 Hey guys, how are you today? So we are here for a design team video now Normally, I just bring you the challenges maybe chat about some new products This month we had a team member who had some family emergencies So she couldn't do her swap with her fellow team member So I pick up I picked up the ball and I said no problem. I'll do it So I've swapped some stuff with Wendy. Um, I on a Wendy. I think on YouTube. She's Wendy. Hi I'm Wendy Ewing and I sent her some dead canvas. I'll link her video in the description below. She did a great job with it In return, she sent me some interesting bits and pieces these two pieces of fabric with trims and stuff on them Wendy, this is a great idea. I do lots of like hand-made So an embellishments. I don't think I actually thought to do something like this, but this is a good idea And she sent me this big piece too and then a piece of her own dead canvas You can see here. There's a hole in it. So the first thing we're gonna do Is stabilize the hole now? Yeah, yeah, so I was trying to think about what I would do with these and my muse is dancing around saying We need to make a journal. We need to make a journal. We need to make a journal. I'm all what about a banner? No, we need to make a journal. So she and I have been having this argument like all weekend So I think I'm gonna just relent and we're gonna make a journal cover. So anyway, that's what we're gonna do But I'm gonna show you step by step. I'm not gonna fast forward in or anything The first thing we're gonna do is stabilize this piece of dead canvas So I'm going to get out a couple things and some glue and I'll be right back Okay, for those of you who don't know in my Etsy shop. I have Not only a lot of digital downloads. I have Um original artwork. There is a section for sort of art parts and salvage pieces I find interesting that I buy an excess amount of and then I sell the extras to you all I also have my own line of stamps and stencils and there's lots of ways you can use them besides um Just your ordinary scrapbook and card making if you're a mixed media artist, there's lots of ways you can use them I'm gonna Try to use them in an interesting way in this case. We'll see how interesting I get with it. I don't know, but we're gonna find out anyway These are These here are from some digital downloads. These are embellishments that you can print out whole sheets of these in my Etsy store And then I cut usually I cut them out and just have a bucket of them sitting here on the table So we've got those we're gonna use. I've got some tissue paper with gold dots This is one of my favorite tissue papers. Just gold dot paper Um, these are some watercolor embellishments. I did like a million years ago. We're gonna use those probably Um, these are some of my stamped images that I stamped onto mixed media paper and or drawing paper and then I Watercolored so we're gonna probably add those And then I have some of my stamped images on deli paper now This one I may have done. I don't remember This one might have been done by one of my former design team members Um, I don't think I did this. I think they did someone of them did I don't remember who it might have been cindy udder But it could have been anybody If you're watching this and you did these and you sent them to me put that in the description below Will you because I don't remember and I didn't mark it mark it But um, the the images on here are my rubber stamps From one of my stamp sets And I have a green sheet a purple sheet And a red yellow orange sheet So we are going to Use these to help stabilize our piece of canvas Um, and then let that dry before we do anything else So I'm going to glue these on here Um, and we're going to keep it on this non-stick mat that way. Um, I won't accidentally glue something to the table So we're going to use some matte medium Which is trying to glue itself together. So let's not do that I'm going to just pour a puddle of it on here And the first thing I'm going to do is I'm going to put something over this hole In the canvas and I think I'm going to start with the gold tissue paper Now because I'm working on a non-stick stick craft sheet I should be able to do both sides of this and let it dry and it there should be no problem with it Sticking to the craft sheet. It shouldn't stick at all And then I'm going to take I think the purple one Would go best with pink I like these gold. This is one of from one of my stamp sets. It looks like a like an orange I don't have a plan We're going planless When I do these kind of journal covers, I usually don't have a plan Fun fact I just do what feels right With a lot of my art. I do that. I don't generally plan I sometimes do but not often Now my idea is not to completely cover up her background Her it looks like a piece of an acrylic pour that maybe she wasn't completely happy with I just want to add to it Make sure make sure you get all the edges down so that you get plenty of matte medium or Gel medium whatever kind of glue you don't have to use a medium. That's the other thing too. You could use um You know Elmer's if that's what you have use Elmer's that's a thicker piece of paper So it's not going to want to stick as easily It's going to want to move around and repeat on the backside Normally, I wouldn't be so concerned with the backside when I do these kind of journal covers. I Sometimes I'll do stuff to the back. Sometimes I won't But in this case we have a hole here. So we're gonna Like I said, we're going to try to stabilize the hole I'm going to use some