Witch's Boots Tutorial

Finally what everyone has been asking me about, how to make a pair of Witch's boots like the ones on the Halloween tablescape, see here:

While I can't take the credit for making those cute little boots, I'll show you a way you too can make your own.  It all starts with a visit to the thrift shop.

These are the ones I decided to purchase, a dark brown pair for five dollars

I used some gloss black spray paint and sprayed them two coats.

I used Air Dry Clay, you can find it at Michael's the Arts and Crafts Store and a water spray bottle, you'll need to spray the clay because it gets dry very easily.

I used the clay to mold a piece that will go at the end of the boots:

I affixed these tips to the boots to mold and make sure I get a snug fit.  Let the tips dry for 24 hours.

Next, spray paint the tips with the spray paint to match the boots and adhere them with hot glue

see, how clever:

Next, we'll hide the seam around the tip with ribbon, I liked the ribbon so much I adhered it all the way to the top.  Use your hot glue gun to adhere the ribbon to your boot

Next, get some more ribbon or some shoe laces, mine are actually purple but all the pictures I took came out blue.  Use your heat gun to adhere the shoe lace criss cross all the way up.

Tie a bow at the top

next, use some fabric or paper or tulle to make a bow.  I used tulle and added a button

You can't wear them but you can use it as home decor for Halloween

I'm using them on my Halloween table

Thanks for coming by, hope you liked this tutorial.  Let me know if you try it, I'd like to see how yours come out.

Halloween Cards

Are you one of those people who can laugh at a drop of a dime? sometimes I can't seem to control my laughter.  I laugh at everything and have had my share of uncontrollable bouts of laughter.  An older brother an a niece are the same way......just don't get us started.  It's kind of a curse sometimes because there have been times where it's inappropriate to laugh and there I am trying to hold my laughter, until I erupt.  Have you ever laughed so hard, you feel like your heart will stop if you don't stop laughing? this happens to me all the time and it doesn't help that I'm married to the world's funniest man.

Last week I worked at an earthquake conference, nothing funny about that until you get ME in the room.  I was working as a greeter and was assigned the task of seating late-comers so that they would not disrupt the guest speaker.  As people walked in late, I was to find them a seat and lead them to it.  I decided that a gentle pat on the shoulder was a great way to get a person's attention to quickly ask if the seat next to them was taken.  I would then get a yes or no response and fill the seat if necessary with someone who came in late. 

During one of my gentle pats, I startled the person so bad that you'd think he was having a heart attack!.  His legs were crossed and the top leg swung up, like when the doctor checks your knee reflex.  He shook his head so violently that he's glasses went flying across the table, and of course I found this hilariously funny.  My instinct was to erupt in laughter, but I had to hold it in.....after all, I was in charge of not letting anything or anyone disrupt the guest speaker.  I couldn't even apologize to him for startling him, I was too busy holding back my laughter.  The only thing I could do was to conceal my lips with my hand and mumble "available" while biting my lips and pointing to the chair next to him.  His face was white as if he had just seen a ghost but he managed to shake his head while pressing his hand hard against his chest.  At that point, I could hear the other people seated at the table making funny noises as if they were holding back their laughter.  I went straight out the door to relieve the laughter and hoped no one followed behind, thankfully no one did.  The guy was okay, no paramedics were called, but I had a good laugh session outside. 

Do you have a story to tell where you laughed uncontrollably? or did you get caught up in a funny situation and had to hold your laughter? let me know in the comments below, I'm sure I'm not the only one.

Last night I spent the evening with a group of friends in Montebello, a nearby City.  We made some Halloween cards and traded with each other.  There must have been about fifteen ladies there last night but I'm only going to show you a few cards that were my favorite.

The first one was created by Kim Lamos, I took the picture at an angle so you can see inside the window.  There's a moon in the corner and a picket fence.    

The next one is an ATC card and it was created by Tina Rivas.  She used rubber stamps to emboss images and stamped the skull image on acetate.  I like the way she kept the eyes white.

The next one was created by Rose Rodriguez, she stamped her image on acetate.  The stamped image is from Close To My Heart, Halloween collection.  I love the background paper and the paper punch at the bottom of the card.

next is a cute vampire created by Carmen Mazzola.  She used rubber stamped images and colored them in with colored pencils.

next is Maggie Arguilles' card, she is a published artist.  She said she used acrylic paints on acetate.  I've never worked with acetate, I like the look so I'll be trying that soon. Once I figure out her technique, I'll write a step by step tutorial.

the next one is from Karen, I just love the paper she used and the little window in the center, how creative.

