A Rusty Frame.

2nd post of the week for me this week.And this little picture frame has been a pain in the butt, I started last week for the rust challenge over at Simon says stamp and show but was just not happy with it and ran out of time.
 I find this whole crafting thing a very funny mistress, you have highs and lows, days where the mojo is just not working. That's how I felt last week. I had the idea of what I wanted to do with the frame and thought the rest would flow, It did not ;) I was left with a painted frame and nothing to go inside, also new the rust needed adornments but again mind went blank.

I started with another one of these little frames, about 6 inches square. I added some grunge board to the corner and a strip to one side to make it look as though there were some plates riveted over the top. the rivets are sticky pearls and the large ones are upholstery nails (the things used on the big leather chairs)  The little pic above shows it after a base coat of acrylic, It was then given an Andy Skinner rust technique (my fave finish) and sorry for anyone who stops by often as Its a finish I use a fair bit.I did actually paint and stamp inside the frame but really hated it so I cut some card to fit, painted it with fresco finish acrylic paints from paper artsy. I love their acrylic paints. first coat was an olive green type colour and the second was one of their translucent greens, pesto I think, it sort of gives some depth to the colour. I used my clown in a straight jacket stamp from viva las vegas stamps, link on the left side of my blog page. and the Carnival is from one of Andy Skinners stamp sets. The cracked finish was achieved by miss using the 2 step crackle glaze from deco art, I have found that if you do not seal the surface properly and you rush the dryig time of step one you dont get much of the way of cracking but get a nice glaze that has a little texture and a few cracks. To be honest I am not sure what one of my miss steps led to this but I quite like it, playing around lets you get cracks in some places and clear in others all in one coat.When it was dry I rubbed in some raw umber paint to make the cracks stand out.
 The finishing touches were added, the glass squares are from the bead shop in Brighton, the tap and number plate are from Tim Holtz, the tap was quickly painted with red acrylic and when it was touch dry rubbed with a kitchen towl/wet wipe to distress it back to the metal underneath. the number was coated with alcohol inks.
The little copper piping thing was made from some copper right angle joins bought in homebase, I glued them together and painted them with acrylic paints. Again another Andy Skinner technique from his Time Worn workshop.
All in all I think I like it now, not sure if the image fits the frame but I like how the colours work and am much happier with it this week than I was last week.

Thank you every one for stopping by and reading all my ramblings. And I have just seen I have Hit 100 followers,  Wow is all I can say, never thought I would enjoy looking at blogs and people would enjoy looking at mine this much. I really can not welcome and thank you all enough.  Mark xx

I would like to enter this into a few challenges,

Simon Says Stamp And Show have a 'Your Favourite' challenge, I just love industrial grunge and altering 3d objects.

The No Matter Which Challenge is Halloween or Halloween colours,  I goofed up with Mondays entry as I did not use a stamped image, Doh. Hopefully clowns in straight jackets are scary enough, I know I hate clowns ;)

Anything But A Card are having their 4th challenge, 'Autumn/Fall or Halloween colours'  This is a great new challenge blog and if you are like me, someone who hates making cards go check them out.