Post credit cut scene.

All decent scifi/superhero film has a cut scene at the end of the millions of credits that feel like they go on for a fortnight? in good tradition here is ours....

the credits are really all just about money... and following sad passing of Leonard Nemoy, the geek in me found joy at the request from the Canadian bank asking people to stop spockifying the $5 notes. the rebel in me had to just have a go.... printed the notes in full colour, drew on the rough outline and then coloured in with fineliner - not as good as some, but will look nice in a UFO somewhere.

have a go yourself, although I haven't managed to figure out how to mess with the UK notes yet,  so for the moment I just keep searching for more inspiration. Check out these 

INTERNATIONAL DAYS:  Yesterday was international superman day and in his honour I created these little cards, for a time I was addicted to creating 6 word story round ups on my favourite movies/superheros so these cards will be getting added to the collection.

just an hour or so work, mainly used waiting for things to dry, first draw out the logo very lightly, and paint with my favourite tool the drawing gum, leave to dry, and then lightly roughen up in some places so there are no perfect lines.  sprayed dylusion inks on a glass mat with some water and slapped the paper down right over the top. leave to dry.  then rub off the drawing gum and sketch out your superhero. colour in with a black pen and KAPOW a mini watercolour effect card.

GIVEAWAY NEWS!!  

finally I get to tell you who won...

 just to let you know Lou has picked the winners as: 

Sarah Harris: Slaughter house 5

Emily Kate:  Loki

Frances Wybrow: Discworld Chunky

all that is left is to thank everyone for taking part, its been wonderful to see the beautiful art that is being created in all its different guises    

and to know in this mighty big world, universe, and ether we are not alone.

I'll post this on FB and contact the winners directly for a £10 voucher of their choice from either Country View Crafts or Art from the Heart.

let us know if you have any ideas of any interesting 'days' coming up and we;ll see if we can do a project to match, and I'm sure we'll be back long before Halloween.

Laugh, love, live long and prosper.

jas x

the end... or is it?

Sadly Sci-fi month is coming to an end, I have really enjoyed the content seeing peoples work and having regular themed projects.  and although its only 155 days away, its seems a awful long time to Halloween..I wonder if there are any special/weird event days coming between then and now? I know international speak like a pirate day is in my calender for Sept 19th, post on FB any others you can find or think of, and we may just make the odd special appearance. :)

Anyway that all being said, onto the main post.

International Towel day in honour of Hitch Hikers Guide To The Galaxy was on the 25th May, as you are required to carry a towel with you all day, I had a trawl through the Interweb and stumbled across this beautiful idea  and since the beginning of the month my towel has been by my side because you never know when you're going to need it.

I slightly changed my design and it is still a work in progress. I used 2 reasonably cheap hand towels, and laid them top to tail on top of each other off centre, this gave me the top front strip as a design feature and an inner label so you could tell what it was, once they were pinned together I chopped roughly 15 inches from the top.(*add any lettering/patches to the top one here before stitching the layers together across the top) This becomes your flap, and back,  I also included a layer of wadding here.

I then lined up the remaining the same way to create the front/bottom of the bag, and again cut 15 inches off, stuffing the same way and stitched them together across the top.

Because I haven't stitched the sides I turned them inside out and stitched the front and back together across the middle so its one long length again,

Turned them back through, I followed the other blog's directions for a square bottom,

Sadly my machine didn't much care for stitching towels so I did end up going through a couple of needles, and it just didn't want to play nice with the lettering so I've ended up stitching a patch on.

I uses the wastage to cut a thin strap, stitched it up the middle to stop fraying and joined sections using a cross pattern,

Stitched up the sides and boosh. one rough handbag shape.

Finally all that's left is to add some extra retro badges and walk around town with your bag flashing off your nerdness to the max!!

The giveaway ends midnight so don't forget to use these last few hours to show off your wares (as it were) either follow the link or post on FB.

goodbye and thanks for all the fish.  :)

jas x

Sci-fi month and comic boots

No, that's not a typo in the title - I really do mean comic boots.  I love my comic books and you can't do sci-fi and fantasy without getting them in there somehow.

Now, I have this pair of rather boring black boots that I jus don't wear anymore. I also have some old French comics (Bayard) and Mod Podge.  I cut the comics into individual pictures, covered the back with the Mod Podge and stuck the pictues onto the boot, then covered the front of the picture with more Mod Podge to seal. Leave to dry and easy peasy lemon squeezy you have a new look for some old boots. Plus, if I get bored when I'm out I can do a bit of reading now.

