Up, Up And Away With A Twist At Stamps & Stencils

Good morning. Today sees the start of a new challenge at Stamps & Stencils. Your host is the lovely Sharon and here's what she has set as her challenge:

For this challenge we would like to see something that goes Up Up and Away. It could be a plane, a bird, a feather or anything that can go up, but you must use /autumnal colours. So get out the copper, rust and burnt oranges. Be it paint, metal or embossing powders, don't forget to include some Stamps and Stencilling....

Lots of options I thought to myself then the mind went blank! So, to get some ideas flowing, I got out my stash of gelli plate print tags and chose one which had some relation to the theme set. Eventually, I ended up with this (yes, I know, another altered gelli print but I LOVE using them!):

The tree goes up, up but not away! The birds will fit the rest of the challenge and do the away bit so I thought this would work! Not the best photo I'm afraid.

The original gelli print tag. Two stencils are used: a doilly followed by a tree design. A mixture of DecoArt Media Fluid Acrylics and Traditions paint have been used on the print.

A suitable stencil.

Some crackle paste.

Some birds stencilled in the trees and further down the tag the words and a feather. 

When dry, the birds are painted with a mixture of the two DecoArt Fluid Acrylics shown.

The birds have been outlined with an inktense pencil - the start of many layers.

DecoArt Quinacridone Gold Fluid Acrylic is painted over the birds to antique them further and give an autumnal hue.

The letters receive the same treatment.

The top of the tag is finished with a left over rusted die cut from a previous project and some sari silk. The edge of the tag is finished with some copper embossing powder.

Detail shot. Various colours of inktense pencils are used to add autumnal shades to the original green paint on the print.

Inktense pencil is used to bring out some of the underlying print on the tree trunk. Black pen has been used to outline sections of the print.

Detail shot.

Embossed circles show areas with fresher colours of summer and even spring. The areas outside the circles shows the onset of autumn with browns, oranges, reds, yellows and copper tones.

Detail shot showing layers of colour.

Detail shot.

Detail shot.

From not having any ideas at all, I'm quite pleased with how this turned out. I love playing around with gelli plate prints - you never know what's going to happen really!

Please do go over to Stamps & Stencils and see what my wonderfully talented teamies have produced for your inspiration. Why not visit their blogs too and see more of their gorgeous work?

Over to you now - we'd love you to join us for this challenge!