Chalkboards

One of my favorite design blogs, sfgirlbybay has done a post of chalkboards. I thought I'd show a few of my own.

This was done in a baby girl's room, just as you open the door. It's done in oil based paint. There was a bit of a mess and I discovered that vegetable oil removes oil paint from skin. The name was done from a stencil and since it was decided that it might be difficult to line up the letters, they were purposely skewed.
This is in my guest cottage. It seemed to be the best purpose for a solid core door. I used an entire can of chalkboard spray paint over a coat of primer. My guests enjoy the sentiment.
I rolled on two coats of latex chalkboard paint for this wall in my kitchen. As it is opposite my pantry I thought it would be the perfect place to jot menus and grocery lists. Unfortunately we love the drama of the black wall and the way that it shows off the artwork, so we haven't had the heart to mess it up with chalk.

Twig Chairs

Spring has sprung. I don't know about you, but my yard is full of twigs and branches that have been shed during the winter. What to do? Make twig chairs! I learned to make these from Daniel Mack. His amazing work can be seen here.
Materials:

1" diameter twigs

1/2" diameter twigs

smaller diameter twigs

wood glue

Tools:

garden clippers

utility knife

saw or heavy duty lopers

drill

drill bit

large rubber bands

Cut 1" diameter twigs into four pieces; two 12 inches long and two 4 inches long. You may have to use a saw or tree lopers to cut these as garden clippers aren't strong enough. Cut 10 thinner twigs 4 inches long.

Drill 2 holes in each of the heavier 4 inch twigs; one set should be near the top and the other set should be about 2 inches from the bottom. The sets should match. The holes should be 1/2 inch deep and a bit smaller than the diameter of the small twigs. With the utility knife, whittle the ends of the small twigs so that they just fit into the drilled holes.
Squirt wood glue into the holes, fit the smaller twigs into the holes and clamp with a large rubber band. Drill four holes in each of the two longer, heavier twigs. The two bottom holes should match up with the ones you drilled previously. You may put the top two holes anywhere you please but the holes on one twig should line up with the holes on the other. Whittle the ends of four more smaller twigs, squirt some more glue into the holes and assemble. Clamp with rubber band and allow to dry. You should now have two ladders; one 4 inches high and the other 12 inches.
Drill four holes in each "ladder" perpendicular with the other holes in order to join the two ladders together. I have drilled them in line with the previous holes because the heavier twigs are large enough. If you have thinner twigs, you may wish to offset the holes a bit. Again, the holes should line up with each other.
Whittle the ends of the four final small twigs, squirt the glue and join the two ladders to form the chair. Clamp with the rubber bands and allow to dry.
Cut very small twigs to size and glue them to form the seat of the chair.
This is one I made several years ago. I got creative with the twigs and wove the seat. They make interesting wall decor and cast interesting shadows at night.
Tips:

Play around with different woods and sizes of twigs.

I made a lovely chair out of driftwood.

Use bark, moss or weave leather shoelaces for the seat.

A $30 Letterpress

CuttleKids is the junior version of one of those expensive die cutting machines used to make shapes for scrapbooking. It is used for embossing as well, but you need to buy embossing plates separately. I've found a way to mimic those letterpressed cards without having to buy a bunch of special dies. I haven't found a way to add color yet, but I think this is pretty exciting. Although it lists for $30 I paid $15 for this on sale at Wal-Mart. It is on sale now at Michael's as well.

Materials:

140 lb. cold press watercolor paper

fun foam

thin metal objects like brass stencils or letters

tools:

cuttlekids machine

The machine comes with 2 thick plastic printing plates; A and B. Cut the fun foam the same size as the plastic "plates" but cut 1/2" off the end so that the foam is shorter than the plastic. Cut the paper the size of the plastic. Make a sandwich starting with plastic piece "A", fun foam, paper, metal letters and lastly plastic "B". Line everything up at the far end. The front end will be missing the fun foam. This allows the press to "catch" the sandwich. Run it through the press front edge first.

