As You Wish (Princess Bride Box)

NB: I apologise for the background in these photos. Possibly taking photographs of my finished project ON TOP OF MY GROTTY WASHING MACHINE was not the best idea. Wasn’t thinking about the final presentation I guess…. Anyway, please ignore said appliance and focus only on the box itself, ok?

Hello! I hope you are all well and coping with this crazy world we live in. Been a bit brutal lately. If anything can realistically be described as “a bit” brutal. So much going on and most of it not good. I try not to watch the news these days because it is distressing and depressing and keeps me awake. This means that I am quite ignorant about it what is going on much of the time, but I feel that is the only way I can keep my sanity (or what’s left of it anyway).

My cousin recently turned the big 5-0 and, to celebrate, I made her this tea box. We both LOVE The Princess Bride and so it inspired me to make something that was related to that. I didn’t have a lot of time so it needed to be something I could put together reasonably quickly, with as little room for error (and subsequent swearing) as possible.

So, using the gorgeous Iron Orchid Designs “Primitive” mould, I moulded air-dry clay and glued it on to an old wooden tea box I had purchased from an opshop. I love the hares and had been wanting to use them on something for a while. I added hearts and lots of florals. On the front I used IOD’s “Harper” mould to spell out “As You Wish”. These letters are very fiddly and probably the most difficult to mould and glue on, but I think it’s worth it. Before allowing to cure, I gave all the clay a very quick, light coat of paint (I just used acrylic white paint); if you’ve not tried this before, I recommend it – it really helps reduce any cracking of the clay as it’s drying.

The next day, when all was cured and ready to go, I did a couple of coats of pale beige house paint all over the moulds and box. When that was dry, I lightly sponged over the whole thing with a lighter shade of paint, to give a stone or limestone finish. A couple of finishing coats of matt varnish and I was done. It really was quite a quick project but I am pleased with the results. The box was filled with specialty teas and other treats.

What do you think? My cousin loved it and I’m glad I took the time to make her something special. Homemade gifts are always nicer, don’t you think? It may not have compared to the diamond necklace she got from her partner, but I hope she will treasure it just the same 🙂

I always enjoy making things for other people – it gives more meaning to what you are making and somehow encourages you to put in more effort and take care of the details.

Using clay moulds is a great way to transform an otherwise plain item and upcycle things that would most likely end up in landfill or in the back of someone’s cupboard, never to see the light of day. It’s an easy method that takes very little skill or expense and can produce lovely results.

That’s it for today – just a quickie post from this very slack blogger!

Take care – be kind to one another. The world needs all the kindness it can get right now.

x

Frame Game

Howdy. Welcome to another edition of “Who’s a Terrible Blogger? I am” where I apologise for not posting regularly and make promises about doing better in the future. It’s becoming a habit……(is it a habit after more than a decade, or has it just become my way of doing things and is unlikely to change? You decide!)

I’m pretty sure I said I would show these framed pictures before but then never got around to it so, um, here we go! These were created purely by accident when I was just mucking about one day with clay and moulds and small box canvases. Actually, I think what really happened was that I had probably painted something on the canvas and, disgusted by my lack of artistic talent, ripped the canvas off the frame. I then saw that underneath the crappy, cheap, canvas was an equally crappy, cheap frame. But, dear reader, I saw promise in that badly-constructed little frame made from the kind of wood that possibly doesn’t exist in nature or contains some sort of cancer-causing fibres and/or is harvested from rapidly diminishing rainforests. You know the kind I mean; we’re not talking QUALITY here. I am sorry I didn’t take photos of this stage….hopefully you understand what I am on about!

Anyway, the frames were kinda cute – solid and boxy and somehow vintage-looking. Or, at least, they would lend themselves to techniques that would make them become vintage-looking. Plus, they had the added bonus of basically being junk now, so if I botched them it didn’t really matter.

First of all, I wanted to make the wood (or whatever we are calling it!) look a little more hand-carved and beaten up. So, I basically took to them with a little craft knife and battered them a bit – taking a slice off here and there, chipping other sections and generally softening the edges, so they look hand-carved and less modern.

Then, with my trusty IOD moulds and air-dry clay, I made a few decorative pieces to add to the frame. Some, I gave corner moldings to, others had just a feature piece on the top or bottom. I trimmed any that didn’t quite fit the space, and added extra bits if I felt it needed it. These were glued on and left to set. After 24 hours, I painted the whole piece in a solid colour – usually something pale like cream or off-white, grey or a rustic blue. I sanded this back lightly, once dry and then applied a coating of antiquing wax, making sure to get in all the nooks and crannies, and removing any excess before leaving it to dry.

