Hangin' Out!

Who doesn't just enjoy hangin' out on a weekend?  Personally I don't get a lot of time to hang about, but whenever I do I'm always shadowed by one of the furry members of our family. 

This is Sprite and she's special because one of our first boxers, Rebo, is her dad and he was the best dog you could ever have.  He was as soft as a sponge and just adored his teddies.  He always had to have something in his mouth to show to you as he wiggled around on his tippy toes.  If you have boxers you'll know what I mean!  Sprite has a lot of his personality traits.  She loves to carry things around and she wiggles everywhere, but it's always been disappointing that she doesn't do his special wiggle and she doesn't smile like he did too.  His smile is hard to describe.  He would move his head from side to side in a bit of a circular motion at the same time his lips would be drawn back into a bit of a grin while he slaps his tongue around like he's trying to lick imaginary objects.  He was such a handsome boy and I miss him every day.

Anyway, to the layout.  For this I used Core'dinations cardstock for the base and I have distressed the edges to expose the core and sanded roughly around the outside inch to 2 inches.  Just to grunge it all up.

The next layer is my newest favourite thing which is the Ranger Tim Holtz alcohol inks.  This has 3 colours of alcohol ink plus silver mixative which have been squeezed onto a Ranger Alcohol Ink Applicator.  Using glossy cardstock (must be glossy or it won't work!), tap the applicator over the sheet until it is totally covered.  You can go over areas several times to deepen the colours.  Then apply a good squirt of Ranger Alcohol Blending Solution to the ink applicator and go over the sheet again until you are happy with the colours.  The blending solution softens the colours and makes them blend into each other.  The finished effect is amazing.  You can do this with clear fragments or buttons as well.  Trust me this is gorgeous, but being so shiny with the silver through it's extremely difficult to photograph!

The flowers were originally white and I mixed Ranger Dried Marigold distress ink with water in a mini mister and then added Ranger Interference Red Perfect Pearls.  Give it all a good shake and spray on the flowers.  They have a slight shimmer to them, but I could probably have added more pearls to make them even shinier. 

The title "Hangin' out" is using Grungeboard alphabets - these are so amazingly tough and flexible.  I painted them with Ranger Spiced Marmalade Distress Crackle paint (another of my favourites - hmm, maybe I should just list my favourite things which seems to be almost everything!).  I then rubbed Ranger Dusty Concord Distress Ink into the cracks and then wiped off with a damp sponge so that the orange stayed orange and the cracks are now a deep purple like the cardstock.

But wait!  That's not all!!! The "i" in Hangin' is dotted with a Stampin' Up flower brad and to finish off the flowers I added Kaiser Rhinestones to the small ones and Stampin' Up buttons to the big ones.  The final touch is the 3 fragments which have been covered in Stampin' Up pattern paper.  I'm not 100% happy with the fragments, which makes a change for me, but the silver cord took forever to get to stay where I wanted it and now I haven't the heart to change them.

If you want more details on using any of the Ranger products check out Tim Holtz' website.  Link is on this page.  The products are available at Stampin' Stuff.  The link is also available at the side.