Tips:

Although this press isn't large enough to make a full sized card, the pieces can be glued, sewed, riveted, whatever to a greeting card for a letterpress look.

There is a large, more expensive version of this machine called the Cuttle Bug.

You can use most watercolor papers but I prefer to use the cold pressed as it is textured. The impressed design becomes smooth and contrasts with the background.

I place the letters and let them move around a bit while I roll them through the machine but if you want more control you can glue them to a thin piece of copy paper. Just make sure you let the glue dry or everything will stick together.

Paper Type

CuttleKids is the junior version of one of those expensive die cutting machines used to cut shapes for scrapbooks. It can be used for embossing as well but you need to buy separate embossing dies. I've discovered a way to emboss with ordinary watercolor paper. Actually, any heavy paper will do although you will find that those chipboard cutouts are too thick. The CuttleKids comes with 2 plastic rectangles ("A" & "B"). Cut a piece of fun foam the same size. Trim 1/2" off one end.

Materials:

140lb. watercolor paper

fun foam

Tools:

CuttleKids

scizzors

hole punch

Cut the watercolor paper into 1.5 inch square pieces. Cut letters out of the squares using a hole punch for the inner parts of the letters. Trim a piece of watercolor paper the same size as the plastic pieces. Stack everything together; plastic "A" first, then fun foam, watercolor paper then paper letters and finally, plastic "B". Line the foam and paper up at the far end of the plastics. Run the sandwich through the press, front end first. Without the 1/2" of fun foam, the front of the sandwich is thinner and will "catch" when going through the press.

Tips:

I used large scissors for a primitive look but you can use smaller ones for more detail.

Cut shapes or use punches instead of letters.

I like to use cold press watercolor paper as it has a texture. The embossed parts become smooth, contrasting with the rest of the paper.

Alphabet Art

After I used these letters to emboss with the CuttleKids die cutting machine (see earlier posts), it occurred to me that they would make an interesting work of art in and of themselves. If you haven't already, cut a sheet of watercolor paper into twenty-six 1 1/2 inch square pieces.

Cut out the letters using a paper punch for the centers.
Materials:

140 lb. watercolor paper

black poster board

11x14" frame with mat with an 8x10" opening

glue

Tools:

scissors

hole punch

Glue the letters to the poster board. Frame. Hang.

Guinness Chocolate Cake

This cake comes from The Brewery in Great Barrington, Mass. If you go there, you have to marvel at the 3 huge layers, covered in chocolate icing and of course, eat a piece. I've made this smaller (better for family consumption) and a wee bit more figure friendly by replacing some of the fat with applesauce and yogurt for sour cream. It's a lovely moist chocolate cake that is not too sweet.

Ingredients:

1 cup Guinness

1/2 cup butter

1/2 cup applesauce

2 eggs

3/4 cup plain yogurt

3/4 cup cocoa

2 cups flour

2 cups sugar

1/2 Tbl baking powder

3/4 tsp salt

Melt first 3 ingredients in a bowl in the microwave. Cool slightly. Beat eggs and yogurt in mixer then add melted ingredients. Add the dry ingredients and mix until blended, scraping sides of the bowl. Pour into a greased bundt pan and cook at 350 degrees for 45 minutes. Cool in pan for 10 minutes then place on rack.
Tips:

Although The Brewery ices it with a rich dark chocolate icing, I usually serve it plain with vanilla ice cream.

I mixed Creme de Menthe with a bit of powdered sugar and drizzled it over the ice cream for a festive St. Patty's Day look.

Confession time. I accidently made this cake with a full (12oz) bottle of Guinness rather than the 1 cup. All it seemed to do is add about 15 minutes to the cooking time without changing the texture or taste. Whew!

Irish Beer Bread

Why make Irish Soda Bread when you can have Irish Beer Bread? Although you can use any beer you like, in honor of St. Patty, I've chosen Guinness.

