Oh, you beautiful doll ~ eP Get Altered Challenge (Hearts)

Well, Happy New Year! I decided to get the year off to a great start by playing in my craft room most of the day. There's a new Get Altered Challenge on the eclectic Paperie blog hosted by our fabulous Sue Lelli. She has chosen the theme of Hearts and has shared a gorgeous art parts wall hanging on the blog to inspire us. I chose to incorporate hearts into my D is for...doll spread in my altered dictionary and just for fun, I included a Steampunk twist.

My focal image, Steampunk Girl with Doll, by Mitzi Sato-Wiuff, comes from her shop, AuroraWings. I have so many of her digi stamps. She creates the most beautiful faces and images filled with magic and lovely detail. I coloured Jasmine (who told me her name) and her doll, Esmeralda (who also told me her name) with Prismacolor pencils and cut the image out with a Spellbinders Curved Rectangles die. The white space was inked with Spun Sugar and then Vintage Photo Distress inks and the image was matted in brown cardstock.

The two dictionary pages were coated in white gesso, leaving the definition uncovered, and then were adhered to the pages before and after with matte medium for strength. Once dry, Spun Sugar and Victorian Velvet Distress inks were randomly applied to both pages, keeping the colours muted and soft..Vintage Photo Distress ink was applied through TCW's Mini Gears stencil over the pinks.

 Brown cardstock was embossed with Alterations Riveted Metal and Diamond Plate embossing folders and then highlighted with Treasure Gold, Silver, and Copper wax gilt.

Strips were torn from the one pattern and mini gears were cut from the other to add texture and edginess to the background and frame the image.

Crocheted lace trim was adhered to both pages. One of the things I love about Steampunk is the contrast between the soft lace and ruffles and the hard metal elements so I wanted to capture that here. Three pieces of drywall mesh were also added into the mix. The Inkadinkado hearts were embossed with Versamark and clear powder before being fussy cut. Each one was doodled  and/or stamped on to grunge up the pretty pink patterns. I added the sticker lettering "real" as a nod to the Velveteen Rabbit where "becoming real" is explained so beautifully. That's also the reason for including the "Embrace Imperfection" Idea-ology word tag. Clearly Esmeralda has been well loved...and still is, in spite or maybe because of her imperfections.

The remaining letters were also stickers, some Ransom Alpha Parts, some black glittery circles, and some scrabble tile stickers which were inked with Vintage Photo to warm them up. Idea-ology game spinners were adhered to the bottom left corner drawing the eye into the page. An Idea-ology compass coin was added to continue the Steampunk theme. Silver nailhead stickers were adhered to the inside of the gears to bring more metal touches and detail to the second page. A metal Idea-ology gear was adhered onto one of the hearts and doodled inside.

More doodling was done as a border and around various elements. Both Vintage Photo and Walnut Stain  Distress inks were applied to the page edges, as was Walnut Brown Big Brush pen. Open rings were stamped with Golden's Iridescent Gold paint and a bottle lid. A splatter stamp and Coffee Archival ink created the dotty clusters. The final touches were a fussy cut butterfly with a Glossy Accented body and the letter D to identify the page letter.

Thanks for stopping by today to see my take on the Hearts Challenge at eclectic Paperie. I always appreciate your interest, support, and comments. If you get a minute, check out Sue's lovely inspiration piece for the Get Altered Challenge. Other DT members will be adding their projects which you can see in the thumbnails below Sue's post. I'd love to see yours there, too!

Life is good; so is art.
Bonnie
I used these products from the eP store:

Distress Ink Pad - Spun Sugar	Distress Ink Pad - Victorian Velvet	Distress Ink Pad - Vintage Photo	Distress Ink Pad - Walnut Stain
Faber Castell - Big Brush Pens - Neutral	Liquitex Acrylic Gesso	TCW 6x6 Template - Mini Gears	VersaMark Stamp Pad
Ranger Super Fine Embossing Powder - Clear	Idea-ology - Word Bands	Inkssesentials - Glossy Accents 2 oz.