September Sponsor Spotlight Number One - Tando Creative

Hello everyone. It's my turn to share a project I made using a product from our generous sponsors this month:

 Love using chip board? Look no further. . . . 

I chose to use one of Tando's house shaped advent calendar kits. Click HERE to go to the Tando site for more information and prices.

The house comes flat pack and is then made up following the instructions.Now don't get worried - I'm not ready to make Christmas stuff yet! I've had my eye on this kit for a while though. I love the tiny drawers and the fact that you can decorate the piece in any way you choose.
Here's what I decided to do with my kit:

The drawers are just the right size for all those little bits and pieces which can roll around in a larger space and get in a terrible jumble (well mine do!)

The first job was to paint all the pieces - except the drawers - with two coats of gesso and sand lightly on the final dry coat. A stencil and some crackle paste was then used to add detail to the two end pieces of the house.

Once completely dry some random stamping was added in Archival ink. This was followed by various colours of DecoArt Media Fluid Acrylics as shown. The crackle paste areas were picked out using the wonderful interference paint in the same DecoArt line.

DecoArt Crackle Glaze was applied all over each end section. Antiquing cream in several shades was then applied to some areas of the crackle. Others were left plain.

The roof was given two coats of gesso followed by some DecoArt Modelling Paste through a stencil. Sorry, forgot to take the photo!

Half pearls were applied to the edges of the roof for interest and these had extra DecoArt Antiquing Cream added plus a little graphite pencil. As with the house ends, some areas of the crackle glaze were picked out with antiquing cream whilst the edges were sponged with Traditions paint to give them definition.

The draws are flat pack and they were given a coat of the Media Line gold which is just fab - rich with metallic pigment and a real joy to use as it looks so authentic.

Some stencilling was added to the drawers to make appear more interesting. Probably not entirely necessary but it's all in the detail isn't it?!! I used Stazon because I wanted to make sure it really did just that - stay on!!

The main structure of the house is made of gorgeous, thick chipboard and in comparison, the drawers are a little flimsy. I cut out some extra drawer fronts and stuck on die cuts which were trimmed to fit. Two coats of  gesso followed to give them a good surface for painting and more rigidity.

 The drawers were painted with various shades of Media Fluid Acrylics followed by some more gold interference paint on the die cuts. I love the look but it's quite difficult to capture in a photo. I think it shows quite well in the photo on the left though.

More stencilling was added with gold fluid acrylic followed by a layer of crackle glaze which you can see if you squint hard enough!

All twenty four (only twelve shown) drawers were painted with the same fluid acrylic colours. The Crackle Glaze was antiqued with some Traditions Acrylic (still love them!).

Some drawers had additional die cut flowers added with twists of rusty wire. The flowers were all painted with acrylics mentioned before.

Other drawers were left with just the original die cut details. The edges of the main chipboard structure were finished with a gold Krylon pen - I didn't fancy trying to keep a steady hand with a paintbrush on those narrow edges!

So glad I finished the sides of the drawers - plain grey board would not have been very exciting.

Lots of lovely rusty wire on the side sections and more die cut flowers.

So, there you have my non-Advent Calendar House from Tando! I love bright colours, die cut  flowers, rusty wire, paints and mediums and I think there's plenty of those to see here! What I also like is that this piece can be used too instead of just sitting somewhere to be admired.

Do have a look at Tando products if you haven't used them before as they really are very versatile.

Look out for two more Sponsor Spotlights this month from my very talented Teamies. Have you joined in with our new challenge yet? Click HERE to see all the details.

Thank you so much for visiting our blog today and looking at my project.