Shopping and Crafting with Carter

Good Morning Blue Fans. Nat here today with a little fun something to take you into the weekend. But first things first.....I'm the proud momma of a Pre-K graduate. How could it be possible that he's graduating and moving on to Kindergarten? Seems like yesterday that he arrived into this world, 4 weeks early. We have been so blessed to have found a great "school" for him over the last 5 years. In fact, he was 1 of 4 kiddos that was recognized last night with a special award since he has been at this "school" since he was 8 weeks old. It's what Jerry and I like to call the "$60,000 token of appreciation" award. Carter has made some great friends over the years and as a result, Jerry and I have made some great friends with the parents. So happy to know that some of these kiddos will be attending the same elementary school as Carter. Here are some pics of the lil' graduate.

 

Now, for some crafty fun. Carter LOVES to go shopping with me at Little Blue House. I've got to watch him carefully, though, as he just puts stuff up on the counter as I'm building my purchase pile. A recent trip to LBH and he picked out some Tim Holtz Distress Paints. Believe it or not, I don't own any but I also don't have a real use for them (I don't do a lot of painting in my crafts). But when he picked out 4 paints and said "let me get these for you", how could I resist? Confession: the colors that he chose are not at all the colors I would have chosen. I wouldn't say the colors exactly blend well together. Oh well; I bought them anyway. And as I was purchasing said paints, I told Miss Kristyn "I'm going to make something with all 4 of these paints and feature it on the blog." So, here I am.


I was so inspired by Cat's watercolor layout from Monday, that I wanted to do my own little take on it. I grabbed my craft mat, the 4 paints, some "artist's loft watercolor paper" and a spritzer. Let's talk about that watercolor paper. It's WONDERFUL. It's a little textured and very heavy weight, so it doesn't warp or bead when water is applied. Back to the LO.....I dabbed some paints on the craft mat and spritzed with water. I then put the paper down on the paint and pressed down. Lifted the paper, turned it a bit, put back in paint and pressed down. I repeated this until the paper was covered. I looked at the overall colors and patterns and added more paints as needed using the same technique. I was careful and didn't drag the paper through the paint because I wanted more of a "splotchy" look.
(I actually had pictures of this process but somewhere between the download from the camera to the transfer over to the blog, those pics were lost. gotta love technology! so sorry!)

Once finished, I heat set the paper to make sure the paint was dry. I then cut 6 1/2" strips of paper for my weaved border. Since I wanted the watercolors/painted paper to be the focal piece, I chose solid sheets of papers from the Fancy Pants Designs "Be Different" papers. I have so much of Carter's artwork saved from school, so I pulled something he made in 2010 along with a pic one of his teachers took years ago as he was doing crafts. Carter LOVES doing crafts and loves any opportunity he can help me in my scrap room. I finished the layout off with a perfect title and some word stickers from the "Be Different" collection as well as some accents from the coordinating ephemera pack. I love how this layout turned out. And I love that there's meaning behind the elements.

Thanks so much for stopping by today. Do you have little crafters in your life that love to shop for you? What have you made using the things they pick out for you?

I hope you have a great weekend. We have family photos tomorrow, Cat is doing a niece exchange (she's getting her other niece for a few days), Carter has soccer on Sunday and Cat is staying busy entertaining. Check back tomorrow as I have some fun sites for you to check out if you're a Silhouette fan!!!

Stay True BLUE

Nat