A couple of things. Firstly, you may want to check that the comics you are cutting up are not valuable. I only had a few (enough for the boots at least) and they were in terrible condition anyway. Secondly, test the ink for fastness by smearing some of the Mod Podge over it and letting it dry. You don't want to end up with an inky smearing mess now do you. Thirdly, have fun with them. I wouldn't suggest that they will stand up to heavy wear and tear, but they certainly are a talking when you when them on a night out.

Don't forget, you still have a week to share your sci-fi/geeky/fantasy creations here or on our facebook group for a chance to win crafty vouchers worth real money.

Live long and prosper y'all.

Bex

scifi month continues or aye aye, thats still no moon!

Olo...

With international yarn bombing day less than a month away - 11 June 15 don't cha know - I thought it was time I got my act in gear,

My crocheting seems to have picked up the pace a bit since I started with my monsters around Feb. and since then I've done a couple of sci-fi related items.

The latest of which is my Death Star cushion

Left: First death star pre Kaboom right: second half built effect DS, on either side of the cushion.

 As much fun you can have with 2 balls of metallic silver wool from the £1 shop, (I probably would have used less if didn't double up so it doesn't end up holey,) this pattern, a 4.5mm hook and a few hours.

I also made my first crocheted surprise gift for a friend who had seen this dude on fb and fell in love, this pattern was from here

and finally as a birthday pressie how about the beautiful baymax from big hero 6. I challenge anyone to watch it and not cry. 

As I've been having so much fun I have 3 mini crochets to give away, a Marvin (from HHGTTG) head, a Baymax head, and a teeny tiny baby death star like this one:

all you have to do is leave a comment here or on our FB page for a chance to win. 

And talking of winning it seems like everyone has forgotten about the chance to win real craft vouchers from either Art from the Heart or Country View Crafts.  Meaning you've an even better chance of winning :)  

We honestly couldn't make it any easier, any project with any thing remotely not real, is in with a chance, show us your myths, monsters, or magical beasts, space, superheros and everything in between before midnight on the 25th May.

Talking of mythical beasts, I'm taking part in a tunnel book and themed mine around the Discworld.

This is how it looked setting off

the cover isn't as detailed as it should be but I was worried it might get damaged a bit as it circles the country so I plan to finish it off on its return.

as you can see lurking at the back of the book is an eye, I wanted it to be a bit like a dragon so I dragged out my new favourite stamp (creative expressions), flooded it with a couple of layers of gesso and left it to dry for a couple of days.  Once it had well and truly dried I gently peeled it off the stamp, and was left with a sheet of flexible embellishment, hopefully resembling dragon scales.

I added a bit paynes grey acrylic, dusted heavily with mica, painted some varigated blue gold leaf to create the shine in the eye, added a cabachon and fabric for an eyelid and voila:

I wonder what stamps you have that would make fabulous gesso embellishments?

pop back next week to see what else we've been up to and thanks for looking

Jas x

An Ininkz Link-up

Star Wars Sunday and another giveaway

Welcome back fellow geeks and today we have another Star Wars project using moulds and this time it's Han Solo encased in carbonite (check on ebay for the mould).

For these, I used liquid Fimo although normal Fimo would work as well. I filled the mould and baked as per the instructions. The liquid Fimo comes out a semi-opaque white, so I added some dark grey paint with a little white to highlight bits. I tried adding some glossy accents to one, but some of the detail was lost so best to avoid that with such a small piece. See, I do these things so you don't have to!

The end result is small enough to make into a pendant which I will give away to one randomly chosen comment made here or on our facebook group during sci-fi month.

By the way, the mould can also be used for chocolate which I also made (don't worry, I have two of these) but the chocolate did not hang around long enough to be photographed!

Anyway, get yourself some moulds and have fun playing with them. Remember we would love to see any of your sci-fi/fantasy/geeky creations and there is a chance to win craft store vouchers if you share your work either on our FB page or you can use this linkup tool

Have a great day and see you soon for more sci-fi madness.

Bex

Say it with ceramic giveaway

Hi all

Recently there was a plea from Sarah - our friend at Free Art Friday, Swindon for more artwork including some that could go out this weekend.

I've been playing with some glass/ceramic paints lately and found some bargain tiles, add those with a dash of stencil playing and mwah a plethora of heart and love festooned pieces to give away.

I measured up my tile and printed out the wording I wanted, adhering some lightly sticky backed plastic I had lying around to the tile and traced the design onto it.

being very careful with my very sharp scalpel I cut out the design, slowly peeling away the letters as I went, tiding any nicks or edges. 

Then using a cut up pan sponge, I stippled my pebeo vitrail paints in rose and red/gold on the white tile, the fantasy moon paint on the black, peeling away the plastic as soon as it was fully covered - Don't wait until it dries, don't attempt a second coat.

