Welcome to the Creative Paperclay® Valentine Blog Hop Link Up Party!!

Hi Everyone and Welcome to Charmed Confections!

My name is LeeAnn Kress and I am so happy to be a part of the Creative Paperclay® Valentine Link Up Party!  It has been such fun being a member of the Design Team on their blog site.  I hope you have enjoyed all the talent that is represented there -- I know, I have!

Here is what I made for this Valentine Link Party.  

A sweet chalk board love notes frame.

I am a firm believer in leaving love notes for your family.  

It truly makes the day sweeter for all!  

If you love my project, sign up for the GIVEAWAY!  

Yes!! I am giving this away!!

  

Please scroll down to the bottom of this post and sign up!  
You could win!!!

So, let's get started.  (All my instructions will be posted under each picture.)

Here are the supplies needed:

Creative Paperclay®

8x10 frame with glass

Rolling Pin

Baby Powder

Flower / Leave Cookie Cutters (various sizes)

Chalk Board Spray Paint

Gloss Wood Spray Paint

Matte Varnish Spray Paint

4" long wooden dowel

Paint in various colors of your choosing

Paintbrush & water

E6000 Glue

White Tacky Glue

Chalk 

Above you will see that I just bought a plain red frame.  I bought this frame at Michael's for $6.00 on the sale aisle.  What a steal!

Take the frame apart leaving the glass elsewhere.  I am going to spray the frame with some Glossy Wood Tone spray paint to richen up the red wood frame and make it not look so plain, flat red. 

Next, take your glass and spray paint it in layers with Chalk Board paint.  You will be applying lots of coats to this piece of glass, so go slowly in smooth layers.  Build up the layers after each drying.  I think in the end, I had about 7 coats of paint on my glass.  

Here you can see that I have my pink silicone mat out.  I am going to roll out some Creative Paperclay® and cut out some flowers and leaves with my cute cutters.  You will also see that I have a tin of letters, a roller, and a bowl of water available.

In this picture, I have lightly floured my silicone mat with some baby powder.  Baby powder works like flour would to cookie dough.  You can use this to roll out your clay instead of placing your clay between two sheets of wax paper.  By doing this, you get a smoother finish to the clay's surface.  No bumps where the wax paper crinkles.  Go ahead and cut out some cute flowers shapes.

Here is my flower.  To give it some interest, I am going to use a tool to push some round indents in each flower petal.  I used this tool in my porcelain doll making days and am still using it now.   This is a tool to size doll eyes for glass eyes.  Funny how you can use tools for other purposes too.  Hang on to them!

Next, I cut out another flower shape, but this time a little smaller.  Wet the back of the smaller flower to adhere to the larger flower.  Gently push in the middle to make it stick.

I rolled out a tiny bit of clay and made the center of my flower.  Using my tool again, I made a round indent into the middle of my layered flower so that I could add the center piece.  Wet the center piece again and apply to the middle.

Here is a picture of my finished flower.   Pretty easy, huh?  Now, take some water on your fingertip and go over all the edges to smooth them out.

IMPORTANT:  When applying these flowers (or anything for that manner out of paperclay to a frame) you will need to rub a little white glue to the back of the clay pieces before applying to your frame.  This will make sure they stick securely where you want them while the piece is drying.

Here I am cutting out the word "Notes" out of paperclay.  I am using my cookie cutter letters to do this.  Take out the clay in the center of each letter, as we are using the outline part only.  Make sure you save the inner center of the "O" - we will need that!

Just look at my sweet mess!  You can see that the frame has the banner "Love" on it and a couple of flowers placed.  Go to the next picture and I will show you how to make the banner.

Here is how I made the banner for the word "Notes".  You can see that I rolled out my clay, stamped in the word, took out the letters and cut out a banner shape out of the clay.  Not too hard!  

