Explore, Dream, Discover

Hello all!  Welcome to Words and Pictures - and an especially big welcome to the new followers - I'm honoured and delighted that you've decided to join the journey.

I'm very happy to be back with another Artistic Outpost project, and I've been playing with the Huck Finn stamp set for the first time.  I had a lovely time with this extended tag, and I'm pretty pleased with the end result.

Some of you will be ahead of the game, having already seen this over at the Artistic Outpost blog, but there are some more how-to details for you today and, of course, some more photographs!

After the extravaganza of the Lace Box - thank you all so much for your amazing feedback on that, by the way - I thought it would be nice to go for something of a simpler, natural style for today - and we've also gone from girly to boy-y (how come that doesn't work?)!

The pictures were taken a while back... we're now pretty snowy - how about you?








The background is Tim Holtz tissue wrap, wrinkled onto the tag and inked with various Distress Inks.

I love the texture you get from the tissue wrap, and the fabulous type-text into the bargain.  I like the idea that Huck is emerging out of words, since he belongs in a book!





All the stamping was done in Coffee Archival, either on white or kraft card, and I coloured Huck himself using Distress Markers, sometimes with a little water, sometimes not.

I used mostly the fine-tipped ends of the markers, as I wanted to keep the checked pattern of his dungarees, suggested by the stamp.

It's such a beautifully detailed image - look at the crooked ear on the dog!

I tore around the edges and then inked with Broken China and Vintage Photo... You're safe even if you get near the image, as the Distress Markers will resist any ink blending you do to a certain extent.






I stamped the large words from the set onto kraft card, and ripped the edges for a rough, natural look.

The inking was done with Vintage Photo and Gathered Twigs.

I love this vintage typeface, and its built-in distressed look with blots in some places and thin ink in others.

The little wooden pegs (pulled off the back of the very cheap flowers  I got in The Range) got a sweep of Peacock Feathers DI, to tone in with the background.

And since I was aiming for a rugged look, I layered the whole thing up with some burlap ribbon.

Originally, I had the sentiment stamped on kraft too, and was trying to get everything onto the tag.

I spent a while juggling the elements to find a layout I liked, but the wonderful quote was covering up too much of the background for my liking.








So I decided to add a separate panel using eyelets and some twine - now the sentiment had somewhere of its own to live.

But it no longer looked right stamped on kraft, so I re-stamped it onto the same card as Huck, and gave it the same edging treatment, to tie the two areas of the tag together.









The whole thing's topped off with some raffia and natural twine.  Again, the twine ties the top and the bottom of the tag together (artistically rather than literally, that is).












So that's my extended AO tag... the Huck Finn set is really lovely to work with, and I think you'll be seeing a lot more of it!  

I hope you're all keeping safe and warm inside (great excuse not to leave the craftdesk!) - and enjoying your Sunday.

We're celebrating my mother's birthday so there might not be much visiting time today, but I'll do my best to catch up during the week... And I'll also have some birthday present projects to share with you over the course of the next few days.

For now, thank you so much for stopping by, have a great weekend, and I'll see you soon.

He was sunshine most always - I mean he made it seem like good weather.

It's lovely to live on a raft. We had the sky, up there, all speckled with stars, and we used to lay on our backs and look up at them, and discuss about whether they was made, or only just happened.

Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot.
BY ORDER OF THE AUTHOR
All from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain