It's not easy being green...

Well... it's not that hard either - it's just a song I love (Kermit used to sing it on The Muppets, you can listen here), and I fancied it for my title - you'll soon see why!

Welcome (back) everyone - so happy you decided to drop in... it's always great to have company on the journey.  Since I'm 'fashionably late' for both the challenges today's piece was inspired by (though thankfully I haven't missed the party altogether), I'm going to dive right in.

I can't tell you much about the making of this tag ('phew', I hear you all cry), as it's for the Studio L3 challenge, hosted by Linda Ledbetter, to carry out the techniques in Tim Holtz's Compendium of Curiosities II.  So if you'd like to know more, you'll need to check out page 41 of the book or - as a special treat this week - you can watch the man him self in action (LOVE the opening credits - the music has become a really happy tune for me as I know I'm going to enjoy what follows!):

So now the cat's out of the bag about how it's done, here are a couple of shots of the early stages of the tag.  I knew I wanted butterflies, so once I'd started I just layered butterflies and butterflies and butterflies!  

I love resist... so I love this technique!

The other challenge I really wanted to make time for this week was Our Creative Corner's lovely Recycle with a Pop of Green affair.  Well, as you can see, I've got the green covered already, so now the recycling...

If you visited me on WOYWW this week, you'll have seen the bread wrapper on my workdesk, awaiting a new life in a crafty project - well, the reincarnation has taken place!  Thank you Morrisons supermarket for selling your bread in wax paper...  and it gets splendidly rumpled and creased as you make your way through the loaf, wrapping and unwrapping it!

I had various plans for it, and just had to find the time to make the piece they would be right for.  And here it is as my lovely dimensional butterflies. 

I haven't got a butterfly punch or individual die, so I used the Tim Holtz On the Edge Butterflight die, which meant doing some topping and tailing to get whole butterflies.



 




They're stamped with the little Prima Almanac wallpaper stamp in Staz-On black ink, and heat set. Then the two layers are stuck together with Glossy Accents, which is also what I used to attach them to the tag.



 





I'm so pleased with the effect, as the wax paper is so light, it has a really delicate translucence and flutters in the slightest draught so that my flight of butterflies really dances with dimensionality.


 


Once I started assembling the whole thing (it's mounted on thick chipboard, so that it's nice and sturdy), I found it all a bit too polished, so before sticking anything down I wellied in with a coarse-grain sandpaper emery board at the edges. 

I loved the worn wallpaper look that I got, so took it onto the main surface of the tag in places too.





(The quote is one I've always loved... so was easy enough to decide on!)





The rough hewn, shabby look was just right for what I had planned at the top of the tag, and for the ribbons and twine I was starting to gather around the tag on my workdesk, seeing which wanted to really be there.

I had a leftover kraft tag that I'd tried a new woodgrain stamp on (new three months ago, when I experimented).  It was far too large, so I cut it down, and then ripped the bottom edge, and gave it a going over with the Paper Distresser on the other edges.  

To this I added a butterfly I cut from the trimmings of the Kraft Resist paper.  He also got a little sanded at the edges.  And lastly I stuck on a mini botanical label from the 7 Gypsies Conservatory set.  

Again, this was something I'd made ages ago, when I got hold of some Glossy Accents for the first time (in, I think, late March-ish?) and was just seeing what it would do!  It's been sitting in a little box since then - time to come out and play!

 






The delicious ribbon at the top is from the Funkie Junkie Boutique, as is the twiny mesh ribbon from which I made the fringe at the bottom of the tag.  

Overall, I'm pretty happy with the finished tag - especially as I didn't think I was going to make the deadlines for these challenges!  I really had fun creating it - greens and blues are so soothing to work with... I hope you've enjoyed it too.  It's always great to hear what you think, and I always try to pay a return visit if I know you've stopped by.




I'm entering this in:
Studio L3's Compendium of Curiosities Challenge 19, Kraft Resist
Our Creative Corner's lovely challenge, Recycle it with a Pop of Green - recycled bread wrapper
Addicted to Stamps challenge called Etwas Recyclen - in other words, Recycle Something
Hels Sheridan's lovely Sunday Stampers challenge, which is to use Green at Ink on My Fingers
Paper and Such are playing a challenge this week called Wings N Things
Simon Says Stamp are on an Anything Goes challenge
Out of a Hat Creations would like us to use our Favourite Technique or Product... well it's probably no secret that I would be lost without Distress Inks, and at the moment, I'm fairly obsessed with resists of one sort or another - but my absolutely favourite thing is Distressing or ageing things for that lived in look... and there's plenty of that going on here!
Oh, and I almost forgot - I wanted to enter it for Frilly and Funkie's gorgeous Resist challenge too!

Butterflies are self-propelled flowers.
Robert Heinlein

I only ask to be free.  The butterflies are free.
Charles Dickens

If nothing ever changed, there'd be no butterflies.
Anonymous