#Cre8time takes Flight...

Hello friends... Happy NEW YEAR! Today I resharing one of my favorite and most popular makes from last year.

As my health has made itself my main priority, this has left me with a fraction of the time I used to devote to creating with abandon. Now when my muse comes out to play when she is fully rested and rejuvenated... I have found myself creating things with wings and making some fun stuff to accent my studio.

I've had this papier-maché torso lying around for more years than I'd care to admit - I used to have three and I passed two on to friends. I have to admit I was a bit unsure of what to create with this last one since I've had it so long. The possibilities are endless... so I decided to create an altered torso.

I've painted her up with spray paints and StencilGirl stencils and gave her some handmade resin tropical flair and WINGS!

I created several molds using Amazing Mold Putty: an Art Deco style vintage mirror, a hand-carved polymer clay palm leaf, and some interesting shaped shells. 

I selected three stencil designs: Art Deco Wallpaper Stencil L319; Tribal Leaves Stencil L213; and Mimosa 6 Stencil S126.

The first thing I did is put a border of clear packing tape around the edges of each stencil, on the front and backside, and burnishing with a bone folder. I remember hearing this trick from another artist and thought it was worth a try -- works for me!

First I added some color to the wood accents on the torso. I used Carbon Gray Varathane Wood Stain - it's easy to apply and dries quick. I never heard of gray wood stain... I happen to love this color and the color it achieved. I have an unfinished wood cabinet that is soon to be tackled with this lovely colored stain.

When this is dry I use some plastic wrap to cover the wooden parts to protect area from spray painting with stencils! I used a coating of Mod Podge Matte finish to seal the papier maché torso in preparation to accept a good layering of spray paint.

I have a bright gloss green and a bright blue which I sprayed alternating in no particular pattern.

After I had a nice base layer, I continued adding color spraying through the stencils. The shapes are organic and look like shadows peeking through palm branches at night.

While the paint is drying, I get on with casting my accent pieces. I brush the inside of each mold with Ocean Blue Alumidust and also mix some into a batch of Amazing Casting Resin. This resin turns an opaque white when cured and with the Alumidust mixed in, it will result in a pretty pale blue.

I always make sure to have extra molds on hand to pour any leftover resin so it doesn't go to waste. This is all of the molds poured with resin cured. I needed two of the mirrors so all the small bits are extras for the rainy-day project bin.

Look at the AMAZING detail in the front and back of each shell cast in resin. The overpour {flashing} tears away pretty easy while resin is still soft and any remaining can easily be trimmed away. I sanded edges with an emory board.

I gave a little shine and brightness to the resin pieces by brushing the high points with Tonic Nuvo Embellishment Mousse. This color is a nice pearly pale blue... perfect for beachy themed projects! 

I finished off by adding a section of recycled jewels around the neck to dangle the resin palm leaf and a faceted gem. I crossed the mirror shapes and wrapped with wire to form wings and secured with wrapping wire around the torso. I brushed a little of the spray paint onto the wire to blend it in to the background pattern. I'm so happy with how this looks that I left off the other two shell pieces I prepared {they won't go to waste -- stay tuned}! I hope you love my tropical winged torso as much as I do. She make's a beautiful beachy addition to my creative workspace.

This lady is making a trip to Phoenix, AZ to be on display in the Alumilite Corp./Amazing Casting Products Booth #2214 during Creativation January 20-22, 2018. I'll be demoing all three days, so if you are attending -- drop by and say "HI"!

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Thanks for dropping by and I'd love to hear what you're favorite make from 2017 is... leave a comment with a link!   xo Sb

Welcome to the #Cre8time Tropics...StencilGirl Products + Amazing Casting Products Bloghop Day 1

Hello friends! Today I am participating in a very special bloghop where the creative teams from Amazing Casting Products and StencilGirl Products have put their spin on projects using products from both lines.

I have to admit I was a bit unsure of what to create, there possibilities with the challenge at hand are endless... so I decided to create an altered torso. 

I've had this papier-maché torso lying around for more years than I'd care to admit {over 10} and it has nice wood accents. I'm painting her up with spray paints and StencilGirl stencils and gave her some handmade resin tropical flair and WINGS!

I created several molds using Amazing Mold Putty: an Art Deco style vintage mirror, a hand-carved polymer clay palm leaf, and some interesting shaped shells.

For two of the shells, the details on the front were just as beautiful on the back. So I rubbed the cured mold with petroleum jelly {inner and outer edges}, and pressed another batch of Amazing Mold Putty onto the top of each, overlapping down around sides to create a two-part mold. **TIP** A mold-release is needed to do this as mold putty fuses to itself, so in this case petroleum jelly works perfectly.

