highlighting under the rays of glass beads.  The two butterflies that you see are cut out from a serviette.  I glued them down with matte gel medium.  I then added the flowers, leaves and vine.  I do plan on using the glass beads gel for some other ideas that I have come up with.  I will keep you posted.

I hope you enjoy!!!

Until next time

HAPPY SCRAPPING!!!!!

Here is my first quote of the day:

"I believe that best friends are quiet angels to lift our wings when we forget how to fly."