Cephalopod Ornaments

On the last day of Creepmas I give you tentacles and a craft.  And a little science, because I was curious if  those appendages were truly tentacles.  It turns out that those are indeed tentacles because they only have suction cups on the ends.  When suction cups run the entire length, then it is called an arm.  So I've been using the word tentacles incorrectly pretty much my whole life.  This is a nice little run down on cephalopods from the Birch Aquarium. 

Flickr is a gold mine of  creepy illustrations.  There are a number of institutions that have made images that have no known copyright restrictions available on flickr.  Of those listed so far I have only explored The British Library  

For this project I used images from the Biodiversity Heritage Library  They are not one of the previous mentioned institutions, but most of their images are public domain.  It's just good practice to check copyrights on any image you want to use.  They have so many wonderful images of creepy crawlies, skeletons and tentacled things from the deep.  All the images I used here are available in this album.  For the backside I used the same image, altering the color to match the front image.  I believe the back image is the mouth of a squid, not belonging to any of the critters on the front.  I just like that it looks like an angry eye.  

I only have a tiny Creepmas tree so I made small ornaments using 2.5 inch cardboard rounds similar to these.  I snagged a bunch of these in various sizes from my husband when he decided to let his license expire and give up making his own fireworks.  They are really nice and sturdy, but I certainly wouldn't buy any for this if I didn't already have them.  My big thing for a while now has been to use what I already have.  Jar lids would work great for this too. 

First the images were mod podged onto the disks.  Then I added a ribbon loop for hanging.  I made a small loop, because I intend on hanging it on a small hook because my tree is small.  I used a pin to hold the ribbon since I could stick it right into the cardboard. 

I cut a length of bead trim long enough to wrap around the disk.  A zipper or ball chain would work too.  

I applied a layer of texture paste around the edge.  I have done oodles of stuff using texture paste.  There are all sorts of formulas for making texture paste, they generally include paint, glue, a thickener and/or some type of texture. I just toss in whatever I have on hand, last Creepmas I even used black pepper. 

This particular mixture was joint compound (for drywall repair), black paint, glue and dried tea from used tea bags.  For this it needs to be thick enough to trowel on without spreading, but wet enough to stick.  I have a cheap set of plastic paint knives, they're pretty flimsy but they work.  Craft sticks would work too, though I'd probably use a toothpick to do any minor adjustments.  

A layer was applied around the edge, set on parchment paper and then the bead trim was wrapped around.

After that dried I added more texture paste on the top edge of one side.  I also filled in any gaps around the side rubbing away any that I might have gotten on the top of the bead trim, so the beads weren't completely covered.  

After that dried I added texture paste along the top edge of the other side.  If you use jar lids you could really have fun adding things to the inside lip.  Tiny shells, pearl beads and sand, would play into an ocean theme.

I wanted the border a bit thicker, a bit wider and a bit more textured.  I added some more dry tea and added another layer to each side.  

I highlighted it with DecoArt metallic paints.  I start with a layer of Renaissance Brown Glaze and then added just a touch of Champane Gold.  I love working with these colors and it really makes the texture pop.  

This is my high tech method of painting.  I squeeze out a few drops of paint into the palm of the hand holding the ornament and use the index finger of my other hand to spread it into a thin layer and then lightly rub it onto the textured areas to highlight.  

This is how the edges look after highlighting.

I also made little hooks using copper wire (maybe 16 gauge) scraps from a quarantine induced electrical home improvement project.  The only tools required were a wire cutters and round nose pliers.  Each wire started out 4cm and after curling the ends the hooks are 2cm in height.

And then I realized all the ornaments would hang sideways and twisted one end to fix that.  

The only thing left was to hang it on my goofy little Creepmas tree.  

Merry Creepmas everyone!

Creepmas Millipede Ornament

I feel like this project should rate me some sort of title. It's not quite up to par to earn say, Queen of Crafty Recycling, but maybe Lady of Reused Refuse or Dame of Gluing Things Together That Anyone In Their Right Minds Would Toss.

I feel the back could be so much better, but I had no idea where I 

was going with this at the time and it is the back, so nobody look at it. 

Today is Creepmas Day 12 1/2, because I say it is.  And I got a little distracted with this project yesterday, so Yeti cookies are still not made, therefore Creepmas is still not over.  But when the old gods provide a perfectly shaped dead bug, you must act accordingly.

The following are a couple of pictures before I added a couple of nice glossy topcoats, because it's easier to photograph when it's not all shiny.  Layers from bottom to top:

The base is cut from a Yogi tea box.  The inside of the boxes have henna inspired designs.  I colored the design with a Sharpie and covered the other side with eggshells and paint.  See more about using eggshells here.  I got a little sloppy painting the eggshell side and had to get creative with the henna side to cover the areas I smudged paint.

