Escape to Paris–mixed-media Paris

Escape to Paris–mixed-media Paris
Escape to Paris–mixed-media Paris

Ahhh Paris…the City of Love. Or so they say. I have to take people’s word on this since my love, The Husband™, has never wooed me with a romantic get-away to France. To be fair, I haven’t wooed him there either, but this is my blog, so it’s all about moi*.

My fifth and final tag of the Valentine series focuses on the City of Love. All of the elements of this tag are either a deep red, purple or silver color. I don’t think this is particularly Parisian, but of course I have no way of verifying that since someone has not taken me there. Just sayin’.

 

Ooh la la. City of Love tag

Ooh la la. City of Love tag

Making the tag

Complete the base for this tag in the same manner as the Heavenly Valentine Tag, but use purple and red acrylic paints. Remove the string, apply a base acrylic, emboss a pattern, apply a second acrylic and rub like crazy.

While your tag continues to dry, run Tim Holtz Grungeboard Dots through your die cutter using a heart die. From your scraps, cut a narrow (about ¼” wide) strip of the Grungeboard that is the same length as the width of your tag. Paint the strip with metallic silver Adirondack Acrylic Paint Dabber and paint the heart with purple acrylic. Let dry. Then color the raised dots of the heart with an embossing pen and sprinkle Red Embossing Tinsel over it. Emboss with heat gun.

Next, perform my super special Doily Trick depicted in the Valentine is the 14th tag by placing a valentine doily on a white paper or cardstock. Paint the doily purple, going slightly beyond the edges. This will create a negative image of the doily on the paper that you can then use in a future project. After the doily dries, cut a narrow strip of a curved section. I personally used the top of the valentine where the two sides come together. Don’t you think it’s such an elegant symbol of two souls joining in love? Yeah, I know. Blech.

20140111_211101-doily-web-1

Now that I gave you all those intricate directions, you could have just as easily cut a piece from the doily you made for the previous tag and used that. See why it’s always good to read directions all the way through? Nevermind the fact that I could have just told you this earlier. This way you learned a useful life lesson. Besides you got to be amused by my “Blech” and that is worth the extra work.

RTFM--It's always good to read directions all the way through.

RTFM people–It’s always good to read directions first

On the tag, center the “Love” brad and insert it slightly above the bottom edge. Since the brad is something I found in my stash, you could replace this with a sticker or a countless number of other items.  Now would be a good time to temporarily place the rest of your elements on the tag to ensure they all fit in an aesthetically pleasing manner. Of course, it would have been even better to do this before inserting the love brad. Aha! I was testing you to see if you learned your lesson about reading directions. If you passed my test, go treat yourself to a Reese’s when the tag is done. **

Turn the heart over and use a strong glue to attach the ring above the Eiffel Tower to the intersection of the heart (I’m sure there is a name for this ring, but I’m not a beader, so I don’t know what it is). While that is drying, carefully (this material is fragile) adhere the doily snippet below the hole of the tag. Then glue the silver Grungeboard strip along the bottom edge of the doily, making sure you leave enough room for the heart die cut.

Turn the heart/tower combo right side up and adhere it to the tag, with a portion of the heart extending beyond the tag. Cut out a 2 3/8” x 4 ¾” piece of coordinating paper (or whatever size your tag is), adhere the paper to the back of the tag. Using a scissors, trim the top two corners of the back paper so they line up with the tag. It is easier to do this after you have adhered the paper to the tag, than trying to perfectly trace or measure the angles of the tag. Line up your hole punch with the tag and punch a hole through the paper.

Finally, cut 10” lengths of red and purple sheer ribbon and thread both through a silver bead. Thread the ribbons through the hole of the tag and then through another silver bead so that the two beads sandwich the edge of the tag. Using a hot glue gun, glue the two beads together, getting a small amount of glue inside the beads so that the ribbons stay in place.

Your tag is complete. Looking at this piece of beauty is almost as good as being there. Yep, let’s keep telling ourselves that.

Stuff I used:

Avery Shipping Tag; purple and red acrylic paint; Adirondack Acrylic Paint Dabber in metallic silver; Stampin Up Hearts Stamp; Dream Impressions Spencerian Collage Stamp; Big and Bossy Giant Pre-Inked Embossing Pad; Zig Emboss Writer; Melt Art Ultra Thick Embossing Enamel; Tim Holtz Grungeboard Dots; Ellison Thickcuts Primitive Hearts; Ranger  Red Embossing Tinsel; Eiffel Tower from WT Collage Accent Kit; Love brad, doily, ribbons and silver beads from unknown sources; assorted adhesives.

*Please note that I used French when writing about a Parisian tag, because that’s how authentic this blog is. It is also the only French I know how to spell, so it is all you are going to get. If this was a German tag, I might be able to include a couple dozen words. That would be the most useful thing I have ever done with my five years of high school and college German. Hmmm… conjugated verb tags, anyone?

**You can do it before it’s done like I do, but then you have to find ways to artistically deal with chocolate smudges.

3 Responses »

  1. This is a fantastic tag. Lots of visual texture! I like that about this tag. The colors are great, and looking at it up close is when I see all the embossing “bumpiness” that begs to be touched and felt.

    Leslie

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