It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas…

**Announcement**

This is my first post as a DT member for Altered Eclectics.  I’m so excited to be part of this talented group of altered artists.  There’s a new challenge every month and it’s always my favourite…Anything Goes.  Hope to see you over there!

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Tando Village in a Box

So, for my project I decided to finally do these Village in a Boxes from Tando.  I bought mine from my favourite shop, That Craft Place, now located in Polegate.  They have a fabulous Facebook group where you can buy the multitude of goodies (Lisa’s, the shop’s owner, taste is far too good!) that they stock.

I bought 3…one for me and one for each of our mums.  I’ve only got mine and my mum’s finished so far.  (Somehow I’ve lost the roofs and one of the houses for mil’s…how I don’t know…maybe it has to do with my creative organisation of my craft space! lol)  I really like the fact that it all fits together in a box for easy storage in the non-Christmas season. Although you certainly could make it any other season/holiday village.

Mine!

I did mine first so that any learning curve mistakes would happen on mine.  I went with pastel colours for some unknown reason…think I’ve been looking at lots of shabby chic furniture pictures! I painted all 3 houses with a base coat of white after two coats of gesso.  Since my weathered wood technique didn’t work so well (think because the houses are so tiny), I used the Ditzie Design cogs backgournd stamp with white ink to add some crackle like interest.  The snow is texture paste, painted with white pearl paint and fine glitter.  The roofs have DecoArt’s stucco paste, white paint, and glitter on them.  Lastly, I stamped the sentiment from a JOFY set and painted it with Cosmic Shimmer Shimmer Paint in Blossom.  That pink was a little too intense for my pastel houses so I put a thin coat of white pearl paint over top.  The lid was done with the three house colours, weathered wood product, and lastly white paint.  Hopefully it looks like a morning after Jack Frost (no relation to Prince Charming) has been out!

3 shades of green DecoArts paint plus a mix of festive green and black, applied light to dark, then sanded back to show the other colours.

My mum’s always loved purple, green, and blue together.  She calls them her colours and I guess I’ve been trained to love them too.  Like mother like daughter, and all that! 😉  On this village I used Creative Expressions Cosmic Shimmer Shimmer Paints in violet and peacock (the most stunning colour irl) and inka gold in blue.  I then used Gold Lime on the roofs with chunky glitter for snow.  I didn’t add any crackle or ink edges, despite wanting to very much, because MIL (and I’m thinking my mum) like things to look NEW.  Actually, Prince Charming has said similar things about the projects I’ve used weathered wood on too….there’s just no accounting for some people’s taste! lol  I much prefer the trees in this village to the ones I did in mine.  I did another base coat with a mix of festive green and black, then dry brushed the peacock and lime over top.  Finally I edged the trees with black archival ink.  The snow in this one is big chunks of stucco texture paste, painted with the white pearl, and sprinkled with glitter.  I left flat spots for the houses.

My mum’s favourite colours

I really like these villages…they’re small enough to sit on a mantle (or radiator cover in my case), but are still really interesting.  There’s just so many things you could do with them…I’m now thinking about a Halloween village, a springtime one, maybe a mountain one with log cabins, etc…

Please enter the challenge over at Altered Eclectics.

I’d like to enter the following challenges:

http://avenue613.blogspot.co.uk/

http://www.aaacards.blogspot.co.uk/

http://stampedblessings.com/

http://anythingbutacard.blogspot.ca/

http://www.fashionablestampingchallenges.com/#

http://glitternsparklechallengeblog.blogspot.co.uk/

http://opus-gluei.blogspot.co.uk/

http://pileitonchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/

http://craftyhazelnutschristmaschallenge.blogspot.co.uk/

http://fantasystampers.blogspot.co.uk/

http://papercreatorscrafts.blogspot.co.uk/

http://sweetstampinchallengeblog.blogspot.co.uk/

http://vandicrafts.com/vandicrafts-artistry-challeng-19-anything-goes-twist/

http://brownsugarchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/#

http://suzysmarty1.blogspot.co.uk/

http://creativecornerchallenges.blogspot.de/

http://qkrstampede.blogspot.co.uk/

http://simplycreatetoo.blogspot.co.uk/