Snowflake Alchemy!

Firstly, Hello to all the gang at Sprinkle Twinkle in Kings Lynn where I was giving a demo day and workshop at the weekend, we had lots of fun looking at some of the new Christmas dies and sharing a few techniques.

At the start of the day, a lovely lady named Tina brought me some Welsh cakes to make me feel at home so 'Diolch yn fawr iawn'. Next time I'm down that way I'm going to take them a few mountains, we've got plenty to spare in North Wales and they could do with a couple dotted about the place. I've never seen so much sky?

One of my demos on the day involved a new set of Thinlits snowflakes from that man Tim Holtz who has hit a winner again with his gorgeous new collection of seasonal dies, click on this link to see what I mean!

I am also using a set of Thinlits Tags which everyone should make some room for in their die-cutting stash. Two other sets which proved very popular on the day and which I couldn't resist using are the Thinlits Holiday words collection and the Thinlits Labels collection. The embossing folder used is from a set of two namely Beaded Garland & Snowflakes. All of the products named are designed by Tim for Sizzix and I will be featuring more in the coming weeks because they are fab!

I use the word alchemy in the title which was. of course, the pseudoscientific vain pursuit of turning base metals into gold. With Sizzix and a few Distress Inks however we can hopefully turn plain ivory and kraft card into crafting gold..... I hope!!!

I die-cut the tag and word 'joy' from stiff ivory card and I die-cut three of the five snowflakes and the rosette label from kraft card. I then embossed or to be more precise, debossed the beaded garland onto the ivory tag before blending some of my favourite Distress Ink colours (Broken China, Shabby Shutters, Dusty Concord and Vintage Photo) over the top.

I used a brayer to apply a thin coat of gesso to the label and snowflakes before strategically inking with the green, blue and purple. I then delicately spritzed the die-cuts with clean water to add a subtle mottling effect. Finally, I applied a little Vintage Photo inks to the edges. 

Do you use Distress Glitter.... If not why not? It's super fine and adds a wonderful sparkle to whatever it touches, you can apply as much or as little as you want and it always allows the underlying colour to shine through. I applied a blob of PVA glue to my craft sheet and used my fingertips to apply some to the edges of the die-cut shapes in a random fashion before dipping it into the glitter. Next, I used 3D foam pads to mount the three snowflakes together before decorating with a few adhesive gems.

I applied the glitter to the word 'Joy' which I attached to the label before adding an adhesive pearl in place of the die-cut dot over the letter 'j'. Next, I used a pokey tool to pop a hole through the top of the label and added a couple of jump rings.

I used my Distress Inks to colour some Crinkle Ribbon and attached it around the base of my tag tied into a bow.

And here is the finished tag, I added some paper string through the hole in the top from which I hung my label and mounted the snowflake with some more 3D foam pads. It may not be alchemy, but it's certainly very different from the raw materials with which we started our journey... More from Tim's new collection next week!