Ta'dah finished tile - now these will stand up to a gentle washing and drying but probably can't be used as a regular coaster, if I was wanting repeated use I would give it a quick coat of resin to protect it.

a just because gift for a friend, stippled greengold vitrail paint with 'I heart brains/zombies' depending on how your thoughts are leaning that day..

Because I have a few spare tiles left, in case you can't get to Swindon or manage to find one when you're there, I'm offering a bespoke giveaway, 

by my counts there are 6 designs in 4 colour ways, add a comment to here or on our FB page for a chance to win your choice.. 

whether you say something nice or just what colour/design you want by 12.pm Thursday 19th, the winner will be announced in Friday 20ths LOC post.

Enjoy your weekend and keep an eye out for more un/loved up posts

Jas x 

Floods, spoilers and even more to give away!!

Hello there!!

Well like buses you wait ages for one post and two come along all at once :)

A little while ago I mentioned Scott Wong's flood the streets with art part II on our face book group, asking if any of you lovelies out there were participating. If you have, please share with us on the Weird Scissors FB page so we can see what you were up to..

Here's mine:

Ode to Neverland, 5x7 dylusions painted background, glitter paste, image transfer of the Newcastle skyline silhouette.
My take on a firstcovers.com image.

These are a couple made with some of my favourite new paints.
This one:

Ode to Cinders,  5x7 canvas board, deep blue glass paint and lightening medium, with sand 'Moon' Paint, Gold foiling done with gedeo Mixtion relief.  Lashings of encased glitter with ' a dream is a wish your heart makes' quote.

I had the best afternoon playing with the different effects you get when you add the vitrail and moon paint together:

Starting with a blank 5x7 canvas board, I outlined my main silhouettes and painted them in Paynes grey. Using the Pebeo Vitrails paint (I only mention the name as I don't know if this technique works with other glass paints - I am NOT on commission, mores the pity :) ) in deep blue, parma, rose and turquoise, along with lashings of the lightening medium I painted the 'background' over the top.

Next while it was all still wet, I used the Pebeo Moon paint -in sand- and using a pin I pushed tiny little drops into the already painted background (see the first image). I left it to dry overnight and when I returned the tiny pin drops had spread out and mixed into the surrounding paint, the bigger the drop the wider the spread, really easy but quite effective. (see second picture) I almost wish I had risked doing more as in the overall image some of this is lost, but now I know for next time.  Once it was completely dry, as I didn't want the next bit to mingle, and summoning my inner Klimt, I went in again with the moon paint adding the odd rectangles over the top, and lastly after adding the quote in Posca I added the Gedeo Mixtion relief over the wording and some of the moon paint.

to create this : a Tangled ode.

You will have to forgive my photography skills it really isn't showing the mirror foiling to its fullest, it really is shiny...

My last art litter is one for the boys and geeks of all denominations, its a print of one of MessyPanda's designs, with permission and added glitter. :)

SPOILERS - All of the weird scissors will be celebrating the festive season with a weekend of twisted Christmas fun on the 6th and 7th December, accompanied by the new regular Left of Centre posts on a Friday.

GIVE AWAY - because I was playing with these new paints and I wasn't sure how they were going to end up I created multiples, rather than leave them out and about as I can't go that far, I'm offering to put one of each in a draw and I'll even let you pick which one,

Leave a comment on here or on our FB page by midnight 7th December, including which one/s you would be prepared to give a home too (Neverland, Cinderella, Tangled or Starwars) and if we end up with more than one request for the same one I'll draw names out of a hat. Winners will be drawn and notified on Monday 8th December 2014,

Matchbox Keepsake and a Festive Friday Giveaway

And we're back after our little break with some news. We are now on the design team over at the Left of Center Challenge Blog so we'll be popping by every Friday with something new for them, as well as some of our one off projects. See the end of this post for our new Festive Friday Giveaway.

The first project is a matchbox keepsake box. Now I love my matchboxes and alter them all the time. If someone knows a good use for like a gazillion matches please let me know! Anyway, here's what I did with four of them and an image from A Day For Daisies.

 Looks like a plain old card from the front.

But it's actually a keepsake box that could be filled with treasures.

Really simple to make. Take four matchboxes and line them up like this.

Measure two pieces of card a little bigger than the boxes and glue them to the top and bottom.

Cover the sides of the matchboxes and the front of what will be the drawers with card and add brads to the drawers to act as handles.

Finally, line the drawers and add your chosen decoration to the front, and you're done.

A quick and simple project for these busy times and it would make a nice alternative to Christmas or birthday cards, with the drawers filled with little chocolates pr other little gifts.

I am giving this away to one winner - just leave a comment here or on our facebook group before midnight GMT on Wednesday 3 December  and I will pick a winner at random and send them this box. I made even add a few goodies to the drawers. Winner will be announced next Friday so good luck.