of these scraps somebody spent time creating this paper for me So I'm going to make sure to use it all up I don't know how long this piece of paper these I should say papers have been in my bin probably for a while So usually when I'm creating these I just grab a stack of things That I think I want to use and then my goal is to just use them up on the on the dead canvas Now it's not that I don't like what Wendy did with the canvas It was Actually a beautiful color. I don't want to um Cover it all up But we're just transforming it into something new. She obviously took it off the stretcher and there was something about it She didn't like but we're going to see what what we can create with it Okay, so now before we do anything else We need to let this dry Completely Um, and then we're nowhere near done So I'm going to let it dry. I've got to go run some errands for you. It'll just be a second for me It'll be uh, probably an hour or so and we'll be back Okay So it's Mostly dry the back is a little bit wet still But I think it's going to be okay and we are going to continue on That medium, um, I want to add some stenciling to the piece of fabric before we Do anything else The colors I'm picking are not only to coordinate with what's on here But with the fabric that she sent me so I chose colors That would go with that. Um, I chose mostly the Blick matte Um acrylic paints Because I have them number one, but also because I think the matte paints These seem to dry a little faster than some of my other paints So I picked I have the matte acrylics in these five colors And then I picked one deco art paint. This is ultra blue deep A deco art and my arcana paint because one of the fabric swatches And trim she sent me has this dark blue color in it So we're going to go with those and I've got three of my stencils. This one is 10 dot I believe yep And then can you see that? Yeah, and then this one is Yep primitive That's what it says on the edge Here names are etched into the edge of the stencils at least the newer ones And this one is Oh, here we go four square 11 So I have a series of stencils called four square Where you have four different designs in a square stencil You can use it as is or you can I've done with some of them cut them apart um Okay, we're going to start with 10 dot I'm going to put a few of the paint colors out here on this piece of newsprint Just need a little bit Don't need a ton I don't know if I'm going to use all of them But I'm going to start with the pink sort of the turquoisey color then pale yellow and the dark blue I might add some of the green Let's do the green too. The one I'm not sure I'm going to use is the purple this purpley color I'm not sure I'm going to use that I pulled it out just in case but I don't know if I'm going to use it. Okay I have a sort of a short stiff bristled stippling brush and it is a It's called a scruffy brush Folk art one stroke Scruffy it says 4152 That's all I can read without my glasses on So I'm going to take I'm going to start with the 10 dot And you know the trick with stenciling is to Not to have too much paint on your brush So I'm going to dip the paint the brush in the paint And then I'm going to tap some of it off And then I'm going to Tap up and down You could scruff if you don't care about getting a good impression And you don't mind if it's a bit messy And it you know that it maybe goes under the stencil, but if you want a good impression And a good mark A little bit of paint And up and down motion Sometimes I still get the bristles Under the stencil because I still have too much paint on it or I pushed too hard, but you know Usually you're going to get a nice impression if you do it that way And again, I'm doing this in real time. We're not going to fast forward. So this is going to be a bit of a longer video Hopefully that's okay with you Okay, so that's one I've added a nice a range of color to that I used up all the yellow that was on there, which is perfect I'm going to I'm not going to be super Crazy about cleaning the brush. I'm just going to sort of dry it off And then we're going to go in with this one Which I could use the four square But I'm not sure I just want to do one at a time. So Um, we're going to go in with the turquoisey color Need some more of that color That color is not going as far as the other one to right in the middle So you can see already Lots of interesting marks. Okay, so now we're going to go with the four square And I'm going to turn it upside down I'm going to start with the pink I think Let's turn it a little purple because I didn't wash my brush, but I'm okay with that Try the brush off again And turn the stencil. I think this way Go with the green Okay, and then one more time and we're going to go with the blue I can get my brush a little bit cleaner So there's no right or wrong way. Just keep layering marks and stencils on your little piece of canvas or um scrap of fabric or Old pair of blue jeans or you could do this on anything. You don't have to have an old piece of paint paint canvas Um, so we're going to let that dry And I'm going to check the back and make sure I didn't mess up the back since it was still wet And if I did I'll probably put some Um, like pattern tissue or plain white tissue or something on the back But I'll do that and I'll let everything dry and I'll be back. Okay So This is a little bit cold, which means it's still like Probably a little bit damp, but it's dry to the touch So now the next thing is to make this into a journal cover. Now We did, uh, put some