The next one is from Kat, she taped the card front to a goodie bag, how clever is that! she also wrapped a candy bar in scrapbook paper and placed an ATC card on top......I ate the candy bar before I took a picture, sorry....but you get the idea, right?

and the last one is mine, I feel it's kind of plain after looking at all the cards these ladies made.  I used a Day of the Dead loteria card stack and triple matted it with card stock to make the card stand out. I purchased my loteria at Olvera Street in downtown Los Angeles but I found a website store that carries it, here's the link if you're interested, they're located in Santa Rosa California: Day of the Dead Loteria.

I hope you liked these Halloween/Day of the Dead cards and I hope you've been inspired to make some.  Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have a great weekend!

Recycle Materials Artist Trading Cards

I just got back from spending a few hours with my artsy friends.  These ladies are very talented and today have come up with more ideas than I can conjure up myself.  Today's theme was "recycle" and we were to make Artist Trading Cards (ATC) with mostly recycled things to swap with each other.  Artist Trading Cards are made by artist to trade with other artists.  The concept is similar to trading baseball cards, in fact, they're the same size.  

This card is a Crafty Chica Product Line

It's not just fun and games, though.  Today we had a serious conversation about what exactly were we, as a group.

Are we just random innocent ladies who love to craft, hot glue gun in one hand a brush in the other?  

Are we a group of artists who are addicted to paper crafting? 

OR

are we, gulp......A CULT! ....GULP!....

Well, thankfully, we all agreed that we do exhibit signs of addiction....'com on, I KNOW you have skeletons in your closet too, in my case, it happens to be paper in my closet.....tons and tons of paper, hahaha, but we are in no way......a cult!

Well, now that I know I'm not in a cult, I can go on with my blogging, whew! 

The first ATC card is a technique that Ally Sanchez taught us.  You take a paper bag, crimple it up and use shoe polish (the paste) to rub on the paper, fun and easy.

 Next is Pat Esteves, she used the packaging of something she purchased. It's a thick clear plastic packaging.
She embossed a Hello Kitty and added some glitter and a paper flower.  To make the flower, she cut the paper in a spiral and rolled it up. 

next, is from Florentina Rivas, Tina.  She used corrugated paper from packaging, the stem was made from the wire wrapping of a bottle of wine....niiiiiiice.  She used recycled paper for the flower using Tim Holtz, Tattered Flower die, you can find it here.  She used Gold Glimmer Mist, you can find that here.  

 next is Carmen Mazzola.  She used various packaging materials, including bubble wrap, corrugated cardboard, tissue, twigs, pine cone ends and various shells. 

The next one is from Kim Lamos.  She used a Pepsi can to make the bottom of the cup cake.  The top of the cupcake.....you're not gonna believe this.....she used paper made out of elephant dung!!! oh yes my friends, this takes the prize as far as recycled materials.  I tried to scratch and sniff but, trust me, it does not smell...at all!  you can read more about this paper here.

The next one is from Virginia Binion, Jinnie, a pretty little flower made out of a recycled book and tinted with a brown ink pad.  Love the color combination on this one.

The next one is from Cheryl Shoats, she used a soda can to cut the Tattered Flower from the same die as Tina above.  She used butterfly die cuts embossed to give them texture.  I loved that she used the colors of the soda can and incorporated it in her design.

next is Rose Rodriguez.  She used bubble wrap...genious! to mimic the bubbles under water.  She used little die cuts for creatures under the sea.  The red netting is from a bag of oranges...cool! the algae was cut from a green plastic bag.

Lastly, this is the card I made to trade with the ladies.  I used a cereal card board box as my base.  For the background, I used pages of an old book.  I used the inside bag of a POP's cereal to cut the cage using Tim Holtz die, find it here. I strung a lace ribbon through a soda pop cap.  The metal heart is a small paper clip bent forwards to create a heart.  The butterfly was made using a recycled take-out plastic container.  To get step by step instructions on how to use this plastic, go here.   I used blue ink around the edges for dimension.

And that wraps up our group's recycled ATC cards.  I sure got a ton of ideas from these ladies, I hope you did too.  If you would like further instructions on a technique discussed here, please send me an email (see my profile) and I'd be more than happy to go over it with you. 

Have an awesome day tomorrow, thanks for coming by!