Dancing Leaves

Hi everyone, and a warm welcome to Words and Pictures - so happy you've dropped in.

I've a quick tag to share with you today, catching the very last tumbling leaves before the trees enter their stark, bare, winter state (also beautiful of course - silhouetted tree branches against the sky... wow, well done Nature!).

I've got an amazing view out of my (temporary) living room window, straight on to the River Avon, with a tree just outside, bravely clinging on to its last few yellowed leaves.

There's a definite melancholia to this stage, though with yesterday's bright blue skies, the crispness in the air was wonderfully invigorating.  And rather than falling, the leaves really did seem to flutter their way to the ground with one final flourish.

Today, in grey drizzle, it's sadly not the same story!  But this tag celebrates the final flourish, nonetheless...











It came together out of some discards and leftovers that were lying around on the craft table.  The kraft luggage label had been used to wipe a gesso-y brush on a couple of times, and the leaves are cut from one of my discarded Fashion ATCs!

The whole thing was based on a calico background, but in the end the fabric was a bit too floppy for my liking, so I backed it onto another layer of firm kraft card.

You can see those layers here...

The luggage label had taken on a slightly crumpled look, so I intensified that, scrunching it up and distressing the edges.

And then I had an absolute ball with some paints, inks, stamps and stencils to create the background.

I'm really happy with the leaves.  In pursuit of a Fashion ATC for the challenge over at Fun With ATCs (still plenty of time to play... we'd love to have your company), one attempt started with an ATC background on which I'd done the Tim Holtz Enamelled Stamping technique (from Compendium of Curiosities II)

I stamped some flourishes in Seedless Preserves DI and embossed them with clear embossing powder, then inked the background with the same colour and embossed again.




I completely loved the look - so much, in fact, that anything I put over it to build the Fashion theme didn't please me as much as the background itself - and believe me, I tried!

But what a delight when the idea struck for this tag to use that discarded ATC with the Tim Holtz Autumn Garland decorative strip die to cut myself some beautiful leaves.

I love how they catch the sunlight at certain angles, and at others reveal more of their flourishes.  

So really, it's a tag of two backgrounds - not only the tag itself, but also the not-quite-an-ATC background!

I added the sentiment that came to my lips, stamped onto some another gesso-painted kraft label (this time deliberately painted!), torn and edged with Gathered Twigs for extra definition, and assembled my pieces trying to leave plenty of  background on display.  

When I glued the leaves, I kept the glue just to the centre of each leaf, so that they could flick or curl up at the edges for extra movement.

I added some of the trimmed off calico as my ribbon at the top, and that was pretty much that!

Thanks so much for taking the time to drop by.  I'll be back very soon with a very special announcement... oh, the suspense!... so I'll hope perhaps to see you again, if not here then elsewhere in Craftyblogland.



I'm entering this in the following:
Artful Times would like us to share a Fabric Tag
Our Creative Corner are asking us to Make Our Own Background
Crafts 4 Eternity are looking for Terrific Tags

Autumn, the year's last, loveliest smile.
William Cullen Bryant

Autumn wins you best by this, its mute appeal to sympathy for its decay.
Robert Browning