papers and things over where the tears were to You know reinforce and strengthen the hole here Um, but that being said we only did it to strengthen it I do like the sort of frayed, you know, holy edges So I don't know that I necessarily want to cover them up completely At least at the moment And I don't like huge journals. I like small ones And here's one that I did No, not that one somebody else did that one Here's Here's one that I've done out of actually dead canvas Um Like the one that we're doing today and it'll end up being about the same size And this this was the background was a piece of old canvas of mine that I didn't like I did the same thing to it that we're doing today um So, okay, I've pulled I still have her fabric that I want to attach I've pulled a few things from my small bits bank Um, the I have these colored safety pins, which are a lot of fun Um, I pulled a blue and a pink one and a green one I have these pieces of sort of halfway art embellishments That I've done and these are just layers of Things I have in my stash alcohol ink and sharpie colored Plastic with magazine pages and words a piece of alcohol inked canvas um a print of um one of my art Pieces you can get from the etsy shop. This is one of my rubber stamps stamped with sharpie ink on a Shrinky dink Shrink plastic and then shrunk down And then made into this piece that's on here This is another one of my stamps that's on a piece of plastic packaging and then shrunk down And it got kind of curly around the edge, but I just thought that was interesting and again, this is magazine pages A print of a piece of artwork Um, some words some alcohol inked plastic Um, a painting paper a clip. Um, so I have you know, these are the kind of things They're not completed artworks in my opinion, but they're good to have around And I like to use my stamps and stencils in them in a new different ways And then I have them to sort of add to the cover of a journal like this And I might use this one just because it's a little bit smaller and we won't completely lose all that Stuff we've done in the background I also have these pieces of polymer clay. These are done patty tolly parish style If you don't know who she is, I'll link her channel in the description below It's thin polymer clay rolled out in a sheet Then I stamped it with some of my rubber stamps and then I cut it into tile shapes and baked it And then I took some metallic paints and rubs and just dry brush it across the top to make the pattern stand out And then this is a popsicle stick or craft stick Um, depending on what generation you are Um, that I uh, I would do a whole bunch of these together Paint them and then stamp them with some of my stamps And then when you pull them apart you get a craft stick that looks like this. It's really cool So we have all those little bits and pieces to play with not to mention the fabric Wendy sent so I'm thinking this fabric Would be great to kind of finish up the edges on here And I know I said I kind of didn't want to lose this but I'm thinking we have to lose some I don't know. Let's see what happens. So I'm gonna I want to get all of these colors So I don't want to use this this way because then I'm only like going to get that strip I really want all of these colors So I'm going to cut off a piece of this I should go get my fabric scissors to do this because they're a lot sharper than these These are covered in glue, but that's okay And then um, you could stitch it down But you could just staple it too Do I want to wrap it? I want to just Do that So really it's just about layering pieces until I get something I like and then I'm going to either staple it or stitch it down So let me do that and I'll be right back. Okay. So far we have this So it's getting there. I only sewed this down in the center. Um I don't know if I like it flapping like that, but let's let's keep working on it. We're not done I do want to attach this because I do really like the idea Of this being on the cover And I think with the lace underneath it that way it doesn't make you fear So what we're going to do Just lay this on top. Now if you don't have something like this You could assemble something like this from pieces that you have around your art room um using your stamps and Um digis and I'm just going to staple it I like the sort of mixture of messy sewing and glue paint staples I like the look of that So that's all done And I think I want to attach some of my safety pins here Let's see if I can do that probably should have done that before I stapled everything together, but you know Hindsight's always 2020, right? So I think we're going to put all of these safety pins on here Really when you're doing covers like this as far as I'm concerned Like you can't put enough stuff like there's not at such a thing as too much I guess there might be but not for me. Okay, and then we're gonna I'm going to staple this little piece of lace here So it doesn't do too much flopping around So I didn't lose this But we did get the fabric on here I don't know if I want to cut this off or not. I kind of like that at the bottom But I should probably even it out. I want to put that on there Maybe I don't think these work on here, but this may be Maybe over here Let's do some signatures first. So let me get some drawing paper out and cut a few pieces of paper Um or a ready-made journal and do something about pages inside. All right, I'll be back Okay, after doing some measuring if I can cut my pages to be five and a half square They should fit nicely in here. I