Companion Piece

Hello all, welcome to a brand new week here at Words and Pictures - thank you so much for stopping by!
A pair of tags for you today, companion pieces that "speak to" each other:

Okay, okay, yes... I succumbed: I gave in to the lure of the newly released Distress Colours!  But, you see, I wasn't even crafting last Autumn when the Fall Seasonal Release happened, and although you can still get hold of the other trios, the Fall one was nowhere to be found.  

And given that I've discovered I love autumnal crafting, and that I'm even (contrary to my expectations) starting to get sucked into Halloween-y things, the Gathered Twigs, Ripe Persimmon and Seedless Preserves were calling... loudly!  Okay, enough excuses - back to the tags.


Those are basically the colours used here, with some Archival Coffee used for the stamping.

I had a glorious time swiping the inks onto the craft mat, and then doing Tim Holtz's wrinkle-free distress technique.  I kept one tag quite delicate, but used more full-on colour on the second.

I also added some metallic Distress stain - the Tarnished Brass - to the mix for the second one, which gets you a touch more opacity and that delicious sheen.

For the second tag, I also blended some ink onto the tag to get that much richer combination - but other than the Tarnished Brass, it's exactly the same colours for both.  


I can't tell you how much I enjoyed playing with these vibrant intense colours... and as you blend them on the mat, you get whole new shades - just glorious.

I'd originally intended to use the second - let's call it Tag B - in the die-cutting machine to make flowers to go onto Tag A, but once they were both sitting there, I knew I wanted to keep both of them, and work them as a pair. So I had to make a whole new wrinkle-free distress sheet to cut the flowers out of!

I'm back to my musings on mortality, I'm afraid - well, that's pretty Halloween-y, isn't it?  31st October is the night of All Souls, after all, and a time for the contemplation of death.














So the journey is from youth and beauty to death and decay... and I tried to echo or mirror the images from one tag to the other.

And Shakespeare's back... another sonnet, this time number 65, asking whether or how it's possible for beauty to hold out against the inexorable passage of time.

(Shakespeare ends the sonnet by suggesting that the subject of the poem's beauty may live on through his, Shakespeare's, own verse... He wasn't short on a sense of self-worth, old Will!)












The main image on Tag A is one of Graphic 45's images from their Ladies' Diary stamps.  And her 'opposite number' is the skeleton from the Oxford Impressions set called Dr Coffin's Apothecary.


Generally I prefer to use mainly one make of stamp on a project, to keep to a specific style, but I felt these complemented each other well - they're both quite delicate.


They're both stamped in Coffee Archival, and then - to give a bit more zing against the background, I embossed them with Detail Clear embossing powder.


The point when I realised I might be onto something, was when I worked out they had their feet in the same position - so it really connected the two images.





As I've already mentioned, one of the early elements in the game were the flowers... that was really what I started out playing with.  Don't ask me how the whole thing ballooned into this - it just sort of happens!

You see handmade flowers everywhere in Craftyblogland, and while I've made the odd one or two, I thought it was time I got a bit braver.  These are cut using the Tattered Flower Garland decorative strip die.  

I'd coloured the card on both sides using the wrinkle-free distress technique, and then spent some time arranging the layers and tweaking petals into life.  They're attached with Idea-ology long attachers.  I think they were gold to start with, but they've had a little dab of alcohol ink (Ginger and Rust mixed).  

So with the flowers on the side of youth and beauty, I needed something on the side of time and decay. I remembered some skeleton leaves I've had for - oh, I don't know - certainly a decade or more.  

I got them just because they were lovely, with no idea what I might ever do with them!  Thankfully I was able to lay hands on them, and they also had a little brush of alcohol ink to deepen their creamy colour to a rustier tone.  

I applied the glue only at the base of the stems so that I could curl the tips of the leaves away from the tag for extra dimensionality.










The final pair of images has two of my current favourites - the haunting little girl from Artistic Outpost's Think and Wonder set, and Tim Holtz's fantastic skull from the Apothecary set.  

Could there be a starker contrast?!  








Bones are at the forefront of my mind at the moment, and not just because of Halloween.  On Saturday, I found myself at the most extraordinary little museum - the Grant Museum of Zoology, which is essentially a Victorian gallery of skeleton specimens, from dodos to chimpanzees, from dugongs to elephant skulls.  

My friends and I wandered around in state of spellbound wonder at the intricacies and variations of life displayed in these bones.  When you get down to the essence like that - we're all really very much alike!

 


A last little look at the ribbons - dyed with the same range of colours to tone in with the tags, except for the pale pink one which was a little freebie with an order from the Funkie Junkie Boutique.  



And I added two Idea-ology tassels to match the jump rings attaching the words at the foot of the tags.  I love the look of these divided tags - I picked the idea up a while ago from the hugely talented Redanne - and it pleases me greatly!

Thank you so much for your company today... every visit is truly appreciated, and I'm constantly blown away by your warmth and support.  Craftyblogland is a really special place.  

I'm entering this in the following:
Fashionable Stamping Challenges are playing with Halloween or Halloween Colours
Simon Says Stamp have some Eerie Inspiration in the form of a photo board - I'm playing mainly in the bottom row 
Art With No Boundaries are playing October and Halloween
The Anything Goes Challenge Blog would like us to Make Your Own Embellishments - that would be my flowers, and I hand-dyed the crinkle ribbon too
At Anything But a Card they'd like to see Autumn or Halloween themes and/or colours
And with the AO stamps and the metallic Distress Stain (not to mention the freebie ribbon!) all from the Funkie Junkie Boutique, I'd like to add this to the Sunday Share over at Frilly and Funkie

And I feel I should leave you with the chance to have a read of the whole of Sonnet 65, should you feel so minded...

Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea,
But sad mortality o'er-sways their power,
How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea,
Whose action is no stronger than a flower?
O, how shall summer's honey breath hold out
Against the wreckful siege of battering days,
When rocks impregnable are not so stout,
Nor gates of steel so strong, but Time decays?
O fearful meditation! where, alack,
Shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest lie hid?
Or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back?
Or who his spoil of beauty can forbid?
   O, none, unless this miracle have might,
   That in black ink my love may still shine bright.
                                           William Shakespeare