DIY Bellies

Hi Everyone!

I'm not talking about the post-Christmas feasting belly which is currently sitting comfortably in my lap and making me wish I could wear my onesie to work - NO! - I'm talking about home-made embellishments to go in my January Counterfeit Kit.

The challenge this month is to create a kit from your own stash, inspired by the Hip 2 b Square December Kit and the Oh, Deer Me December Embellishment Kit check my previous post for all the details.

My main kit is called Winter Mixture (used to be a very popular old-fashioned sweetie here in the UK), and I wanted to create an "add-on" kit to go with it, filled with embellishments ("bellies") inspired by challenge kit.
Mine is sort of a combination of the Oh, Deer Me kit ....


... and the Hip2bSquare add-on kit ...


... I didn't have any of these items exactly, but I wanted to see if I could create the same style and sense of fun using some of my stash and a bit of ingenuity, so here are my DIY bellies ...



The stick-on gems, snowflake brads and flair buttons were all in my drawers (!?) and the bottle top was left over from a previous project - here's how to make them with a Cuttlebug
The kraft shapes were just punched from scraps, but of course die cuts would be great too, and I may stamp on them as well.
The tiny hearts were very easy - I just used a punch and some scraps of woodgrain paper. Here's a better picture of them, and my version of the fancy brads ...


I'm not going to grace this post with the title of "Tutorial", because it's not that complicated - it's just a few ideas which you might like to experiment with as well. 
To make the decorative brads, I started with some large plain ones and some Echo Park patterned paper ...


... cut circles from the paper (punch would've been easier if I'd had the right size) ...


... then adhered them to the brads, sanded the edges and glazed with Glossy Accents - shiny!

Next came the shiny 3D stickers  I made my version with patterned paper and clear stickers ...


... you just need to put the clear stickers over a pretty part of the paper, then trim around them ...


The stars were quite fiddly, but not really difficult. The star-shaped gems came from a Pound Shop and I also used Glossy Accents and some wire I found in the shed ...


... very simple process - just cut the wire to suitable lengths and attach to the stars - but now I've done it once, I will try it with other shapes as they would make pretty additions to flower clusters ...


As a subsitute for the fancy-shaped paperclips, I just embellished some plain coloured ones with buttons and flowers, again using Glossy Accents as it sticks plastic to metal quite happily ...


... here's the end result ...


... to get the effect of the acrylic frames, I pulled out some Ranger Fragments and a pile of peel-offs which I've had for years ... 


To get the arrow shape, I sketched it onto a piece of paper as a guide, placed some acetate packing over it, outlined the shape with gold peel-off lines, and cut around it. Will definitely do this again!


So here are my versions of the acrylic frames ...


I also counterfeited the Thickers Doodled alphas in the inspiration kit, using a stack of leftover white alphas from different sets and a black pen ...


Great fun as I love doodling, and it should pull all the mis-matched alphas together.

Well, I hope you find one or two useful tips and ideas there - and why not have a go at a Counterfeit Kit yourself? It's my first one, but I have a feeling I'm going to love it :o)

Comments

cinmfoster said…
Great tutorial. I've never tried the bottle caps and will have to keep that in mind for the future.
Julene Matthews said…
These are all great. I love the scrylic arrows etc.Must try that one. You had the same idea as me for the flair buttons.
Julene Matthews said…
This comment has been removed by the author.
petrii said…
These tutorials are fantastic!!! I love those stars and flair. Swoon!!

Blessing ~~ dawn
Maria Ontiveros said…
Great job! This is one of my favorite things about the CKC... making your own embellies.
Rinda