do think I'm going to just leave this at the bottom I kind of like it. Um, and I've got some of my favorite drawing paper here And so we're going to cut it five and a half high By 11 long and that should give us the signatures that we want How wide is this paper because I don't remember It's like 12 So I've got my guillotine printer printer. It's not a printer cutter here And so we're going to move the guide to five and a half And we're going to lock it in there and cut some strips that are five and a half By the width of the paper and I think if we do Sorry, I think I hit the camera I think if we do two or three like that, I don't know how many pieces of paper this is So this is a 70 pound drawing paper for most uses Light paint and sketching. This is my favorite paper It won't hold up to watercolor. Um, but you can do a little bit with it Yeah, that'll be good So then let's cut it to 11 wide And this is an exacto guillotine paper trimmer. I got it from staples A long a while ago not a long long time ago, but it works pretty well. It's pretty accurate I can put that away now at least off to the side I need my chair so my big head doesn't get in the way All right So then we're going to take each one of these and we're going to fold them in half If you have a bone folder, you can use that. I do have a couple bone folders I don't always use them. Why I'm lazy We're going to nest the papers In side of each other like that. So I'm going to do this whole stack of papers and I'll be right back Okay, so now we have our cover and we've got our pages. They fit in really nicely Now if you wanted to be really neat and trim about it, you could trim all this You know once you nest the papers inside of each other Um You get This the inside pages need to be cut a little bit shorter so that everything's flush and even if that bothers you You need to put this on the table with a straight edge And an exacto knife and trim all that off. I generally don't do that. I don't doesn't bother me So I leave it I could do two signatures, but I'm just going to do one Before we do anything else to the spine because I do think I might want to add this popsicle stick um We're going to sew the signatures in so I'm going to get some Sharp pokey things and some book binding needles and thread and I'll be right back Okay, so I've got a sharp pokey tool I've got some thread scissors now these are actually medical surgical scissors They work great for embroidery and things like that. They're my favorite thread scissors. I have have a few pairs of them Um, so the next time if you have to go to a medical supply store, you might think about checking these out They're not expensive, but they work fabulous I'm going to get a long needle see This is my needle book In case you didn't get that idea I think we're going to use one of like these big huge ones And then I have some pink baker's twine. I think we're going to use that for our thread And I think this one here Kind of matches the colors of the paint really well That's on here the color the pink color that's already on here So we're going to cut a whack off a big piece of that Thread our needle word. I'm trying to do this without my glasses on That's probably not a smart idea Okay, I really can't do that without glasses hang on Okay, even with the glasses on that wasn't working So I got out my longer upholstery needle with a bigger eye on it and that worked great Um, okay So the next thing we're going to do is I'm going to line up my pages with where I want them in the cover I want them to be about there And I'm going to just eyeball it and poke some holes Now if that you know, you're the kind of person that you need precision Then this isn't the way to do it for you. You want to measure And clip everything together to make sure you get it in the right place Because doing it this way is going to make you crazy But I'm going to just start poking holes Keeping my fingers out of the way so I don't jab myself because that would be bad And I'm going to force the needle through which is this is a big needle. So I'm going to have to push And pull it's going to suck. Okay Don't pull it all the way through leave a two or three inch tail there Try to find where that hole is Go in that to hole at the top There we go. Go in the hole at the bottom And then go back up in the middle. I'm going to put this underneath that center string So we have One tail on one side and one on the other side. I'm going to pull it taught And then I'm going to tie it in a knot One Two Tie Two I don't know what kind of knot that's called. I don't remember now, but it's something I learned when I was knitting And it just it holds um stronger. I do have these right here and I still didn't use them Geez So now our signature's in That is cute. I still think I want to put the Popsicle stick on the spine Do I want to glue it or put holes? I think I want to put holes in it So let me go to my drill press and let me put a couple little holes in my popsicle stick. Hang on And before anybody asks Yes, I have a dremel drill press in my art room I love my drill. Okay So I put two. Can you see maybe you can see on this side? I put two holes in each end I really want to sew it to The spine like great like right there So I'm gonna How am I going to do this? Go this. Oh, I need to Oh that needle is not going to fit I'm going to have to make that other one work. Hold on. Try Let's try this one One with a big eye, but That's thinner. I swear I spend more time trying to thread the needle. Here we go All right, let's see