Ingredients:

3 cups flour

3 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

1-12 oz bottle or can of beer

Mix all ingredients by hand. Pour into greased pan . Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes. Butter and salt the top and bake for an additional 10 minutes.

Tips:

I baked this in a saucepan but a loaf pan works as well.

I actually prefer to eat this the next day as toast for breakfast.

Some beers (Budweiser is one) are quite salty. Use a bit less salt in the recipe in that case.

For a softer more tender bread, combine the beer with 3 cups of Bisquick and cook as above.

Mural, Mural on the Wall

I've done a number of murals and have found ideas and techniques that make it easy. After all, that's what I'm about; easy crafts.

1. Less is more. The first client I had convinced me that in a room with baby, baby furniture and toys, a full mural would add to the cacophony. You need calm, not mess. We did vignettes and I've done them ever since. Better to tuck a nest of baby birds in a corner and a bouquet of flowers behind a door than fill all the walls with busy jungle animals. I usually paint a focal piece over the bed and tuck small relative objects around the room.

2. Less is more. Make it pale, rather than bold. The very fact that you are working on a plain wall will make what you are painting pop, so you'll be more effective if you try to be subtle. Believe me, it will be bright enough. Sometimes I achieve subtlety by mixing some of the wall color into my paints.

3. Copy. Unless you are a prolific artist with a large portfolio, it's hard to come up with a perfect mural. Use book illustrations, greeting cards, wrapping paper, etc. as your templates. Don't feel guilty. Remember "Good poets borrow, great poets steal." It's the same with artists.

Materials:

copy paper

graphite paper

acrylic bottle paints

black paint pen (not a permanent marker -these are sold with paints and made by Elmer's or Krylon)

Tools:

brushes

pencil

light box ( look at older posts in this blog to learn to make one)

I found this photo of a duck and traced it onto a piece of copy paper using a light box. You can blow up your drawing on a copy machine till it is the size you need. (You may have to join several sheets of paper)

Place graphite paper under the copy and trace it onto the wall. I like graphite paper better than carbon paper as carbon paper is more permanent. Graphite paper is like the lead in a pencil and can be erased. If you can't find it (it's available at Michael's), scribble a pencil on the backside of your drawing. If you would like to try this picture, download the duck drawing here.

Fill in the shapes with acrylic paint just like a coloring book. You learned this in elementary school. It should be familiar and easy. Use three shades; lighter, medium and darker. This looks like a white duck, but it's actually a pale gray. This allows me to add the white for highlights and the deeper color for shadows. (I used gray-blue for the shadows, white for the highlights in the body and mixed the 2 as the medium color)

Now comes the artistic part, the shading and highlighting. It's all about wet into wet. If you shade or highlight onto a dry surface, you may have defined edges between light and dark and it won't look natural.

You have to work rather fast or just repaint as acrylics dry fast.

1. Decide where the light will come from. The opposite side will be shaded. Repaint the shape in the medium color. While it is wet, roughly scumble the shade color on the dark side. The edges will soften and blend into the main color. The same goes for the highlights. Sometimes I use my finger to blend the edges a bit more. (I did that for the body of this duck.) I didn't need to blend the beak and feet. I used a yellow-orange for the medium color, darkened with an orange and highlighted with yellow.

2.If you want a sharp highlight; a catch light in an eye, or a highlight on a shiny surface, wait until the underpainting has dried, then paint on the highlights. (I did this on the eye of the duck)

The slightly textured surface of dry wall makes it hard for me to make neat and clean edges so I outline everything with a paint pen when I am finished.

Tips:

I used a large stamp for the leaves on the trees in the very first examples. If you can't find one, cut it out of a mouse pad with an Exacto knife or strong scissors.

The graphite paper is "old school". If you have access to an overhead projector, use that. There are projectors for computers. Scan a picture or pull something off the web and project it onto your wall.

A permanent marker will bleed through if you ever decide to repaint your wall. If you do use a marker, rather than a paint pen, cover it with a primer such as Bin before repainting.

If you click on each of these pictures in this post they will enlarge and you can see them in better detail.