I selected three StencilGirl Products designs: Art Deco Wallpaper Stencil L319; Tribal Leaves Stencil L213; and Mimosa 6 Stencil S126.

The first thing I did is put a border of clear packing tape around the edges of each stencil, on the front and backside, and burnishing with a bone folder. I remember hearing this trick from another artist and thought it was worth a try.

First I added some color to the wood accents on the torso. I used Carbon Gray Varathane Wood Stain - it's easy to apply and dries quick. I never heard of gray stain... I happen to love this color and the color it achieved. 

Some areas didn't take the stain too well and looked a bit spotchy {most likely due to wood glue in the composite shape} so I added a little more color with a white-wash from a paint pen, then brushing over with a grey acrylic glaze. That's more like it!!

When this is dry I use some plastic wrap to cover the wooden parts and get ready for some fun... spray painting with stencils! I used some Mod Podge Matte finish to seal the papier maché torso in preparation to accept a layering of spray paint.

I have a bright gloss green and a bright blue which I sprayed alternating in no particular pattern.

After I had a nice base layer, I continued adding color spraying through the stencils. The shapes are organic and look like shadows peeking through palm branches at night.

I brush the inside of each mold with Ocean Blue Alumidust and also mix some into a batch of Amazing Casting Resin. This resin turns an opaque white when cured and the Alumidust will give it a pale blue hue.

I always make sure to have extra molds on hand to pour any leftover resin so it doesn't go to waste. This is all of the molds poured with resin cured. I needed two of the mirrors so all the small bits are extras for the rainy-day project bin.

Look at the AMAZING detail in the front and back of each shell cast in resin. The overpour {flashing} tears away pretty easy while resin is still soft and any remaining can easily be trimmed away. I sanded edges with an emory board.

I gave a little shine and brightness to the resin pieces by brushing the high points with Tonic Nuvo Embellishment Mousse. This color is a nice pearly pale blue... perfect for beachy themed projects!

I finished off by adding a section of recycled jewels around the neck to dangle the resin palm leaf and a faceted gem. I crossed the mirror shapes and wrapped with wire to form wings and secured with wrapping wire around the torso. I brushed a little of the spray paint onto the wire to blend it in to the background pattern. I'm so happy with how this looks that I left off the other two shell pieces I prepared... in this case less is MORE! I hope you love my tropical winged torso as much as I do. She will be a beautiful addition to my creative workspace.

To see more AMAZING projects for the StencilGirl/Amazing Casting Products Blog Hop follow along at the links below!

Today's stops on the hop are as follows...

StencilGirl Talk Blog

Mary Beth Shaw

Tina Walker

Kristie Taylor

Susan Brown

Lyn Gill

One lucky winner will receive both a $25 Gift Certificate to StencilGirl Products - AND - a $25 Gift Certificate to Amazing Casting Products!

Visit the fabulous designers from both teams and comment for your chance to win!

The more blogs you comment on, the more chances you have to WIN!

(One comment per blog please.)

You have until Sunday, April 23rd at 11:59PM Central Time to leave your comments.

Winner will be announced on StencilGirl's Facebook page and Amazing Casting Products’s Facebook page on Monday, April 24th.

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Thanks for dropping by and I'd love to hear what you are creating with stencils! xo Sb

** This is a sponsored post. StencilGirl Products and Amazing Casting Products® have provided products for use in this project in exchange for my creative ideas, views and opinions. My ideas and opinions are my own.

I'm having an AMAZING #Cre8time Moldmaking and Casting... Day three of the "See You at CHA Blog Hop"

Welcome to day three of the "See You at CHA!" Bloghop. This upcoming CHA Mega Show will be it's 75th year celebrating creativity. Yes this is a party and there are plenty of chances for you to win the AMAZING bloghop prize. To get back to the top of the hop and catch up on day's one and two CLICK HERE to jump over to the Craft and Hobby Association's Blog.

CHA has been an event that I have attended as a retailer {when I was an instructor at my local scrapbooking store}, and now I attend as a CHA Designer Member with my business SMBdesign, and also as a working artist demonstrating at the big event. This upcoming CHA Mega Show will be my 5th year attending. I travel cross-country from Florida, the land of Disney World to attend this event that happens just steps away from Disneyland. Can you believe I haven't been to Disneyland yet?? My first time attending, my sister and I drove down to Huntington Beach for dinner and put our feet in the sand {it was way too cold that year to put our feet in the water}. 

You can find me demonstrating at the Amazing Casting Products/Alumilite Corp. Booth #2400... come and try out Amazing Mold Putty and see the other products in action.

For the celebration I'm sharing this mini pumpkin project using Amazing Mold Rubber, Amazing Remelt, and Amazing Casting Resin. 

