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FOR BEGINNERS or someone looking for alternative ideas:
Embellish your scrapbooks and other objects with curiously creative items from eBay and your own closet!
Scrapbooks can have a ONE-OF-A-KIND (ooak) look even when you use commercial papers and kits if you also add UNIQUE embellishments. This guide will help you to identify and find these objects on eBay and in your home.
- Finding SPARKLE You are making a bright, cheery scrapbook and would like to add a little sparkle--well, it is simple when you know where to look. ON eBAY or IN YOUR HOUSE, look for inexpensive vintage costume jewlry. Grandmother's clip-ons can be re-purposed or taken apart to create fantastic glitter and sparkle to glue on or tie on your scrapbook, art cards, or frames. Look for old beads! String the beads on a glittering piece of yarn. Crystals add magic, mystery, and more sparkle! Use metalic pens for the real look of silver leaf, gold leaf, and brass leaf. There are wonderful metallic acrylic paints that will add a finishing touch.
- ADDING NOSTALGIA This is my specialty and it can be done on a budget! ITEMS to search for include VINTAGE post cards; RPPC (real photo post cards); sheet music; antiqued brass charms; natural fiber yarns as well as specialty yarns and fibers; silk and satin ribbons; MakingMemories brand letter charms; rubber stamp alphabets in the typewritter style font and in a variety of sizes; rubber stamps with unique, vintage- feel images(nibcatsauctions);tea stained tags; wooden tags; small altered art objects, antique buttons and beads; other bits of ephemera.
Vintage postcards can be very useful in creating catagories within a scrapbook. Let's say you are making a MAINE VACATION scrapbook, vintage Maine post cards are just what you need. Look for Large Letter Post Cards for the cover or inside contents page; find Real Photo Post Cards of particular Maine places or activities. Charms are a great way to embellish, too. Check for pewter or brass charms if you are on a budget. Lobster, sailing, light houses, anchors, sand dollars....all great items for the MAINE VACATION scrapbook. Look for Maine based ephemera, you might find a unique surprise. The pinecone is important to the state...find pine and pine cone rubberstamps, charms, and postcards.
Use brown inks for a nostalgic feel. Tip the edges of each page with ink pad ink by lightly passing the pad over the edges. Sanding photos and printed items adds a used appearance; test this technique, first. Wrinkle and tear images and tags and then iron them out for another interesting look. On hard coated surfaces, you can experiment with crackle glazing. An easy way to do this is to thickly apply Elmer's brand white glue to a coated surface. Allow it to dry and coat that surface with waterbased polyurethane. Apply the poly in as few strokes as possible. When that is dry, rub brown acrylic paint into the crackles and immediately clean off any surface residue.
- If your subject is your PET, you might look for the appropriate vintage or contemporary pet postcard. Many artists listed under the ZNE search offer unique tags and you may be able to find one that's appropriate. Of course, charms are great for this area...there are many wonderful cat charms, for instance, as well as birds, dogs, and horses. POSTAGE STAMPS make a great embellishment. Search for your pet under postage stamps. Consider using a dog collar to for the closure on the scrapbook. Vintage dog licenses are great embellishments. Look for colors that might be easily coupled with your pet. For instance, poodles might be shown vintage 50s style with grey, pinks, whites, and blacks! Consider using a fake fur cover--of course, the fur should be similar in color and quality to your pet; or find a pattern that is appropriate--spots or stripes. Feathers might be a good page by page glue on or dangled from fibers.
- Color coordinated? Look around the house for anything that can be repurposed. The colorful patterns inside many window envelopes can be recycled for a scrapbook. Using colorful paper clips, bits from magazines, and fabric scraps are great, inexpensive ways to add color. You might consider spray painting charms for the correct color. Try to use several shades of a single color for a more artistic look.
- Miscellaneous bits: Use empty slide holders to create little frames for photographs or tiny paintings; Bottle caps can be decorated, perforated and added to long threads of fancy yarns-leather strips-string-or twine; Pierce and string up old coins; crochet three different fibers together to create a book mark. Old trading cards that are in very poor condition make great tags; museum tickets and clip ons; found sea shells; fishing lures without the hooks; vintage laces; and swizzle sticks. And there is more...old cuff links; vintage sewing notions like snaps and zippers; Barbie and other small doll shoes and accessories; cast off ties; labels from vintage clothing, esp designer labels; baby mittens and toddler gloves and booties--shrink them and tie them on to your book with yarn; old key chains; old passport stamps; photomat photos; pressed flowers; tokens; the red paper fish that curl up in your hand; bazooka joe comics;and anything you might think will work!
SHOPPING ON EBAY
I hope this guide has been helpful!
Adrienne La Vallee Gallery Vim embellishments
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