Monday 17 September 2012

A grave tale

Imagine my excitement when today the postman delivered my winning stamps from T!ms August tag entry - I have spent a few days preparing a some configuration boxes to do a kind of advent calendar thing for the boys during October for the run up to Halloween, and here is my finished masterpiece:


Starting on 20th October they will be able to open a box each day and share goodies or tricks between them - I will fill the boxes with sweets or jokes and, maybe just maybe, I might put in one of the boxes that they both need to go and tidy their bedrooms - he he he.

Anyway I used two configuration boxes that I painted dark grey, then stippled with white acrylic paint and inked with Iced Spruce distress ink.  The top part is done by using five pieces of card bent to shape, covered with a piece of white muslin inked with Iced Spruce distress ink.  I added the witch by using T!ms mask and Black Soot distress ink - then I cut out all my letters, the rickety house, ghosts, spider, skull, bats and graveyard (which arrived last week) and then waited for my stamps to arrive.

As soon as I got home from the gym this morning they were there and obviously I have ignored all the housework and other things I should have been doing and got on with this!  I stamped all the images I wanted with black archival ink, cut out and inked all the leaves (using T!ms Autumn Gathering sizzix die) and then stuck everything together.

Here are some closeups:


the graveyard at night......  spooky


the rickety house, lots of ghosts in there and just like the Haunted Mansion in Disneyland always room for one more!


and here is the witch flying across a pumpkin patch - the pumpkins I made from little polystrene balls that I squished down and put lines in with the edge of a piece of card and then inked with Spiced Marmalade distress ink, finished with bits of green inked branches from the Autumn Gatherings sizzix die.  The spider and ghosts are by Quickutz all other dies are by T!m.

Obviously I wouldn't have slept at night if the back was left bare (can never resist filling a blank canvas with something me!) so I decorated that too:


the bones are handcut from white card and inked with Antique Linen and edged with Iced Spruce - the lines I drew with a Wethered Wood distress marker.  The letters are from T!ms alphabet die and the stamps from my new Mini Halloween collection - ideally I would have liked to use the new halloween sizzix strip die of people but that's not available in the UK yet :(

Hope you like the name of the chap buried under this tombstone - I spent a few hours searching for funny names too - believe me there are some funny graves out there.

Anyway that's it from me today - off to go and do something I should have done earlier....

Thanks for looking - All Spooked Out from Solihull

8 comments:

Jenny Marples said...

Spookylicious! What a great idea and how exciting to get your happy post today. Waiting for mine to arrive (stamps galore!)
Loving those leaves too. How useful are they? Thanks for sharing, hugs Buttons x

The Slow Quilter said...

I love it, the spooky boxes are great.

Craftin Suzie (Susan Wykes) said...

This is just brilliant, so well thought out and I bet your boys love it! x

JoZart Designs said...

Excellent piece of art that will be used for years. Love your eye for detail and you've put so much into it.
Lv Jo x

kay said...

this is awesome,would love to have a go at something similar,would you mind?

kay said...

hi me again :) the link you sent me wont work for some reason,can you message me again with the month on your blog it was done and then i can have a peek,thanks,x

Mrs A. said...

This is super. Wish I had time to make one of these for each of my 2 grandsons as I just know they'd love it. Next year perhaps!!! Don't know how you manage it all. p.s. love your birdcage up above.
Hugs Mrs A.

Missus Wookie said...

oh now that is gorgeous. Bet the boys have fun and I think you should have some tricks as well as treats - you can always reward them for playing along and doing their bedrooms.

Wookie & I talked about making some gravestones and came up with a list of names then moved here and suspected it wouldn't have gone down as well :lol: