Tutoral: Altered Trinket Box with Faux Wood Grain

This Altered Trinket Box is a great (inexpensive) project for those that what to learn how to "alter" things.  I've made sure to add in many small details that will help you obtain this great vintage look!!

Let's get to the tutorial!!

SUPPLIES

Paper Mache Trinket Box

Hymnal Pages or Sheet Music

Acrylic Craft Paints (browns, black, & gold)

Gloss Decoupauge Medium

Lace (optional)

Miscellaneous decorations (optional)

Step 1: DECOUPAGE & AGE OUTSIDE TOP

Cover the box top's outside using thin pages of music, such as old hymnal pages.

Note: If you don't have old hymnals or sheet music available, another great option would be old sewing pattern paper.

Using a fine mist bottle, spray the decoupauged top with an aging/distressing ink.

Gently wipe away the excess and cover any missed areas and let dry.

Step 2: DECORATE INSIDE THE TOP

Cut a piece of music to fit inside the top.  If you're anything like me, this will come out sorta "wonky".

To cover any cutting mishaps and to hide the paper mache, paint the inside rim with dark brown acrylic craft paint.

Using a strong tacky glue, glue lace to the inside edge of the box top.  Set aside to dry completely.

Step 3: PAINT A FAUX WOOD GRAIN

I didn't care for the paper mache's appearance so I decided to create a faux wood grain on the bottom part of the box.

Paint a coat of light/medium brown over your entire surface.

Add a tiny bit of gold onto a foam brush, dab off the excess until the bruss is almost dry, then gently dry brush the gold paint onto the surface very sparingly and always in the same direction..

Repeat the dry brush technique using a medium/dark brown, then black, then light/medium brown again.

To finish the look and to seal the outside of the box, just add a couple coats of glossy decoupage medium.  In my opinion this gives the faux wood grain a varnished type of look!!

Note: I chose to add little wooden feet to my trinket box, but this is totally optional.

Step 4: PAINT THE INSIDE OF THE BOX

Paint a couple coats of gold (or other color) acrylic craft paint over the inside of the box. Seal with decoupage medium.

I think the trinket box looks great at this stage, so you may choose to leave it as is.

However, I chose to decorate the top so I've included those instructions as well - just keep reading!

Step 5: FOWER WITH MUSIC LEAVES

(optional)

Find a paper flower with a realitively long stem.

Cut the flower's stem to the desired length, but do not throw away the extra stem!

Cut 2 leaf shapes out of sheet music and glue them back to back over one end of the excess stem.

Using a strong tacky glue, attach the flower stem to the leaf stem.

Decoupauge over the attachment point to seal.

Step 6: DECORATE TOP

Gather up miscellaneous items to use on your top.  I used cheesecloth, my paper flower, buttons, a decorated puzzle piece, old stamps, an old key, and a filigree finding.

If you choose to add cheesecloth, just decoupauge it to the top before you add your other embellishments.

Layout your items before gluing them down to make sure you're happy with their placement.

Once you find a layout you like, simply glue them down using a strong non-yellowing tacky glue.

FINISHED!!

Thanks for reading!! Until next time...

Tutorial: Basic Hand-Carved Eraser Stamps

This tutorial actually contains instructions for all 3 of these stamps so it's going to be a really long post, but it'll be super informative!!

In this post I'll show you...

- A list of the supplies you need for stamp carving

- Some stamp carving basics that apply to all hand-carved stamps

- Instructions for a "sliced" heart-shaped stamp that anyone (adult) can make

- How to carve an exclamation point (!) stamp for beginners

- A complete tutorial on making word stamps

Some tutorials you'll see online require either linoleum carving tools or wood carving tools.  This tutorial only requires a craft knife for carving and I know most of you have an X-acto knife already!!

Before I get into the tutorials, I need to apologize first.  The photos in this post are not good at all!!  I desperately need a new camera, because my little $99 camera is not cutting it.  Thanks for bearing with me until I get a new one.

One last thing before I start...

WARNING

This craft project is for adults only!!

Using a craft knife is very dangerous and you must be very careful!!

Now, let's get to the stamp carving!!

SUPPLIES

Eraser

Craft knife (Exacto Knife)

Pencil & Pen

Tracing Paper

STAMP CARVING BASICS

BUYING ERASERS

Before you go to the office supply store to buy your erasers, go to the dollar store instead!!  I was able to get six 1"x2" erasers plus 12 erasers that go on the end of a pencil for just $1!!  That's about 15-cents per large eraser!!  Super affordable!!

CARVING DIRECTION

Always carve away from your body and never towards a finger or body part!!

The sketch above is of a side view of a carved stamp.

Imagine the blue rectangle is the original eraser and the red lines on top are the parts of the stamp you want to show up on paper.

