Valentine's Day Decor with Kiwi Lane Designs

Hey there Kiwi Lane Peeps!

Today I've veered from my normal paper crafting and ventured into the land of wood blocks! Ok, so it's not so unusual, but I don't usually share it here. But I loved how they turned out, and I thought you might like to see it. Here's what I made with the help of my templates from Kiwi Lane Designs:

Pretty cute, huh? All I did was paint some wooden hearts, cover with paper, add some template shapes and finish off with some epoxy dots of various colors and sizes. It's really pretty self explanatory, so I'll let the photos speak for themselves. Mostly.

Here's what I started with:

The paper collection I used is called "Kiss Kiss" and it was Crate Paper's Valentine line a few years ago. The hearts are cut out wood shapes that I picked up at the farmer's market over the summer. They're about 4.5" tall and 4.5" wide and just under 1.5" thick. Before I painted, I made sure I sanded them lightly and wiped off any sanding residue. You'll get a cleaner paint application if you remember to do that.

I also want to point out that I framed my project right on the wood shapes. Who says you can only use your Kiwi Lane templates to frame on your paper?! And just like when you design on your pages or cards, you can change things as you go without ruining pretty paper in the process!

I love the size and configuration of these hearts because you can mix it up when you display them:

And I covered the back with paper so it's pretty from the other side, too.

Looking at the bare paper on the back, I'm thinking I need to go back and add some more layers...

Thanks for taking a look! Leave a comment and let me know what you think!

Templates used:

Tiny Sweetheart 2T,3T

Tiny Explore 3T,6T

Mini Abbie Road 3A,3B

Elements 2,7

Stacked Halloween Blocks (Inspired by Pinterest)

So I've recently been put in charge of a crafting group in my area.  Which is all fine and dandy when you consider I have an extensive knowledge of paper crafting.  But this group thing is kind of throwing me for a loop.  Why?  I asked for input as to what the group wanted to make, and NOTHING was paper crafting.  It was wood... and paint... and metalwork... and other scary things!  But, I decided to jump in with both feet and branch out of my paper world.

One of the projects shared was this:

It was shared from Pinterest. This looked fairly do-able and I decided to take a shot at it.  Here's what my stacked Halloween blocks ended up looking like:

Just a bit different from the original idea, right? ;)  I had no idea what the block on the bottom was- a scarecrow? A witch?  And I wasn't too thrilled with the idea of having two green blocks, so I turned the scarecrow/witch block into a pumpkin and switched places with the monster guy.  I also wanted the eyes to have more personality, since they are the only part of the face.  I have no idea what size blocks were used for the original, so I just did what I thought would be easy- I chopped up a 4x4 into cubes.  Actually, it was a 3.5x3.5.  I had enough people sign up to do the craft that I ended up doing about 25 sets.  Lots of cutting and sanding.

So, lets go through the stack and I'll let you know what I did.

Pumpkin block:
Painted it orange, traced and cut a burlap leaf from the Kiwi Lane Designs Tiny Nature template set, painted a spool with a layer of brown followed by a layer of bright green on top, made a vine out of twine and painted eyes on the front of the pumpkin.  Hot glued the leaf, stem/spool and vine/wire to the top of the block like this:

Mummy block:
Painted a layer of white followed by a layer of cream (Why? Because 2 layers of cream looked to yellow and 2 layers of white looked too bright.), painted eyes, wrapped around a 2-3" strip of gauzy fabric and tied in a knot on the side above the eyes.

Monster block:
Painted it green, spray painted wooden push pins silver, cut hair out of paper and glued to the top of the block as hair, painted eyes and scar.  I used paper because I could not find any black felt in our town ANYWHERE!!  And I looked everywhere I could think of.  But, if you use paper, don't use hot glue!! I did and it has warped the paper and looks awful! I think I'll be replacing it with felt as soon as I can find some again.  Anyone want to send me some? ;)

I sanded the edges of all the blocks for a slightly distressed look (and to help cover up any painting mistakes- sanding makes it look messy on purpose!)  The finished product ended up being about 12" tall, including the spool/stem.

And there you have it!  My first soiree into the world of wood crafting!  Maybe not the first, but I don't think I've done anything in that department for a few decades.  Is there such a thing as a born again wood crafter?  If so, I think I'm in that category! ;)  I really liked playing with paint and blocks. I think I might even do it again!

Thanks for stopping by and Happy Crafting!!