I'm entering this into the following:

Robyn's Fetish Challenge Blog for use a digi

Artistic Inspirations Challenge for warm and cozy/anything goes

Cheers for now and see you soon.

Bex

15. Junk key...surprise!

Thanks for joining me on this Wicked Wednesday! Now every good, bad or ugly witch, warlock or wizard, needs to keep their things locked away, and if they're anything like I am it needs to be a bulky keyring so they aren't lost down the back of the sofa.

It's a pretty simple concept lovingly 'borrowed' from an art blog pal of ours called DonnaLouiseRogers, as can be seen in more detail here: grab an old looking key - make sure its not one you're going to need at some point, and start adding to it.

Alternatively if you don't have a big enough key, or want more use out of the finished piece try a kilt pin brooch instead.

*NON HALLOWEEN STORY SKIP IF PREFERRED:

Recently for a friends wedding I had a padlock engraved with their details, and gave them a shadow box frame, the idea was to either put their padlock in a collection, or somewhere special that has meaning to them both and use the frame as normal.

OR

Frame their lock, adding things to to it as they went, their baggage clips, festival bands, keyrings from day trips, ticket stubs, babies hospital bands etc as life moves on.  I was thrilled when I went around to find it hung on their wall as living art of their life together 
without having to get out an album or three

The padlock idea sprung from the original Junk key and either or both can be used for a variety of projects like weddings or moving home, but Halloween themed is definitely much more fun and is finished quicker - in theory :)

Anyway once you've found a starting point, just keep adding to it, whether it be charms, beads, chain, ribbon, little potion bottles, papertags, stamped bits, shrink plastic, scraps of leather, etc until its nearly lost, then either frame it or put in a little matchbox as lost and found. 

If you've made a brooch attach to your coat or bag and wear for the rest of the season

These are my starters for 10: 

*To be truthful I'm not as happy with these as I want to be at the moment, (wrong key, not enough papery things, etc) however I am going to carry on adding to them and by the weekend they should be how I want them, at which point I'll add a new pic.

and...

Surprise! I'm going to give these away including a brand new pair of earrings just about the same as in the photo (but never worn).. Me being busy carrying on with these gives you some time to comment on our pages, and fb group. Any new comment (preferably a nice one and 'likes' don't count it has to be a comment) that has been made between last weeks draw and the same time this weekend qualifies. So go on have a poke around and see what you've missed.

I'll pick out 3 random winners to send to, no specifying which you'd prefer as that would take organisation. It's not a pretty picture. I don't like doing it!

I am entering this in the Left of Centre Altered Art Challenge.

Jas x

This weeks wicked Wednesday Winners for the Junk key, kilt pin or earings are in no particular order:

Susibee

Carmen

Pauline

If your name matches the above and you posted on our blog or FBpage between Saturday 1201 and Friday Midnight, email your address to Minerva27.jg@googlemail.com and I'll post one of the items to you

Thanks for joining us, and keep an eye out for our next give away.

8. Mini Matchbox Journals - and a GIVEAWAY!

Details of the giveaway are at the end of this post.

A fun mini project - little matchbox Halloween journals. Perfect for using up those scraps of paper. A big thanks you to Gill who made some mini journals for a swap that I ran recently, and who inspired me to make spookier versions.

Remember those little matchbox monsters I made HERE. Well, I wanted something to fill the matchboxes with. Of course, I could have filled them with sweeties, but then I’d have just eaten them! 

Instead, I cut 31 rectangles of watercolur paper and leftover scrapbook paper a little smaller than the inside of the matchboxes.  I then punched holes in the top left corner of each one with my cropodile and inked around the edges. 

For the covers, I used greyboard from the back of old paper packs, and decorated them in a variety of ways. Ready made embellishments, inked embossed images, stamps, googly eyes, and my version of the journal covers that Lou made HERE (thanks Lou). Having punched the holes the same as for the pages, I set eyelets into the covers for a bit of extra sturdiness.

To make the closure,  you need something elastic - a narrow hair tie is ideal and was just the right size. I love it when a plan comes together! Punch an additional hole in the lower middle of the back cover and push your hair tie/elastic through that hole and then set with an eyelet which should hold it in place. Trim any stray elastic at the back.

I added a small book ring through all the holes and some little charms and 'tis done!

And they fit perfectly in the matchboxes.

I have entered this into the Corrosive Challenges blog.

I am giving away six of these matchbox monsters, complete with mini journals inside. All you have to do is leave a comment on ANY post by midnight (GMT) Friday 10 October and six lucky winners will be announced on my next post on Saturday 11 October, so check back than to see if you have won.  I will happily post to anywhere in the world. If you have already left a comment, then I thank you for taking the time and you are already included. Good luck.

Bex