I love creating molds in Amazing Mold Rubber and I decided to make molds of three different mini pumpkins {please CLICK HERE to view mixing/preparation}. This project shows how I made a mold of the smallest of my teeny weeny pumpkins – it's not a pretty mold on the outside and I had to do a little extra work to make this mold usable. 

Amazing Mold Rubber is a liquid silicone which is fast curing and captures every little detail. I figured since it was starting to thicken up really FAST {it's still super humid summer time here in South Florida}, my pumpkin would stay submerged... NOT!! Before putting the pumpkin in the mold rubber, I dipped the top with the stem into the liquid silicone and let all the airbubbles dissipate before fulling submerging into container. So I had to sit there and keep pushing it back down and dragging the liquid silicone over the top.

**A TIP** Don't use a SILICONE spatula in liquid silicone – use a plastic knife or spoon. If you don't clean it off immediately, the liquid silicone fuses to it. My nice purple spatula now has a pink tip.

In preparation, I had a couple sections of old cut up molds submerged to keep the pumpkin from settling all the way to the bottom {you can see the yellow peeking through the mold}. I planned setting it upside down so the stem would be at the top of the mold and I would cut a nice size "X" at the top to gently free the pumpkin from the mold. Since the cured mold is all bumpy at the top, I need to backfill to make it level. I could do this with another pour of Amazing Mold Rubber... but since I had a mold fail on a previous pour, I'm fresh out of my pink magical goop and my local store was out - yikes! So I can fix this in a jiffy with Amazing Remelt, so I can use my mold right away - and I can go back with another layer of mold rubber later for a permanent fix.

I melt down some Amazing Remelt in the microwave and pour on top of Amazing Mold Rubber, filling the bowl to the top. I set this in the refrigerator for a bit to cool off and solidify quickly. I was busy messing about with other molds I was casting so I wasn't paying much attention to how long I left it in the fridge {sorry}.

So now my mold is level and the Amazing Remelt formed exactly to the shape of the Amazing Mold Rubber mold... and it doesn't stick to it permanently. When I'm done casting resin, this can be cut up, remelted and reused for something else!

I attached a mini binder clip to one of the sections of the "X" cut at top of mold, prepared a small batch of Amazing Casting Resin and then poured into the mold. I set aside to cure for about 20 minutes. I let cool a bit and removed first casting from the mold. The detail is so AMAZING!!! But I have a couple large air bubbles that were trapped in the mold – I forgot to poke around inside with a toothpick before the resin solidified. No worries... this baby won't go to waste! I filled the holes with some air dry clay and sanded back the edges – all fixed.

The paint I wanted to use wasn't a bit too fluid for this purpose, so I gave the entire resin pumpkin a coat of clear gesso – an easy fix! Once dry I rubbed on some Ranger Distress Paint in Cracked Pistachio {a lovely teal green}... I'm in LOVE!!

When dry, I mixed another small batch of Amazing Casting Resin colored with some Cotton Candy Alumidust. I poured some off into molds and saved the rest for topping my pumpkin. This is what I did... I waited for the resin to start to get thick and I dipped the pumpkin into it a couple times right as it was about to solidify. As it started to turn opaque, I turned it upright and sprinkled a rainbow mix of seed beads to serve as sprinkles {I mixed these myself from my 30 separate colors of seed beads}. This is so adorable... but it needs a little something, right?! I wanted to add a little more.

I waited for resin to fully cure and gently rubbed off the seed beads. They came off pretty easy. I mixed up another batch of Amazing Casting Resin with the Cotton Candy Alumidust and dipped again. Now the stem was completely covered. I used a mini file to make little hole in the top of the pumpkin to accept a piece of wire and wire-wrapped a stem to hold a candle and attached a glass leaf bead. Perfect!

This pumpkin is ready just in time for the See You at CHA Celebration! What item have you been dreaming to mold to use for your creative projects?

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Now for the giveaway instructions... there are three ways you can enter via Rafflecopter below.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

There are just three entry options to win our $500+ $650 Visa gift card:

• Leave a comment on this blog post below (mandatory) answering the question - "What is your favorite "can't live without" craft supply or tool?"
• Tweet about the giveaway (tweet text includes #CHAshow hashtag; you can tweet daily for extra entries)
• Answer a multiple-choice poll about how often you "cre8time" for crafting (double entry value).

Anyone and everyone in the US and abroad is eligible to enter, even you and your team. CHA staff are the only folks who are not eligible.

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Thanks so much for dropping by! I hope I get to meet you at CHA next month. I'll be demoing with my fellow amazing creatives at the Amazing Casting Products/Alumilite Corp. Booth #2400. Stop by and say HI! See you at CHA!!!  Sb :)