Tim Holtz - 12 Tags of 2014- April entry

Well hello bloggerkins’

I am 10 days shy of the deadline again.  I have excuses but more about that later.  Let me show you my April 2014 entry.

There are only a few tags and pieces that I have created that have escaped my habit of excessive judgement and catapulted straight into my ideal of awesomeness. This tag is definitely going to be one of them. It was so fun to make and it turned out so beautifully that even though I made it as the front of a card – I dont think that I am going to give it away, I dont actually know what I am going to do with it – but I am going to keep it all for my selfsome.

 It involved glossy and crackle accents, splashing paint, and some Macguyvering.  I think I might have also unintentionally developed a concerning crush on washi tape in the process. 


Anyway, my interpretation of the Mr Tim’s inspired work this month, took flight from this one simple image from the line of stamps that was featured in last month’s tag challenge. 

I stamped it onto stamping paper cut to 1/3rd of an A4 sheet, I am all about those tall trifolds right now.  Ranger Inkssentials Specialty Stamping Paper is my new favourite medium to work on.  It kind of looks and feels like shoe-filler board.  But don’t be fooled - this stuff is bloody awesome and will make you buy shoes just to see if you can get the same effects from the shoe-filler (ask me how I can vouch for that?). I swear on every Sizzix die that I own, right from your juicy stamp not sliding at all, to how it reacts with dyes, chalks and paint to get fantastic textural and special colour effects, I have never met any undesirable moments with these sheets of pure brilliance. 

I don’t love the Pinecone die as much as I love my other ones.  Firstly, I think I have a defective die cos it doesnt cut all the way through on the last 3 outside petals of the spiral. There unfortunately was a stupid thought that I could remedy the no-cut woes by “tempering” the die with one of my Spellbinders Tan embossing mats.  BAD MACGUYVER MOMENT!!!  I now have a curious tan siliconey rubber pinecone spiral.
Eventually, I realised that shimming in just the right outside petal spots with folded newspaper pieces makes the die even enough to cut a perfect die-cut.  

Secondly, have you ever met anyone with infinite amounts of  patience to roll up loads of those pine-rones (Yes I just made up that word – work it out – you’ll want to say pine-rones too, I promise, seriously, do it, do it now……see……)?  Having said that – I forced myself to engage with the die and made a whole lotta pine-rones! Look there on the right and below that on the left – you know why?  Cos I ‘rone like that!!

I bought these Idea-ology tag fragment thingies ages ago and never got around to using them, so even though I have those metal word tag token thingies – I decided that the sentimespiration (Yup, invented that one too)would be this month’s test of “use-your-holtzings-in-different-ways” personal challenge.  Love how this turned out darlings…. I love Ranger’s Archival Ink to stamp on anything – more than I love that other brand that promises to stick on anything, you know the one, the ones where they dry up real quick and stays on things you dont want it to stay on, and stays off the things you want it to stay on.

I think making the branch look all gnarly and dimensional was defo a highlight for me too.

I had fun with the Frameworks die-cuts too. Some Macguyvering there too, but good Macguyver had come out as the dominant personality this time.  Did I say that I loved making this tag yet?

I confess that I haven’t been around to everyone’s of late.  In my real-life I sometimes have to put in extra attention to my work at my day job.  Recently I presented a paper at the UJ Phenomenology and Naturalism conference in Johannesburg and I kind of got distracted with getting that into shape. 

I do not like Jo’burg city in general, whenever I am there I always feel like I am looking in on the set of some kind of Dystopian Novel turned into a movie-set.  But I may be biased because I grew up on one of the Tropical Coasts of my country, and I way prefer my lush part of the world with minimal concrete and it’s natural beauty to the concrete jungle of the Goldmine City.   What I do love about Jo’burg though is it’s amazing twilight and dusk sky. Check this picture out that I took from the balcony of the place that I was bunking in for the duration of the conference.  Isn’t that just a Distress Ink Palette?  Going to have to do something with this skyline and colours soon.  That’s it for me today – catch you soon…ish!