Four Piece Swap - Mission Accomplished!

One of my dear blogging friends

Mrs A of It's An Alien Life

recently challenged me to a four piece swap.

The idea being we send each other 4 paper crafting items

of our choice and then each add a few items from our own stash

- make something with it all and send it back.

I'm always up for a challenge so of course agreed!

Here's what Mrs A sent to me

- sheet of designer paper

- pink fabric flower

- glass beads

- metal butterfly

It took me a few days before I decided what to do with it all!

It was the fabric flower that spurred me into action.

Look how pretty it is, so what did I do?

I took it apart - as you do!

Once the petals were separated

I had the idea of making them into little hats.

I was going to use clay heads at first, but changed my mind.

Very fashionable, wouldn't you agee!

I stuck the hats onto a (7" x 10") canvas board -

after adding two stylish ladies -

I wonder who they could be - lol!!

I glued the designer paper onto the canvas first with Paper Mod Podge

then gave it a light brayering of white acrylic paint to tone it down.

The ladies were pieced together - their faces, arms and legs

were drawn onto book text then painted a tan colour.

The clothes were pieces of scrapbook paper.

At the bottom of the canvas, I stuck on some tissue tape

and coloured it with water colour pastels.

The metal butterfly, I coloured with alcohol inks and it became

a hanger at the top of the canvas.

The Coco Chanel quote, I found on t'internet - printed onto

copy paper and stuck onto the canvas with more Paper Mod Podge.

Thus far I had used three of the four items

 - the designer paper for the canvas background

- the pink flower for the hats

-the metal butterfly for the hanger

This left the glass beads and the only way I could incorporate them

I thought was to just hang them from the canvas - but that seemed

to be a bit of a cop out to me.

After several days of thinking about and playing with

the beads I decided to make them into a necklace -

but not one for wearing!

I had a wooden heart blank in my stash and drew

on a neckline - so the heart effectively became

a sort of torso / bodice hanging.

I stamped versamark ink on the lower part of the heart,

applied several layers of embossing powder and heated it up

- whilst still warm, I pushed an acrylic stamp into it.

I painted the top half of the heart with tan acrylic paint

and then a coat of Sparkle Mod Podge.

The finishing touches were a row of stickles at the neckline

and the lace around the edge.

Phew, all finished!

The worry now was would Mrs A like what I did with

her four pieces.  I'm pleased to say yes, she did!!!

Here are the four pieces I sent to Mrs A -

- scrapbook paper

- lace

- ribbon

- beads

I can't wait to see what she makes of them all!

Finally, here's the inspiration for my canvas piece -

the two fashionable ladies with their fine hats!

A book called 'Collage Couture' by Julie Nutting.

It's full of wonderful ideas and I'd thoroughly recommend it.

Thanks for looking :)