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I have to tell you that when Daisy issues a challenge to the E-Team, it's always a great one! But this one is beyond that! I thought it was close to impossible! I scratched my head and looked at the 3 required elements, continually coming up with nothing creative and different to do with them. Well, one of them anyway!
Our challenge was to use these 3 elements in our project -
- Ranger Distress inks
- Die cuts
- and an egg carton (Remember these….there's a good reason!)
An egg carton??? I know, right? What in the world do I do with an egg carton?
Well, here's my FINALLY finished project using the 3 elements~
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And here's my process~
The first thing I did was cut the paper egg carton in half right down the middle. I had seen online that you could soak an egg carton and then use the wet pulp to make your own paper. Sounds interesting, right? So I put one half of the carton in a large bowl of warm water to soak overnight, which is what the online article said to do. The other half stayed on my desk top since I still wasn't sure what I was actually going to do.
3 days later (ha, ha…I was busy!), I took the egg carton out and squeezed out the excess water. It still was not pliable enough to reform into any other shape, much less into paper. So I just set it aside to dry, much like you would any piece of cardstock that you've crumpled then straightened out to use as a distressed element in your project.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…I had pulled out this cute chicken patterned paper from the Melissa Frances Kitschy Kitchen paper collection and decided to play around with my Ranger Distress inks and Distress stains to try and "dirty" it up a bit. I already had the die cut piece of a coordinating paper (a leftover from another project) and set it on top of the chicken paper while I rubbed my Weathered Wood Distress stain over the edges. A two-fer! I like how the pattern showed up on the chicken paper! (As always, you can click on any of the photos to see them larger.)
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Then I went back and rubbed some Frayed Burlap Distress ink on the edges of the die cut using an ink blending tool to add to the distressed look of both the die cut and the paper.
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You may be able to see some other spots of the Weathered Wood Distress stain on the patterned paper. "Aha!" you say, and then you ask "How did she do that?" Well, let me tell you! I tore one of the egg "cups" from the wet carton, put it on the end of my fingers, rubbed some Distress stain onto it, and then using it as a dauber, stamped and rubbed it onto the paper. Very subtle effect, yet pretty cool!
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The next step was to pick out my image to color. I chose this great chicken/sunflower image from the Our Craft Lounge Sunflower Seeds stamp set and colored him up to match the colors of the paper. (Where there are eggs, there must be chickens!) It's stamped on vanilla paper and I used a lot of Copic markers and some sponged-on Frayed Burlap Distress ink to "dirty" the background up.
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Next came the process of choosing other elements and layering them together before attaching everything to the 7.5 x 5 inch kraft card base.
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I also used a piece of seam binding that was already inked with some Fired Brick Distress ink. I thought the red was a little too bright, so I just used the Frayed Burlap Distress ink pad to dab some "aging" onto it. (I also actually took some time to read all the helpful hints that are on the bottom of each Distress ink pad!)
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One of the elements used on the card was a portion of the soaked egg carton that read "ONE DOZEN". I inked it up good first!
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Now you may be wondering what I did with the unsoaked half of the egg carton. Nothing! I think I'll save it for another project!
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Ok, how about some of the blog hop details? This one is EGGS-TRA special and fun because this time YOU GET TO PLAY ALONG!! Now do you see why you needed to remember the 3 elements?
There will be 2 random winners chosen from the blog participants comments to receive some of the new 6x6 paper pads that have arrived at eclectic Paperie, along with some more surprises.
You can leave one comment per blog beginning Friday, Aug 12 and ending Sunday, Aug 14.
The winners will be posted on the eP blog on Monday, Aug 15.
To play along in this NEW ECLECTIC CHALLENGE which is open to everyone, use the same 3 elements that the E-Team used:
- Distress inks
- Die cuts
- and an egg carton
Then just use the linky system on the eP blog post to give us a direct link to your post containing your project or to your online gallery project post. The winner will be chosen and posted on the eP blog on Monday, Aug 15 as well, and will receive a $40 gift voucher to eclectic Paperie! Woo hoo!!
So now you can hop on over to see what the rest of the talented E-Team has created for your inspiration!
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E-TEAM
Latrice Murphy
Linda Duke
Micki Harper
Sherry Cheever
Starla Nelson
Daisy Sparks (eP blog)
Linda Ledbetter isn't able to participate this time, but you could still visit her!
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So that's it for me, folks! Thanks so, so much for stopping by to check out the E-Team blog hop and the NEW ECLECTIC CHALLENGE! I sure hope you'll play along with us! I'd LOVE to see what you do with the egg carton element!!!
- Stamps: Sunflower Seeds, Say It with Flowers (Our Craft Lounge)
- Paper: vanilla, kraft, Kitschy Kitchen (Melissa Frances)
- Ink: Memento - tuxedo black, Ranger Distress ink pads - Stormy Sky, Frayed Burlap, Fired Brick, Ranger Distress stain - Weathered Wood, Copic markers
- Tools used on every card: Fiskars 9" trimmer, Scor-Buddy, Tim Holtz scissors, Ranger non-stick craft sheet, Rock-a-blocks
- Other: egg carton, paper bag, pinking shears, Floral Doily Motifs die (Spellbinders), ink blending tools, seam binding, hemp twine, vintage button, flower