Next layer is a clothing tag wrapped in fake spider webbing and painted.  See more about using spider webbing for texture here.

In the main the letters are painted alphabet pasta.  The large "C" is a dead millipede I found in my basement.  I liked the coloring, so left it au naturel.  

The little grommets, I bought on clearance years ago and they have come in handy quite often.  The black stars and ribbon that will magically appear in later pictures were also bought on clearance.

The grommets were originally inspired because of the hole in the clothing tag.  I then chose to make a corresponding hole on the other side.  I shouldn't have put them through both layers because they looked out of place on the back.  The grommets with the ribbon through them made sense, but the two middle ones I decided to cover up and that's where the star gems come in.

Ornament Creepmas Makeover

I gave a few ornaments a makeover.  I really should spend some time learning how to properly photograph, but I haven't, so you'll just have to take my word that they look better in person.

Here is how they started out:

Each ornament contained the same image on both sides, the front side having more decorative elements.  The ornament on the left shows the back side and the ornament on the right is the front.

This is how the back of the right one ended up:

The surface of the frame on this side was completely flat.  I mixed paint with black pepper to add texture to the inner oval and the black areas between the "C" shaped elements.  The only reason I used black pepper is because I'm lazy and I was close to the pantry. But pepper does have a nice chunkiness to it, that I think I'll probably use again in the future.  


For this one I added herbs and then a little pepper to get the texture I wanted for the inner oval on the backside.

This one was almost perfect before I touched it.  I doubt if the original artist meant to make a tentacle bow, but that's what I see.

This one I actually prefer the less blingy side.  I think the pearl-like ring compliments the tentacles better.  On the blingy side I didn't like the gaps between the bling and filled them in with textured paint.  In hindsight I should've done a better job, but it is what it is.  

At least I've rid them all of whatever bright cheeriness they might've held.  Now they can feel perfectly at home on the Creepmas tree.  

Revamped Ceramic Skull

A few months ago I went to an estate sale for the very first time.  I've had more than one friend just happen on an estate sale and find the most awesome "potion" bottles.  I did not have such luck. I only found one interesting bottle, but I did get a skull for $0.50. I almost didn't buy it, it was rather cheesy looking and I had absolutely zero inspiration for what to do with it.  But it's really hard to pass up a skull for fifty cents. I mean you can always find a use for another skull, right?

It also made me wonder about my future estate sale.  I know the kids will keep a few of my prized possessions for sentimental value, maybe a severed body part or a zombie creation, but I'm sure most of it will have to go.  I can even hear possible future spouses, "No. I know you loved your mother, but that thing is not coming in the house."

At my estate sale there won't be one lonely skull on a table amidst other holiday stuff.  There will be a whole table of skulls, next to the table of skeletons, between the body parts and potion bottles, right across from the table full of spiders.

This is the before and after of my skull.  It's a ceramic skull.  There's a big open area in the back so you can put a tealight in it and a smoke hole on top.

If you've been following along, you know I started obsessing over altered bottles last year.  It's like collaging in 3D.  There are so many different ways to go about it and I've only touched on a few so far.  Any method can be used to cover much more than just bottles.

One method I've been bouncing around in my head is using molded components.  HomeTalk has a nice video using this technique on ornaments (Creepmas anyone?)  Except I didn't have any molds and there's so many to choose from.  Investing in yet more crafting stuff requires a commitment I wasn't ready to make.

The Fates decided to intervene and I happened upon some Mod Podge molds on clearance at Michael's. I picked up the Ornaments and Royal mold.  The mold's are small, a 9.5cm square and less than $3, so not too much of a commitment in money or storage.  They are meant to be used with glue sticks, but they're silicone molds, so you can use just about anything.

For my first go-round I used a spackle glue mixture I had leftover from an ornament project.  It had lost quite a bit of moisture and was a really thick putty.  I used it for the three pieces on left which have some imperfections, but I believe that's called character.  Then I added a little water to thin out the rest, which was a huge mistake. It got all clumpy and no amount of kneading would smooth it out.  I used it anyway pressing it very firmly into the mold, but after it dried it broke into pieces when I removed it.

I also had leftover paint and joint compound mixture from my pirate ship. These pieces were lighter and more detailed, albeit a little pockmarked.  Maybe because of the sand texture?  They were also a little flexible.

