Calico Tree ATC

Encore Posts

I'm away again for a month or so.  There are some scheduled posts with new creations coming your way, but I'm also taking the chance to do some catching up here at Words and Pictures.   Projects which made their first appearances elsewhere for Design Team duties or Guest Designer opportunities, but which only had a sneak peek here, are being gathered together in the pages of my virtual scrapbook.  I'm calling them "Encore" posts and they're formatted differently (all the way down the centre), so you can spot them easily.

Please don't feel that you have to comment all over again!

After that bit of fairly ancient history in Take a leaf out of my book, I've a slightly more recent Encore for you today.  This one appeared over at the Calico Craft Parts blog on October 23rd, 2015.  At the time, I was in the throes of an obsession with Wilted Violet, the then new-on-the-block Distress colour.  As an addition to my favourite blues and browns, it was making soul sing.  For this ATC I found some DecoArt paint colours to give me that same feeling with the perfect late autumn sky for this fabulous laser-cut tree.

I'm playing mainly with watercolours just now (November 2017) and funnily enough there's a similar colour love affair going on.  More of that another time... Oh, and since it's an ATC, consider it a little more inspiration for Anne's wonderful Mini Marvels challenge over at A Vintage Journey.  Here's what I wrote back in 2015.

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Hello all, Alison here from Words and Pictures with a crackly ATC for you today.  It's no secret that I love trees at all times of the year.  I love the young spring leaves so fresh and vivid, the luscious summer growth at its height, the glorious array of colour as the leaves turn in autumn (there have been plenty of creations celebrating that lately), but I also love the bare branches, stark against the winter skies.  This ATC celebrates that particular beauty.

I love working with these ATC blanks.  They are sturdy and beautifully dimensional in themselves, and so lend a much more substance to a small piece like an ATC.  I've used the Plain ATC but there are lots of designs to choose from.

I started by applying a coat of DecoArt Media Crackle Paste in varying thicknesses across the ATC.  Once that had dried, I wanted a bit more crackle around the edges so I added some Media Crackle Glaze (which also has a glossier finish) and waited for that to crackle too.

Regulars at Words and Pictures will know I've been having a bit of a purple phase... adding Wilted Violet to my autumn colours with great joy.  I've played with a similar autumnal range of colours here, but using DecoArt Media Fluid Acrylics, applying them in washes to build the layers of colour.  The paints involved are Dioxazine Purple, Cobalt Blue Hue and Phthalo Blue coming down from the top, and Raw Umber, Burnt Sienna, English Red Oxide and Quinacridone Gold coming up from the bottom.

The gorgeous Skeleton Tree Style 3 has also had a touch of colour - a wash of Quin Gold and then some Dioxazine Purple to add the darker shadows.

I wanted some scraggy meadow grasses, so I stamped them in Sepia and Black Archival inks around the foot of the tree.

And up in the sky the affirmation of the eternal beauty of trees - some ChitChat stickers with the same paints creating shadows around them to bed them in to the wintry sky.

I love the dimension of the Craft Parts - they give this little ATC a real presence - and the delicate cutting is so intricate and detailed.  I hope you like my Winter Branches - as you can probably tell, I'm rather fond of this one myself!

If you're tempted to go shopping, you can click on the links in the text to go straight to the Craft Parts I've used.  Do go browsing while you're there - there are always new treats on offer.  Thanks so much for stopping by, and I'll see you again soon.

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So I suppose this one is definitely heading for the end of autumn and into more of a wintry vibe.  I'm still not quite ready for the full winter look yet, but we'll get there soon.  Thanks for sticking with me while I'm missing in action - but at least there's a little bit of action here on the blog.  Hope you're all thriving and happy crafting all!

As soon as one leaves, one sees: wet bare branches, fog which floats over fields, trees, homes. Sky. Early dusk. And it all tells an incredibly simple truth.
Alexander Schmemann