"Our Family" Canvas

Hi everyone :) The Helmar team have been lucky enough this week to team up with Faber Castell to showcase some of their amazing products!!! Not having worked with their products before I sat down with some watercolour paper and simply played to get an idea of how each of the different types of pencils / pens etc looked....Boy did I have fun!!!! I am loving trying new things and styles atm and this was perfect for me to step out of my comfort zone!

So once I had an idea of how easy the pencils worked etc.. next step was to create my canvas background... Napkin art - using a variety of napkins and the Helmar Decoupage and Craft paste - this is a beautiful thick type of medium so as my canvas is 30 inch by 30 inch... I watered down the craft paste so it was easier to spread over the whole canvas....I simply dabbed my brush in water then into the paste and then gelled down the one ply napkins in random spots... Once dry I did a white wash over the top... I created the tree by ripping up pages of an old book and glueing down once again with the Decoupage and craft paste.. Then I pulled out my Faber Castell pack - Mix and Match Mixed Media Aquarelles and ink in green so to create my leaves. After stamping over 200 leaves on to the same old bookpages as I had used for the tree trunk...lol (and I still reckon it needs more - what do you think??) it was time to colour them in - I simply did one stripe of the orange down one side of the leaf and then used 2 shades of the green to create a bit of shading etc on the leaf... using a wet paint brush you brush over the top of the pencil which in turn into vibrant watercolours!!

Once dry I then had to cut them all out by hand... - that was a sit infront of the tv watching footy night! Next using Helmar's Acid free glue randomly stuck the leaves down over the tree.... Next up was the embellishing..... all the metal flowers and chipboard was glued down using Helmar's 450 and then the birds nest was created using the liquid scrap dots Voila... Pre white wash

Finished with photo's of my family in little metal frames and trinkets... :)

Birds nest