When carving your stamp you'll want to carve into the eraser at an angle going away from your image.  Try to not carve straight down and definitely don't carve under your image!!

Don't worry this will make more sense in the photos later on. hehehe

PREPARING THE ERASERS

Most erasers that people carve are shaped like a parallelogram.

When you get your erasers, you'll need to trim off those sizes so that it's a rectangle.

Don't throw away the pieces you cut off!!  You can make super tiny stamps with those!!

"SLICED" HEART TUTORIAL

If you're not quite ready to "carve" stamps yet, you can get used to cutting into erasers with this project!!

Just remember that for this stamp you'll cut straight down and in regular stamps, you will carve at an angle.

Note: In the sketches below, the blue lines are the current eraser piece and the red lines are the cuts you'll be making.

Step 1: MAKE A TRIANGLE

Start with a square piece of eraser.

Cut two lines all the way through the eraser from the top corners to the center of the bottom side.

Step 2: REMOVE TOP POINTS

Cut the tips off of the top 2 points of the triangle.

Step 3: ADD "V"

Cut a "V"-shaped piece out of the top center.

Step 4: ROUND EDGES

Cut the tips off the points at the top.

If there are any points remaining, cut them off until you have almost round edges.

FINISHED!!

THE BEGINNER'S STAMP

This is a great first project for someone that's never carved a stamp before, because it has both straight lines and a circle.  Plus, it's a very easy image to start with.

Step 1: SKETCH IMAGE

Using a pencil, hand sketch your exclamation point on your eraser.

Step 2: CARVE STRAIGHT EDGES 

Slice your blade down around the straight edges of the top of the exclamation point.

Carefully remove the eraser material you don't want in your stamp by cutting into the side of the eraser.

Be sure to not cut too far though!!

Step 3: CARVE ROUND EDGES 

Gently trace around the circle making sure to angle your blade away from the circle.

Carefully remove the excess eraser material.

FINISHED!!

MAKING WORD STAMPS
For the longest time, my stamps were turning out backwards!! Then I learned how to do the tracing paper transfer technique that I'll show you below!!  Now I can make all kinds of word stamps!!
You can also use this technique for any images that need to go in a particular direction.

Step 1: TRACE TEMPLATE

 Determine how big your image can be on a piece of tracing paper.
Using pencil, sketch or trace the word onto the tracing paper making sure there's a heavy layer of pencil on the paper.

Step 2: TRANSFER IMAGE

 Place the paper image-side-down on your eraser.
Rub the image with your finger, pushing the paper onto the eraser so the image transfers properly.

Step 3: TRACE WITH INK 

 To make sure the transferred image doesn't rub off while your working on the stamp, just trace the image with an ink pen.  Just make sure the pen won't damage the eraser and won't smear.

 Step 4: CARVE

 Gently trace around the letters making sure to angle your blade away from the image.

Carefully remove the eraser material you don't want in your stamp by cutting into the side of the eraser.

Be sure to not cut too far though!!

FINISHED!!

So now that you know how to carve stamps, just promise me you won't get addicted to this craft!!! hehehe
This really is a super fun craft and I constantly go back to it time and time again!!

Thanks for reading!! Until next time...

Project: Hand-Carved Stamps

In September I started hand-carving stamps out of erasers and fell in love with this craft!!

This post isn't a tutorial, but I'll be sure to make one for hand-carving stamps in the near future!!  This post is just to show some of the stamps I've carved since September.  

All of these stamps were made from dollar store stamps that were 6 for $1!!  I'm able to make twelve 1"x1" stamps for $1 this way!!

These 3 stamps are for a Facebook friend of mine who is obsessed with owls!! I hope she likes them!!

This is a Tree of Life stamp I made for myself after making a similar one for another Facebook friend of mine.  I love this one!!

These are the first two love/Valentine's Day stamps so far.  I think the kiss turned out pretty good!!

A snail and a turtle that I made for the fun of it!!  I actually messed up the eyes on both of them, but it seemed to work out anyway!! hehehe

These are 2 hedgehogs and a squirrel/fox (I think).  The squirrel/fox was supposed to be a squirrel but I totally messed it up and tried to turn it into a fox at the last minute!

A little bird and owl.  I think the owl is pretty cute!!

An acorn and a toadstool mushroom.  Brook, my best friend, loved the mushroom so much she had me make her one too!!

A flower and a couple leaves.

These are super tiny at only 1/2" high!!  I think they're adorable!!

More tiny stamps!!  This is my collection of fruit stamps!!  They're only 1/2" too!!

And even more tiny stamps!!  Yep, you guessed it...1/2"!!  This is my party stamp collection.

Last, but certainly not least, this is the stamp I'm most proud of!!  My husband was promoted to Chief Petty Officer in the Navy this year so I made this wood-mounted anchor stamp for him as a gift.  He loves it!!

Thanks for reading!! Until next time...