I cannot tell you how please i am that this step by step didn't crash with my hard drive. Today i get to share with you a tag i created using lots of sizzix dies and fades. Below you will find a little step by step on how to create this tag too. I am digging the wood background paper. Can you also tell i love those white clocks rub-ons? Honestly i could use them on just about everything. They would definitely be included in my favorite things list!
I knew i wanted to distressing this tag a bit with spray inks and stains, so to start i adhered a piece of patterned paper to watercolor paper. Plus i really liked the weight it gave the tag. I use matte medium to glue the paper to the watercolor paper and a brayer to smooth it out. Once it was dry, i cut the tag with the Sizzix Tag & Bookplates die by Tim Holtz. I sealed the patterned paper with more matte medium. You'll see why in just a bit.
I picked out one of my favorite texture fade, the Bricked. The contrast between "bricks" and "wood grain" was interesting to me. I really love all the possibilities with these fades. Today we are going to ink it up a bit and then spritz it with a bit of water.
Flip the fade over and press it onto the tag. Because I sealed the tag, it doesn't completely absorb into the patterned paper and warp it. I'm impatient so i like to heat dry the ink.
Add a few rub-ons here and there. I like the contrast of the white against the wood grain paper. I do think rub-ons are the underdogs of the scrapbook world but they can bring so a cool twist to a project.
Now it's time to add some colors. Here i am using distress stains. Again by sealing the paper with matte medium, it allows the stains to run without soaking too quickly into the paper. You can also spritz the colors with water.
I also wanted a little more opaque layer so i added in some red paint to the top left corner. The red really pops with the other colors. I sprinkled some white splatters across the tag as well.
Next i cut a birdie out of grunge paper using the caged bird die. He needed some coloring so i painted him with some teal & white creating a mottled look. Once the bird was dry i used a black pen to outline his body.
Next i cut some old book text and stacked it up on the smallest flower and the tattered florals die. Since the paper is so thin, stacking layers of them worked well for me.
I really wanted to highlight the edges of the flowers so i inked them with the same color ink as the distress stain. I stacked three of the ink flowers on top of each other and added a green brad to the center.
I found the perfect sentiment on Wendy Vecchi's Tools for Art stamp set. I inked the edges of the sentiment and the tag using my favorite Walnut Stain ink. Now i could assemble my tag and bring it all together. Here's some close up shots of details of this tag.