From Paper with Purple Paint to One of a Kind Earrings

This has been a whirlwind week of house guests, old friends and adventures. Last Wednesday my friend Kate Turnipseed called and said that she was working on a new TV show and they were filming outside of Austin and asked if I wanted any company. Kate was one of my producers on Stylelicious and Craft Lab and has moved on to work on shows like Ashley Paige and Life of Ryan. Of course I wanted to see Kate, she lives in California and lord knows when I will make it out to Los Angles again. So on her short visit we did some shopping on South Congress and hit the Hula Hut for a scrumptious lunch out on the deck overlooking Lake Austin. Little Kate was gone in less than 24 hours so it was a quickie visit.

Saturday my friend Travis Nichols was in town from California for the Texas Book Festival and let me know he would be chatting up his book Punk Rock Etiquette at the Texas State Capital. Chris and I headed over right after a trip to the Sunset Valley Farmers Market. Travis told funny stories about touring with various bands, did a cute slide show about on stage manners bands should follow and sang two songs. I highly recommend this book for anyone in a band with a sense of humor. While at the capital I of course had to get my picture taken with the painting of Ann Richards. Chris and I could not stop singing "Texas Has a Whorehouse in it" the whole time. Watch the video to hear the jam and see our lovely state capital.



As if this was not enough adventure Saturday night my friend Traci Bautista came to stay with me for a few days. She had been in Houston for the quilt show so she took a quickie flight over to Austin to hang out, and I’m oh so glad that she did. I got free personal Collage Unleashed lessons for 2 straight days! I met Traci when she was a guest on Craft Lab and we have been friends ever since: hitting Vegas together, going to craft conventions and keeping in touch crafty style. I used her amazing papers on the Paper Clip Necklace in The Naughty Secretary Club: The Working Girls Guide to Handmade Jewelry.

The next 3 days worth of blog posts will be a pictorial guide to what Traci and I whipped up during our adventures. Look for chunky jewelry, art made from keys and fun foam, cupcake toppers converted into stamps and oodles more. Today I’ll start with a pair of earrings that I collaged, stamped, heat pressed, hammered and more. Dang mixed media arts take a lot out of a person.

So first things first we had to go shopping for supplies. I had lots of things already in the studio and Traci fresh off of teaching workshops was loaded. This didn’t stop us from heading to Austin’s local Joann’s Super Store. We found Traci’s Collage Pauge on the shelves and of course had to take the above picture. We loaded up on paper, paints and brushes. Don't mind us crafting in our jammies and without make-up.


First things first, we had to make bases for our collages. I started with a couple of shades of purple and Traci went with an aqua/green combo.


Recycle your old hotel room keys to use as a paint spreader. We smooshed the paint all over our water color paper for a nice smeared look with even coverage.


Using some fun foam, scissors and a little creativity we whipped up some custom stamps. I went for various squares and rectangles. Once my purple paper had dried using yellow paint I stamped my design all over.


Once my yellow stamp had dried I tore up sheets of zebra print Decopatch Paper and collaged them to my paper. Click the link to learn how to make your own Show Pony Necklace using Decopatch!


I had been collaging on top of a manila folder as not to mess up my desk too much. Traci coached me to always wipe off my brush on it and wipe all excess paint on top of it. Eventually it turned into it's own piece of art which I decided to cut into circles using my handy dandy Fiskars Circle Cutter and incorporate into my Mixed Media Collage Earrings.


Our hotel room keys were all gimped up so Traci and I decided to cut up my laminate badge from Maker Faire to spread our Collage Pauge with. I just randomly laid my circles out on top of my collage.

Traci was collaging her scraps. We were both attaching the paper to a canvas like material using modeling paste in the middle.


Eventually Traci realized I had a heat press in my studio. My aunt had given it to me years ago and I had used it one time to laminate some Christmas things. Traci was so giddy with excitement she drug a pregnant lady out to Wal Mart in the middle of the night for Parchment and Freezer paper. We sandwiched our collages in-between the paper.


Traci manned the heat press which made my entire house smell like smoke.


The heat press basically cooked our collages and flattened them out and made our top coats of gel medium baby bottoms smooth.


After my collage cooled I cut them out into larger circles so that you could see both sets of patterns. I painted the edges black with paint and a fine brush. I applied a shiny top coat of Diamond Glaze to both sides and allowed to dry. After that I used my awl to punch a couple of small holes and set some eyelets for a fancy hole.


Using my usual jewelry findings what was once a piece of paper with purple paint drizzled on it was transformed into a one of a kind pair of earrings. Not too shabby if I do say so myself. I love them so much I’m not sure I could bear to sell them on Naughty Secretary Club and may need to keep them for myself.

The lovely Cory Ryan models...


Remember check back in on the Naughty Secretary Club blog tomorrow for a tutorial on how I used collage, yarn, keys and a trip to Hobby Lobby to make a framed piece of handmade art. Thursday stop by for my third installment on collage where I whip up a different pair of earrings using collage, overlays and fabric. Not to mention a chunky necklace that involves cartoon squirrels and neon pink paint!