A Little Beach Magic

Finally got some time to craft, and wanted to use up one of snags I made at my local Goodwill store, thinking how nice it would be to alter it.  The most difficult part was deciding what the theme would be--should I dig deep into my steam punkiness, or would a dark Halloween theme be better?

But it's summer, and the waves are calling me, so a Beach fantasy scene it is.  I started with a raw wood window frame with a flower shelf (a garden scene did tempt me, but I'm allergic to flowers, subconsciously allergic to fake flowers) that I picked up for $2.

I used acrylic paints until I got the frame the colors I wanted, then used the following mermaids for each window.  From top left to bottom right, they are:
Sweet Pea's "On the Shore" by Terra Bidlespacher, QKD's Porcelain Mermaid, again by Terra, and my newest purchase,  another Sweet Pea digi called "Wait for You" by artist Ching Chou Kuik.  I also used a stamped image from High Hopes of two friendly jelly fish.

I colored them all with my trusty Copics, and with my signature technique, fussy-cut them to put into my handmade scenes.

I love mixed media, which has to be my newest most favorite technique, so each "scene" has bits of surprises in each.

"On the Shore" features torn paper background, Stickled sandy beach, glitter button sun and a stray pearl or two.

A few tiny seashells are scattered along the wood frame as well.

In the "Porcelain Mermaid" scene, I actually used four pieces of dimensional tape so that my mermaid looks like she's sitting on the seashell I adhered to the wood frame.

I added some Liquid Glass bubbles, some Stickled shimmer, some pearl stems, seashells and fibers for misc. ocean stuff.

I had this gorgeous but large white starfish that I wanted to incorporate in my project, but no matter where I placed it, it blocked too much of one of the "windows.'  So I created a background from shimmery ribbon and cardstock and adhered a beach-themed ATC to it.

My next window features "Wait for Me", which I printed twice so that I could use dimensional tape so that the moon is "behind" her.  An adhesive accident with the moon caused me to apply a liberal dose of Stickles to cover it up.
I like to use feathers in my work, so her tail features one.  I hand-stamped the background patterned paper, and hung a seashell from the tip of the moon.  More seashells decorate the bottom of the window.

To finish off my project, I used some miniature scrabble tiles to spell out Beach Magic along the "ledge" and stuffed the ledge with raffia and seashells.

It took about two days to finish my project, and now it's in its new home.  I gave it to my son and daughter-in-law within one hour of the glue drying for their first anniversary.  Their wedding theme was tropical, and hubby and I hosted the reception in our backyard, going all out with tropical decorations and menu to boot.  It was a lot of work but worth it.

I'm entering my project in the One Sweet Challenge blog August challenge, which asks participants to use their favorite technique.  Mixed media and fussy-cutting are my faves--for the moment. LOL