LeighSBDesigns

Spring Fling Felt Clip Dangle 

featuring an Altered Chekit Game Tile

Hello Stampers!

To celebrate the arrival of Spring I challenged DominoART members to design a Spring themed altered domino or game tile creation.  For my project I decided to 'dress up' a felt clip dangle I bought at Michaels with an altered Chekit game tile.  I knew the felt flowers would go perfectly with the stamp I had in mind!

I hope my project will inspire you to look at all the inexpensive goodies you can pick up at stores like Michaels and Target, then make them your own by adding your personal touch with an altered game piece or two!  These felt clip dangles make perfect whimsical little gifts for friends and family and will look good attached to keychains, purses or totebags!

They definitely announce Spring has arrived!  
Enjoy

MATERIALS & SUPPLIES YOU'LL NEED

Flower - clear stamp by Autumn Leaves
Ancient Page Dye Ink - Coal Black
Chekit game tile
Embossing Heat Gun
Sharpies
Gold & Silver Metallic Paint Pens
Delta Ceramcoat Gloss Varnish
Paint brush
Flat back pink Cabochon Jewel
E6000 Adhesive
Felt Clip Dangle
Wooden Dowel
Prestick aka Poster Putty
Scissors

INSTRUCTIONS

Start off by stamping the image of the flower in black ink onto a new shiny Chekit game tile.  The clear rubber stamp helps you center the flower image just right on the Chekit.  You also don't need to worry about doing any kind of surface preparation to the Chekit for this project.  
Heat set the ink with an embossing heat gun or just leave it to dry over night.

Now you can add colour with Sharpie markers.  I began by adding two shades of blue to the center circle.  I started by mapping in the darker blue around the edge of the circle line then blended with the light blue Sharpie called Surf to add shading and depth.

I then coloured the petals of the flower with two shades of pink.  I randomly scribbled a few lines of Berry onto each petal, which is the darker pink, and blended with Rose to achieve various shades of pink as I coloured. 

 Tip:  You'll notice that the curly flourishes in the petals have a darker pink dot in the center.  When you colour with Sharpies the last place where the point of the marker rests is always darker when you lift the marker away from the Chekit.  So plan ahead as you're colouring so that you can either incorporate the darker dot into the design or 'hide' it in the black ink of the stamped image!

To add just a touch of colour to the center of the flower I drew single lines of Pumpkin orange between the black stamped lines ending in the center so that the darker 'finishing dot' actually creates a darker shade of orange in the middle of the flower.

I decided to leave the rest of the petals the natural colour of the Chekit and moved onto the background which I coloured with two shades of green.  I drew a line of the darker Spruce Green colour along the stamped edge of the petals and blended with Clover green Sharpie.

To give the stamped image a bit more dimension and to darken the black ink, gently outline the entire image with an extra-fine point Plum Sharpie.  This also adds another touch of colour too instead of just using black again.

The next step is to add the bling to the design with touches of metallic gold and silver paint!  Use the extra-fine point pens to add dots to the image.

Finish off the Chekit by edging the piece in metallic silver.  I used a broad point paint pen on just the edges but you can also colour the sides silver too if you prefer.

Finally, protect the altered Chekit with a coat of glossy varnish or your favourite glaze.  I use either Ceramcoat Varnish or Judikins Diamond Glaze the most and I just decided to go with the varnish for this project, for no other reason than I just felt like it ;-)

TIP
Dominoes, and Chekit game tiles in particular, are rather small to work with so it can get a bit tricky to brush the varnish onto the top and sides without managing to put your fingers into the varnish and making a mess!  So I came up with a neat trick to solve all our problems ;-)  Stick the game
tile onto a piece of wooden dowel with a lump of prestick aka poster putty and you're good to go!  I actually recycled the handle of one of those black foam brushes to use as my stick ;-)  You will then, of course, have to stand the dowel/handle into something to keep it level and from falling over while
the varnish/glaze dries. 

While the varnish dried on my altered Chekit I removed one of the felt flowers off of my dangle thingie with a sharp pair of scissors.  On the other side of the dangle, pictured above, there was a white felt flower in the center of the blue flower.  I liked the pink flower best so removed the white one.  I then adhered the Chekit to the blue felt flower with E6000 glue.

 

Once everything was dry I admired my little creation and felt it need just a tiny bit more bling to make it special, so I adhered a flat back pink glass cabochon jewel to the center of the Chekit flower with a tiny dab of E6000.  

Perfect!

I hope this project will inspire you to try your hand at altering other game tiles besides dominoes too!

Thanks for stopping by!
Leigh S-B >^..^<
THE SHARPIE DOMINO QUEEN
www.VelvetPawCreations.com