Keys in the Magpie's Nest!

This week France Papillon over at Paper Artsy has been inspirational. Please click here to find out more! I was eager to play along with her and to create another entry for the Country View Crafts Die-cuts Challenge - more of that here! As well as providing great challenges Country View Crafts are an excellent source of all kinds of crafting materials online. So here is what I would like to share for these two challenges. I love creating journal pages and canvases; but this time France inspired me to make something that could be used, like her mini chest of drawers or her potion rack. We are to have a new kitchen (hurrah!) so I decided to make a distressed plaque to store our door keys there, using some die-cuts and some of the techniques and materials France had  wowed us with over at Paper Artsy!

I began with a Tim Holtz die-cut of little houses cut from chipboard, which I decorated with some tiny clock parts; painted with Paper Artsy Frescos in Hyde Park and Beach Hut and Hey Pesto and embellished with gems. The lady in the corner is stamped in Archival from a Lynne Perrella plate. I used a little Grunge Paste through a stencil of chicken wire over on the right hand house.

My next element is a book-plate from a Tim Holtz tag die; Grunge Pasted and then painted with Hyde Park and Snowflake and rubbed with Treasure Gold.. The butterfly is some embossed wings from a Paper Artsy plate with an old fairy light as a body and some little gems. The ladies are LP again, coloured with Frescos.

Here is an ordinary little label I decided to add; painted and Treasure Golded (not sure that's a verb, but it ought to be) with a leaf punched out that I then used as a stencil for a single Treasure Gold leaf on the little house die - I like to get the maximum use out  of everything! .

And here are my elements all laid out on a piece of fibre-board for the base. I decided to save those Prima buttons for something else in the end. Next step was to sand down my fibre-board, smoothing and rounding the edges. 

Now the fun begins! I crackle-glazed a thin layer over Little Black Dress and then painted over when dry with Pumpkin Soup. I then applied Grunge Paste through a flower stencil to the corners of my fibre-board and when it was dry brushed it with a selection of Treasure Golds: Spanish Topaz, White Fire and Green Amber! I drilled four holes for my hooks to fit in and fixed some picture hooks to the back and there it was - a key holder to go with my new kitchen! I am so excited that the heart of Magpieheaven will have something made by me in it! Now all that's left are days of disruption, despair and ruffled feathers as we clamber over rubble to cook! But it will all be worth it in the end, won't it?

As always, if you click on the images you can see a little more detail, especially the effect of the Treasure Gold, which - along with Grunge Paste - I now find I can't live without. Thank you France for all the inspiration this week, Thank you Country View Crafts for inspiring me to get out those die-cuts and Thank you for stopping by and looking in the Magpie's Nest today! I should like to enter this for the Paper Artsy Draw and The Country View Crafts Challenge - Die-cuts.