if that works. Yep And then I'm going to go like near where I sew the signatures in I'm going to go through some of the lace And then back up the other hole But I think I want to put some beads on there. So hang on Okay, these beads were made with some of the words printed out from my etsy shop I have I have files of just words that you can print on stickers And then this is just a scrap of fabric And some beads and some wire So I think we're going to attach that to the spine Which I think will be cute. First I'm going to tie This end in a knot. Okay, then I'm not going to cut the thread. I'm going to go in The hole for the bead I just put it in the hole for the bead wrapped it around when under the popsicle stick out the other side through the hole Like I just wanted to secure it there. Did you see what I did? I'll do it again on the other side We'll zoom in So what I'm gonna Okay, we lost battery power there. So I'm not sure At the time of filming this I'm not stopping to look at the clip Where we left off, but I ran the baker's twine with my needle underneath the lace here That's on the spine till I got near the other end And then I'm going and it's coming out one side of the popsicle stick I'm going to grab the bead through the wire loop on the other end Then I'm going to run the Baker's twine back underneath the popsicle stick if I can feel it. I'm going to grab a little bit of the lace If I can we'll see I think I can there we go And then I'm going to before I pull it too tight. I'm going to go back into either The baker's twine loop or the wire loop and with the needle And pull and that should tighten it on the popsicle stick and kind of center it So it doesn't move around too much I'm going to move the fabric part of the bead around so that you can see the grow. There we go Then I'm going to go In One hole of the other end Oops, I'm going to just secure the end of the popsicle stick To the spine and the lace On the other hole. It's pretty taut. So it's a little challenging I'm going to have to use the Needle to help me tie a knot because It's going to be tight here Which is fine So do that's tied nice and tight make another loop put the needle through I'm going to do this um one more time You could put a little bit of glue on the knots if you're worried about them coming out And then we will cut it. I'm not going to cut it all the way. I don't mind a little piece of the string hanging out there like that That is cute That is a bunch of cuteness. All right, so then just use some tacky glue On those knots Just a little bit if you have fabric tack that'll work. I don't have any right now. I'm out But tacky glue works And there you have it. So this goes just goes to show with scraps that you think Are garbage Things that you would probably normally throw away Unrelated random bits and pieces you can make this cute little journal That you can keep and work in you can share with a friend Um, you can use your rubber stamps on it your stencils on it in new different and unique ways and make something really truly fabulous Um, I hope it gives you some ideas of what you can do and how you can maybe salvage some of that art that you have That you've made that you're not crazy about for instance This little piece of paper that's in the back here. You can just see a peek of it The finished piece was kind of ugly to be honest with you, but the little peek of it is real pretty. Um I love this So and not that her original piece was ugly because it wasn't it was pretty Um, but I love the way it turned out and her her I do have a few little pieces of her fabric left. So Those will be saved to use on paper clips or something Um, anyway, this was a fun challenge. I hope that you enjoyed it as much as I did Please go check out wendy's video And if you want to see what the other design team members got up to not only this month But in months past you can go to the design teams blog page and there you'll find each one of their names And links for different months a little buttons for each month If the button is clickable, that means there's a video attached to it You can click on it. It should take you for to their video for that month I hope you go show them some love and see what they've done. They've done some great jobs On some great jobs. That's great english. They've done great a great job on their products And um art that they've produced I have new things coming out all the time including some stickers that i'm currently working on And um, yeah, it's going to be a fun holiday season I think and a fun rest of the year and we're already planning 2020. So I look forward to it if you would like to Get any of the stamps or stencils um that were Shown in this or any of my videos or the design teams videos use the link in the description below There's a 50 15 discount code in the description below Please use that and as far as I'm aware at the time of filming this If you spend at least 35 dollars in the etsy shop, you get free shipping. So check it out and uh, yeah, I hope that you Um Have a great day that you like share and subscribe if you're not already Check out my link tree list of links if you want to know Where to follow me on social media or how to support the free content here on facebook And over in the facebook art groups by joining patreon or shopping in the etsy store or any of that stuff Click on the link tree list of links, which is in the description below Go out and have a great day. Everybody do something nice for yourself because you deserve it and I'll see you later Bye guys