I had a look through my millions of art books that I keep for cutting up (I know – sacrilege!) and chose a few suitable images. The aperture of the frames are generally quite small and, depending on the thickness of the wood, quite dark so I chose images that were lighter in colour and would not disappear into the shadows. Portraits and landscapes work equally well, depending on their composition. I gave each image a couple of good coats of Mod-Podge to seal and protect and make the paper a bit firmer, as the frames obviously didn’t come with glass to protect the picture. The images were then glued in to the frames and a decorative piece of paper glued over the back, to neaten it up and seal everything in, before adding hanging hardware.

Et voila! So easy and, I think, so effective. I think they look like something you’d imagine seeing in an old pub or the cabin of a ship, where a lonely sea-going captain would gaze longingly at his betrothed or images of home. Or something like that.

It’s also a great way to use up damaged or ugly canvases. We’ve all been given one of those little “Live, Laugh, Love” wall-art canvases by well-meaning workmates or family members….repurpose them! Rip that canvas off and start upcycling the frame with images that suit your personal style and décor.

What do you think? I enjoyed making these and love how they turned out. It’s always good to repurpose items that would otherwise get binned or hidden in a cupboard somewhere. I am planning on making my own frames someday (seeing as how I bought a mitre saw 6 months ago with great plans for its use and have yet to even unpack it!) but, until then, I am pleased with these little ones.

Thank you for stopping in for yet another sporadic blog post 🙂

Starting again (again).

Hello and welcome to another blog post from the girl who can’t seem to actually get her butt into gear and write a regular blog post. Was my last one a year ago? Longer? Less? I don’t know and I am am apparently too lazy to check. At any rate, it has been a while.

Today I logged in with the intention of deleting my account. My main reasons being:

1. My life is boring and no one needs to read about it.
2. Some of my “projects” have been a bit crap and I don’t really need a large audience viewing them (I’m not quite sure who this “large audience” is, but in my head there a MILLIONS of people potentially reading about me and my not-very-good attempts at “art”.)
3. I am, as mentioned before, slack at posting on a regular basis.
4. I’m not sure what the focus of my blog is meant to be. Is it craft? Is it cooking? Is it long-winded opinion pieces? I don’t know. Which means my readers don’t know either.
5. I have a very busy life and no time to keep up with a blog.

All valid reasons, perhaps, but probably more akin to lame excuses, if I’m being honest. Let us look at these points and (because, hey, you made it this far and I’m clearly continuing on, so it would be rude for you to leave now…) see if we can offer an alternate viewpoint:

1. Boringness: Maybe my life is a tad on the tame side. I’m not exactly climbing mountains or winning races or embarking on fascinating journeys of self-discovery. But, I would imagine, that that is true for many people. MOST people in fact. So maybe people might like to read about someone who is like them and not pretending to be AMAZING and interesting ALL THE TIME (how very tiring that must be!). I’m just a regular person trying to make it through life with minimum drama and chaos, and if that makes me boring then snore away!
2. Who said I have to be the best artist of all time to deserve having a blog? Who made that dumb rule? Me, clearly. I am learning all the time and just trying to have a creative life and share the process and if some of my handiwork is a bit on the crap side, who cares? I like it when other artists show their failures or not-quite-perfect projects because it helps me to remember that we all make mistakes and sometimes really cool stuff can come from a stumble.
3. Me being a slack blogger is probably not on anyone’s list of “Things that make life harder/annoying/disappointing”. I’m just not that important, in the scheme of things. So I should take that worry off the table.
4. Lack of focus is, again, not the end of the world. Is anyone paying to read my blog? No. Is anyone basing their entire life strategy or business plan on my blog? No. Is anyone locked in to following my blog for the rest of their life? No. What does it matter if I post about cookies one day and then discuss the merits of bed socks the next? You can come and go as you please. Why am I trying to limit my likes and dislikes to one subject?
5. I am very busy… making excuses. That’s what takes up my time. I think “Oh I am not good enough/interesting enough/productive enough to have a blog” What a load of tosh.

So, you can see, I decided not to delete my account. Not just yet anyway. Maybe I will let it stick around. Because maybe I enjoy writing these sporadic posts. Maybe, just maybe, I am allowed to do something just for myself – shock, horror! – and it doesn’t need to be for anyone else. And it doesn’t need to be exciting, or earth-shattering or even remotely clever. It just needs to be honest.

I am “starting over” in many areas of my life right now so this blog will be just one tiny piece of that enormous puzzle. Pretty sure I will get fed up, lose pieces and chuck it all on the floor during several tantrums, but that’s ok. My life, just like me, is a work in progress 🙂