Thursday, March 24, 2011

Vintage Charms - Crystal Lacquer Style



I love all things vintage - so when I was sent charm blanks from Sakura Craft Hobby for this months Design Team projects , I knew the end result would be something 'vintag-ie'. I had SO much fun making my own charms - that well, I'm still making more designs ,and I can't seem to stop!
In the photo below, you can see the items that I used to complete this weeks design: 3D Crystal Lacquer, Crystal Colored Lacquer and silver charm blanks by Sakura Hobby Craft, Tim Holtz's Tissue Tape and Vintage Photo Distress Ink, fine glitter, a few itsy-bitsy flowers, a vintage pic and a few words printed on white cardstock.


For my "Be Kind" charm, I tore off a piece of the tissue tape and stuck it to the bottom of the blank charm - it's nice and tacky on the back, so it laid down nicely inside the charm. I just trimmed off any excess that hung over the edge. I cut out the words Be Kind from the cardstock, inked their edges with Vintage Photo distress ink and used the Crystal Lacquer to adhere them to the charm. Next, I took the dark blue tiny flower and used Crystal Lacquer to adhere it inside the charm. I kind of flattened it down with my fingers so it would lay flat, then grabbed my 3D Crystal Lacquer and filled in the whole charm.
 Then the hard part - waiting! I let it sit overnight - and in the morning is was clear, shiny and beautiful!
For a little added interest, I covered a second tiny flower with Crystal Colored Lacquer in blue - sprinkled a little fine clear glitter on it and set it aside to dry. I added a small clear rhinestone in the center and attached the dried flower to the top of the charm with Crystal Lacquer - ta da!

For the old-fashion floral charm, I simply printed out a an image on white cardstock, trimmed it to fit the charm, distressed the edges and inked them with Vintage Photo distress ink.  I used the Crystal Color Lacquer in ivory, red and purple to cover 3 of the flowers and sprinkled them with fine glitter and set aside to dry - then filled the charm with 3D Crystal Lacquer . It's such a quick and easy process - but the result is just beautiful!  Just be patient and let the Crystal Lacquer dry!  I let this one set for several days to be sure it was completely dry.
 

 I just love the vintage feel of these charms.  I think they make a perfect addition to my charm necklace that I made at the Idea-ology Booth at CHA in January.
Karen
For more information about Crystal Lacquer products,
 check out   www.sakurahobbycraft.com , and
 visit their blog www.crystallacquer.blogspot.com for more creative inspiration!





Thursday, March 10, 2011

Charming St. Patty's Day Card

This is my first project as a Sakura Design Team member and I'm very excited to be sharing it with you!

Supplies Used: Sakura 3D Crystal Lacquer, Crystal Colored Lacquer, Sakura blank rectangular charm, white cardstock, Cosmo Cricket scrapbook paper, Calendar from Tim Holtz's Lost & Found paperstack, green bazzill cardstock, brown twine, green ribbon, Hero Arts prisma glitter, green stickles, Distress Inks in Tea Dye, Bundled Sage Crushed Olive and Vintage Photo and the font My Underwood.

I started off this project making the charm - and then had the brilliant:) idea to make a greeting card with the charm attached.  I think it turned out pretty darn cute!

For the charm - I downloaded a vintage image using Google search, printed it on cardstock, distressed the edges with a distressing tool and inked it using Vintage Photo Distress Ink.  I used the Crystal Lacquer to adhere it into the charm.  I outlined the clover using green Stickles and set it aside to dry.  I used the Crystal Colored Lacquer in Jade Green to add a little accent at the bottom edges, filling in just a little bit over the picture and let it dry.  Once dry, I sprinkled a little prisma glitter onto the picture and then filled in the entire charm with the clear 3D Crystal Lacquer.  It dried overnight and you can see the results - amazing!

I love how the charm took on a vintage feel.  I added a jump ring at the top so it would attach easily and lay flat on the card.


 To make the card, I simply cut a piece of white cardstock in half (A2 size - 5.50" x 8.50"), folded in half and inked the edges using Crushed Olive & Bundled Sage Distress Inks.  I personally use the Inkssentials Inking Tool (I have about a dozen of them!) that makes it easy-peasy to ink the edges and blend the colors.  I also inked the entire piece of scrapbook paper from Cosmo Cricket just to give it an old look.  I attached the March calendar and wrapped the brown twine around the two pieces before I adhered it to the cardstock.  The greeting was printed on white cardstock using 'My Underwood' font that I've totally fallen in love with.  I printed it in a green color and then adhered it to the bazzill cardstock.  I used pop-dots to attach it to the card.

To finish off the card, I used Crystal Colored Lacquer in Jade Green to fill in the little circles on the scrapbook paper, and sprinkled them with prisma glitter.  I tied on the charm, glued on a little green bow and ta-da - one "Charming" St. Patty's Day card!
All the edges on the card were distressed and inked using Vintage Photo or Tea Dye Distress Inks.  ALSO - I used the Crystal Lacquer as my adhesive and it worked great!

Hope you enjoyed this project.  You can get more info about Sakura's products at
www.sakuracraft.com and see all of the design team projects on their blog,

Karen