This project took a good chunk of time to put together. I saw the Kaisercraft advent calendar kit and wondered if I could do something with it using all of the embellishments and paper from Tim Holtz. Upon completion, I decided to enter it into the "Tis the Season" challenge sponsored by the Funkie Junkie Boutique. The information on the challenge can be found on the Frilly & Funkie blog.
After utiitzing my puzzle making capabilities, I managed to get the wooden structure pieced together. I took some wood glue and glued the pieces together. I had to let the two main pieces sit and dry for a bit (the bottom v. the chimney piece). As it was drying, I used Tim Holtz Distress Stain (Tarnished Brass) to color the inside of the boxes for the advent calendar.
I didn't want to paint the whole wooden portion of the advent calendar so I took sponge daubers and inked it. It gave me a bit more control about how I wanted it to look with streaks and some areas darker than others (kind of like staining). Q-tips helped in the hard to reach areas. Before I put the chimney piece on, I hand cut paper using a neutral color to create a smooth look on the main ledge and the top of the chimney. I inked the edges of the ledges for the "dusty" look. I then measured and Cricut cut all of the internal pieces (bottoms, backs, and sides of each row). Each of those were inked on the edges to give the "vintage" look and glued into their respect spots.
Each of the boxes had to be glued together so I pulled out the multi-medium matte and started gluing away. While it was a bit tedious I was able to get them together fairly quickly. As they dried, I cut out strips of paper from the Tim Holtz Christmas paper pad. I cut each strip a bit taller than the box and trimmed the excess with my micro-scissors to make sure the boxes were uniform. Each strip of paper was then glued on to each box around the sides (I figured that no one is going to look at the bottom of the box).
Before I started working on the boxes, I knew that I wanted to put bottle brush trees on the calendar. The initial set up for the cubbies had doors but I did not use them because I wanted to use the space rather than a door to cover the space (maybe a great idea for Halloween but not for Christmas). This is another reason for using the neutral piece of paper for the ledge. The ledge in its entirety was smooth but it also covered up holes that were to be used for the door hinges. As for the trees, I greabbed a ziploc bag and put the trees in and sprayed in White Picket Fence, Mowed Lawn, and Forest Moss. I let them dry. Once they were dry, I cut them to size and used Snowflake Paste for the snow. I set them aside to allow for the snowflake paste to dry.
As the trees were initially drying, I started sorting through my stash of embellishments to figure out what to put on the boxes. I used the Tim Holtz punch for the juniper greenery and brushed on some snowflake paste. I didn't know how many I would use but I cut out 10, snowflake pasted them, and then set the aside to dry. Next was working out the placement and variety of the numbers for each of the advent calendar boxes. I used Tim Holtz's numbered brads, enamel plates, numbered tokens, alpha parts (ransom), letter press print blocks, mini numerals, and remant rubs (numbers). After I spread the numbers out I started working on the embellishments for each box.
The bottle for box 2 is filled with Tim Holtz Glitter Dust and the bottles for box 21 is filled with Ranger Red Tinsel Embossing Powder (corks glued in to keep them from falling out and glitter getting everywhere). Petaloo snowflake embellishment and frosted berries are used for box 6, box 10, and box 24. The sled for box 17 was initially a bright red color. I sanded it down and then colored it with Distress Ink Pens (Gathered Twigs and Festive Berries). The wreath for Box 16 was colored using Adirondack Ink (Lettuce) and Stickles (Cranberry) was used for the berries. Box 7's wreath only uses the Stickles (Cranberry) on the berries. Many of the other embellishments were colored using alcohol inks (for example the numerals on box 19, the numbered token on box 6, and numbered brad on box 7). The colors used were Cranberry and Lettuce. The wooden blocks used on box 9 and box 20 are embossed. I sanded down the number, used a versa mark pen to ink the number and embossed them (Gold for box 9 and Wendy Vecchi's Fern on Box 20). The sled, the candy cane bottle, cardinal, and the lamp post were all finds at my local big box craft store. The pinecone is courtesy of the Funkie Junkie Boutique. The embellishments on boxes 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 11, 12, 13, 15, 16, 19, 21, 22, 23, and 25 are all Tim Holtz embellishments (glass bottles, key hole, skates, stars, wreath, holiday word token, snowflake charm, key, gumdrops, yuletide fastners, jingle bell brads, and pen nib). Tim Holtz punched juniper is used on box 1, box 14 and box 24. I used Tim Holtz long fasterners for the various boxes as well. Stickles (Disco Ball) was used for the dots on the box 19 numbers.
In the "fireplace" area of the advent calendar I intially made a vintage house from the new Tim Holtz dies. While I loved the house, I went in a different direction and used the Tim Holtz Letterpress Holiday Blocks as they appeared in the package. I glued together each individual letter to create the words. Once dry, I sanded them down and "colored" them. Merry is embossed with Ranger's Red Tinsel Embossing Powder. Believe is embossed with Ranger's Snowflake Embossing Powder (there is a bit of silver glitter with the white and doesn't show up well in the photo but does in person). I did not have a glittery green embossing powder so I pulled out Distress Glitter (Peeled Paint). Once dry, I glued the words to each other and then to the advent calendar.
Finally, the trees were glued into place and the cardinal perched on the corner.
It was a fun project although very involved. I suppose if I had to make another one it would be much faster since the prototype is done!
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