St Patrick’s Day Lucky Tag Decor - Tim Holtz Products

I wanted to make a home decor piece as a housewarming gift for a friend who is Irish. She is also a twin, so I had to take the picture of the piece with my Bobbsey Twins books in the background. :-)

This may look like a basic Etcetera Tag, but there is a lot of prep work to each of the elements before you get to putting it together. So let's get started.

The background weathered wood technique is something I used on multiple projects recently so I made a video detailing how to do it.  For this background, I added a bit of Forest Moss Distress Paint so it looked not only weathered, but as if it has some algae or moss growing on it. You can learn how to do this technique here:
Once I made the wood planks, I decided to apply them to an Etcetera Tag. Before adhering them I needed to prep the tag. I used Ground Espresso Distress Ink Stain and applied it to the entire tag.

Once that was done, then I could attach all the planks using Distress Collage Medium.

I arranged them on the tag and then adhered them. You will need to trim bits here and there, then rough that area and ink it. I used the Tonic Snips to cut the hole in the tag. Also, don't forget to use one of the left over planks to apply to the reinforcer.  Rough up the edges and then trim out the center and adhere it over the hole at the top of the tag.

I used the Watermark Resist technique that I have been using recently to make several pieces of paper from which I could cut the Fragmented Hearts to make the shamrock.

You need these supplies to do this. Stamping Platform, Distress Mixed Media Heavystock, Fragments CMS368, Watermark Resist Ink, Water Sprayer, Peeled Paint Distress Oxide Spray, Peeled Paint Distress Spray Stain and Shabby Shutters Distress Spray Stain.

Arrange the stamps so that they cover the piece of Heavystock.

Stamp three pieces of Heavystock with Watermark Resist Ink and dry.

Spray the pieces with Peeled Paint Oxide Spray -- don't forget to wipe the nozzle when you are done.

The spray with Peeled Paint Distress Spray Stain.

Then with Shabby Shutters Spray Stain.

 

Spray all three with water. This really lets it soak in and softens the coverage so the Watermark stamping shows through.

You can see even before it dries that the stamped portions are soaking in the ink.

As it dries you will see the stamped images even more as they soak in the ink.

This is what the finished product looked like.

Then I cut the large and small faceted hearts out of each piece. You need three to form a shamrock, You will need four if you want a lucky four-leaf clover. I assembled the three hearts and arranged them on the planks. Then free-hand cut a stem from a left-over piece of the green paper. I adhered the stem first and then the three hearts.
You may also notice that I poked holes in the ends and center of each of the planks to mimic old nail holes. I feel like I have to do this on almost all of the planks I make.

Now on to the wording. I used one of my favorite new products from Tim Holtz and Ranger, the Black Cardstock in the Alcohol Ink line. It is so cool and feels like suede. When I was experimenting with it this winter, I tried stamping on it with Distress Oxides and I LOVED the outcome.

Place a piece of the black heavystock on a stamping platform. Then choose a stamp you want to show on your letters.

This is how the Tiles and Mosaic CMS259 background stamp looks stamped in Hickory Smoke Distress Oxide.

And how it looks stamped in the Black Soot Distress Oxide. I dried them thoroughly and the chalky oxide finish does lightly wipe off onto the suede finish of the cardstock. I love the effect.

I then ran the paper and some black cardstock through the newest Bigz alpha released from Tim Holtz, called Society. It's a lovely blocky font.

The smaller letters are a new Alphanumeric alphabet from Tim Holtz called Label.  It is a really tiny little alphabet. I love it! I cut the letters from white cardstock on my Sidekick, and adhered them to 1/2" strips of the black cardstock that had been stamped with the Hickory Smoke Oxide.

The word Friend is cut from the Tall 1" Alphanumeric thinlits from Tim Holtz. I also cut the letters out of black Sidekick foam so that these letters had dimension.

I'm pleased to say that my friend loved this tag and is going to leave it out all year round. I enjoyed all of the steps to this tag and found it to be a labor of love for someone special.

Thank you for following along this far! That was a lot of information for what looks like a simple tag. I hope you will come back to check out the vignette tray I made for my own home decor.
Tami

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