Valentine Project for Doug

I wanted to create something special for hubby Doug for Valentine's Day. I was off to a wonderful start when the idea for a special picture came into my mind 2 weeks early!! That's where my troubles began.....

Project is to be for a mixed media collage using pictures taken when we lived 'way up north' (in maryland) and drove down parts of skyline drive in virginia/w.virginia....the pics were of our skinnier days (especially mine). I started out making copies and blowing up some of the pictures...the idea was to take Doug off of the rock he had been sitting on and place him in the branches of an enlarged tree by an enlarged deer...okay so far...


well when I printed the pics I used the better quality (heavier ink) and that began part of the problem...it was dark...



I placed dryer sheets on top of cardstock and glued them down (my hope was for texture under the picture), the pictures were then placed on top and coated with medium and embossing powders (i love glittery stuff) in butterscotch, enchanted gold, polysparkle and kaleidoscope transparent....let me add that the butterscotch is a solid, and dark, and not see through and should be used on lettering and i didn't like it at all for this particular project (it just made things darker).


(pic at the beginning of heating with utee and embossing powder mixed)



I had sprayed some Adirondack lettuce color wash on the picture to hopefully brighten it some...besides I just love the lettuce color.


I didn't have clear/transparent UTEE (Ultra Thick Embossing Enamel) so I used the interference blue (the only alternatives at Michael's were brown and black). Well after all the heating and reheating to help thin it out (this was my first try remember) these are the results I got. The cardstock also warped with the heating of the embossing gun and won't go flat (guess I should have gessoed it first). Mostly it was a learning process and I'm glad I tried it after all.







(the whole 8-1/2 x 11 pic)











It didn't turn out as well as I hoped and this will be saved to cut up and reuse at a later date and time for another project instead.


It wasn't a total loss as I really do love the protection the UTEE seems to offer. I also learned more about the embossing powders and which ones are better for which projects...




(doug up a tree...gee i make myself laugh)






so it wasn't a total loss....of course now I'm only 3 days away from Valentine's Day and making a mad scramble to start over again and differently on the project...oh and I might as well add...it's going to be smaller...that was another thing...I didn't like how big the original turned out either....



(me in my skinny days)





oh well, hopefully it will be dry and done before he gets home on Tuesday...**grin**