Before you add the banner to the frame, lightly paint on some white glue to the back side of the piece to make sure it adheres good.  Once on the frame, you can free form the banner into the shape you desire.  Make sure you press down on the clay to secure it to the frame.

In the above picture, I am using a small wet paintbrush (that I will occasionally dip in to water to lightly damped) to smooth all the edges.  Take your time doing this.  I try to get all the rough edges of my piece smoothed out for a clean finish before the clay dries.   

Now that the banners have been added to the top of the frame, let's make some leaves to go between those pretty flowers we made earlier.  Take your leaf cookie cutter and cut out some various sizes.  With a sculpting tool, pin or toothpick, draw some lines in the clay for the veining.   

Slightly wet your fingers and rub a little water around the edges to give your leaves a smooth outer seam. 

In this picture above, you will see how I placed my leaves in between the flowers and free formed them to fit the frame.  Do not be afraid to change the shape a little.  Just go with it!

YAY!  One side is done and I am pretty pleased with the look of it.  Now, let's look at the underside for a minute!!

If you have flowers and leaves that are coming off the frame like I do, you need to backfill the underneath with more clay.  This will give them some support and strength.   Here I just pushed in a little clay to fill in the gaps underneath the applied pieces.  Use a damp paintbrush to smooth it out.  Let dry completely!!

Here is my project with all the clay applied.  Once I had all the flowers and leaves in place, and backfilled where they attached to the frame, I went over the entire piece again with my damp paintbrush to smooth out the clay and all the edges.  I also cleaned up any spot of clay on the frame that I didn't want there.  :)

Now ... I just need to let this baby dry for a few days.  It needs to be completely dry before we paint.  Looking good so far!

Ok ... you might think that I jumped several steps ahead, but really, the paint color is up to you.

Here is what I did after the piece was completely dry.  First thing .... lightly sand the clay to give it that super smooth finish.

Next, pick out your paint combinations and paint!  I usually give my pieces several coats of paint and then I dry brush on some lighter variations of the color to highlight the leaves and flowers.  

I added some cute polka dots to some of the flowers for a very sweet and whimsical touch!

When the paint was completely dry, I stained the piece with some wood stain.  Very simple step, just rub on and rub off.  The stain goes into all the cracks and really brings out the detail of the flowers and leaves.

You will see a piece of round dowel in the inside of the frame.  I am going to use this to make a chalk holder.  This piece is around 4" long.  I am going to paint it black.

Once I painted the 4" dowel black, I glued it to the frame with some heavy duty glue -- E6000.   That should do it!

Before I call this frame done, I am going to age my frame a little more.  I think I am going to wash it with a little watered down paint rub using black and raw umber paint.  This frame looks too clean.

When everything is dry, I am going to go outside and seal the piece with matte varnish spray.  Give it several coats to seal it well and let dry.

Here is my finished project!  I hope you like it!  I placed the glass back into the frame and added some chalk to the holder.  Too cute!  You can now either hang this on the wall or place it in a frame holder like in the picture above.  Either way, you can proudly leave your love notes for all to see!

GIVEAWAY DETAILS --- 

To be entered to win my Love Notes Frame, you need to complete the following two steps.

1. Sign up to follow my blog!  In the right hand column of this blog you will see a "follow me" option.   Please sign up to follow me or if you don't have a Google account, like my Facebook page and/or like me on Pinterest.  I would be most grateful.

2.  Leave a comment below this post.  Give me your name and your email address so I can contact you if you win.  It's that simple!  

The drawing will take place on February 14th!  I will contact the winner and post their name here on this blog and on my Facebook page.  

Best of luck to you all!

In the meantime, have a wonderful time hopping from one blog to another.  Our Design Team is so talented!  I am sure there will be some fantastic things to see and learn!  If you have a Creative Paperclay tutorial and would like to share it ... Link Up to us!!  We would love to see what you create!

Here's wishing you the Happiest Valentine Day!  May it be brimming over with love!

XOXO