A few things about these molds in particular.  Most of the impressions are pretty shallow, so whichever medium I used they were dry in a few hours.  The two domed areas on the "Ornaments" (left) mold needed to dry overnight.  You can see I got impatient and lifted them too soon.  Many of the objects on the "Royal" (right) mold were difficult to remove without breaking. Namely the top left scroll, the bee's little legs, the key and the boarder at the bottom.  For my purposes this didn't matter. Any defects just add a worn, aged appearance as far as I'm concerned.

I ended up making another batch of 50/50 white glue and spackle to make additional pieces.  Leaving a thin layer across the back of the mold made it easier to remove pieces without breaking them. It was easy to crumble off if I didn't want it, but I found I liked it.  The glue/spackle mixture isn't waterproof, so it does soften when you lay it on wet glue.  Using a small brush, wetting it if needed you can blend that thin layer onto your working surface.  

Here's the skull covered with a layer of the paint mixture to give me a good surface to work on.  The teeth and other cavities had a hard straight edge from whatever was used to cut those areas out.  I used additional layers of the paint stuff to build up and round out those places.  The "eyes" are just me playing around with pieces.



Then I started gluing stuff on, using white craft glue. The laurel wreath cut in half made a nice mustache.  I cut apart the boarders from both molds into individual pieces.  I took apart some old flowers.  I love that it doesn't matter what color they are because everything gets a coat paint.   The glass eye is just a cheap plastic gem.

   

I even used up most of the crumbly broken pieces on the back.  

Then I put some spackle glue in a disposable icing bag and piped it on to build up areas and fill cracks so the molded pieces didn't look like they were just sitting on the surface.  I used a wet paint brush to further move it around. There was some shrinkage after it dried so I went back and touched it up with more spackle glue.

After that dried it was onto paint.  I started with a solid layer of dark brown.  It took three coats to get every little nook and cranny coated, turning it every which way to make sure I didn't miss a spot.  The paint has to protect the spackle glue so you have to have good coverage. I liberally sponged on a tan coat, then a slightly lighter tan on and finally finished off with a few white highlights.  

This angle reminds me of Shakespeare, which is fitting since we did share an "Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio..." moment while I was painting him.  

It just happened that after I finished, one of my air plants bloomed! 

Altered Ornament

After the holiday season I bought a big package of shatterproof ornaments on clearance.  This is the first of them to succumb to my devious whims.  During my journey down the rabbit hole of altered bottles, I also saw quite a few ornaments using similar techniques.

Lace and fake flowers seem to be popular along with a mix of found objects. I decided to not get too crazy and limited myself to some small flowers I partially dismantled, buttons, PVA glue mixed with spackle and tatting. I started with a layer of watered down glue and tissue paper and let that dry to get a nice base surface to work on.  Throughout this project I used a banana holder to hang the ornament while drying.  

What's tatting you might ask, well it's lace made by knotting thread. I don't remember how it came to be on my radar. But once I saw it, I decided I was going to learn to do it and then create the most awesome skull design ever. No skulls yet, but I finally have the basics down.

I highly recommend TattedTreasures.com to get started if you have any interest. Also the Tatted Treasures channel on youtube. Very easy instruction to follow and I love the fact that she did a video for Lefties.  It really hurt my brain trying to learn how to flip stitches left-handed while watching right-handed videos.

I've been trying out snowflake patterns. All the ones pictured are variations of the same pattern. White is a good beginning color because it's easy to see the knots and snowflakes are generally easy patterns to follow. I had given one of my better ones to my mother-in-law and when she found out I bought a bunch of cheap ornaments to play with, she inquired if I was going to glue my snowflakes to them. The ones I've made are too big for the ornaments, but it did get the wheels turning.

I attempted to modify a pattern into a design that would wrap around an ornament. Besides my alterations, which didn't really work, I was very distracted that day and made numerous mistakes. I was a little peeved with myself for dorking it up. But then I thought maybe it doesn't have to be perfect. So I glued it on an ornament anyway, covered up the mistakes with flowers and buttons and built up some areas with spackle-glue. I think it turned out alright and now I know what to do with my other tatted practice pieces.

I added some swirly texture with my fingers in the spackle-glue. I think I'll have to play with this technique more in the future.

It was hard to tell how it was going to turn out until I did a base coat. Before that it just looked like a big mess and I thought maybe I was wasting even more time on a doomed project. I painted half of it at a time because I was holding the other half, so I could really push the paint into all the nooks and crannies. There were a lot of little nooks and crannies. It took four tries before I couldn't see a speck of white no matter which I turned it.

Here's a few more shots of the finished project.  My daughter said it would have looked pretty if I hadn't used such dark gloomy colors.  I used a matte black for the base, sponged on gunmetal gray, then dry brushed on silver and added a touch of pearl white for accent.  It is rather dark and gloomy, but dark and gloomy makes me happy.  

I think the bottom looks like a cabbage.