Learn how to work with Mixed Media Cross with Christie

Hey guys, it's Christie with The Social Easel. Um, but we're gonna do a mixed media cross today. If you haven't done mixed media before, basically that's just a fancy term for using a lot of different mediums in your artwork. So we're gonna use paper, we're gonna use stamps probably, I may come back and add foil to it later so we can add stamps to it. So yeah, paint, paper. I'm gonna do— tear out a page of a hymnal and put that in there. And then you just apply all of this together. And, uh, on a— I use a— let me show you what I use. It'll be easier to show you now than when I flip the camera around. So you can buy these Canvas panels. This is an 11 by 14. Let me open this really quick. So if you are going to do mixed media, I recommend doing it on a panel instead of just canvas because it is a solid board. I have stuff everywhere right now. So it's just a solid board. So it's going to make everything easier to adhere to. And you're not going to have that give that you would if you just did it on a regular canvas. So this is going to be our surface today. I'm going to move my mixed media pads out of the way. I hadn't decided exactly what I wanted to do yet. And then I have this scrapbook paper, and I think I'm either going to tear or cut my cross shape out of this to put onto the painting. And then I've got— I'll show you guys this. I get these like at Hobby Lobby when they put them on sale, or Michaels. This was only $2.50, and it's all these pretty— it's like a scrap paper pad, cardstock, all different patterns. And then I've got some bigger ones here as well. I save all my scraps because I like torn pieces when I'm doing mixed media too. So they don't all have to have a clean crisp edge. And then I use stencils. So stencils are really fun. I've got several different ones. This is my favorite. That is from DecoArt, and that is in my supply store as well. And then my father-in-law got me all these old hymnals from the Baptist church that they don't use anymore. They're just sitting in storage. So if you guys need hymnals, check with your churches. I know now may not be a good time because we can't go and get anything, but after this whole mess is over, and if you wanted to do some art with some hymnals, these are so fun to do art with. So I was looking through, and, and they give them to you for free, or you can find them at like thrift stores or something like that. But I was thumbing through, and I was hoping they had like an Easter section in here, but it didn't. But it had a salvation section, which is obviously what Easter is all about. And I found one of my favorite hymnals is Nothing But the Blood. Um, you guys know that one? So I will not sing it to you because nobody wants to hear me sing. I can paint, but I can't sing. Um, but we'll, we'll kind of read over these words while we're working on the art and kind of figure out how to put these into it. I was going to show you— I think I've shown you guys my church. I'm going to grab both so I can just show you what mixed media looks like or how I do it. So these are some that I have done inside my Inner Tribe membership. This is my mixed media bird. I'm going to hold this a little bit closer so you can see some of this scrapbook paper from behind here, down here, to have the flowers. And it's just torn paper all underneath that we glue to the board. And then I even cut out, like, the shape of the wing is like a piece of paper, the shape of the body of the bird is a piece of paper, and then you add paint over top of it. So the thing I love about mixed media is there are no rules. And like I don't have it all planned out in my head, so you guys are just gonna get to see me create it as we're going along. You get to be with me while I kind of work out the process of what I want the composition to look like. And then this is another one I did. This is a chapel that is inside of our group as well. This has some tissue paper back here. You could use napkins, printed napkins. This has got a hymnal on it. This one was Happy Day. Oh, happy day when Jesus washed my sins away. So that's why I named this one Oh Happy Day. And then this is that stencil that I told you guys that I love. So, so those are just a couple things, um, to show you guys what you can expect. And then you can use— trying to think of what else to tell you you can use. Like, even stuff like this— this is Metallic Luster. This is— it's like a hard wax, and you can— I just use my fingers. You can take it and like smear the gold onto your paintings or the edges. A little polka dot. Oh, I'm on the wrong side of the camera. I hate it when I have to flip the camera around because I never remember where I'm supposed to be going. Add little polka dots to things. Phyllis said, what is the gold again? It's called DecoArt Metallic Luster Gold Rush, and I have this in silver and gold, but I'm obsessed with gold right now, so it pretty much goes in everything that I create. So I'm gonna pick the camera up and get my stuff situated over here, get my lights going. Clara said, is it— oh, you can do it on wood. Is that what you're asking? Yes, you could do it on wood. You could do it on cardboard. I'm trying to think of like some other surfaces you guys might already have in your home. You can do it on canvas if you have canvases. It's— I would put something— so the reason I say not to do it on canvas is because you've got this space behind here and it's gonna give when you start adhering stuff to it. So if you are gonna do it on that, I try to find something solid to put underneath it so that it holds your surface solid for you. Okay, so I'm gonna carry the camera over here, flip you guys around really quick, and hopefully not hang up on you. Ignore my office that you see behind you. It's a mess. Oh, hopefully I don't knock you off the live. My camera holder is wanting to fall down on me. This piece of scrapbook paper came from— I'm trying to remember if the Paper Studio— where's that other pad I had? I just had it. This is my life. Every day I set something down that literally was just in my hand and now I can't find it. Is it just me, or do you guys do that too? Melissa said, how do you hang a canvas board? Frame it? Would you sell something— how would you sell something on a canvas board? You can frame it. That's what I've done. Do I have one of those in here? I don't think I have my framed one in here. You would do an open-back frame because it doesn't need glass over top of it. You can put glass on it. But it doesn't need it because it's like a finished painting. And then you can also buy these hangers that will— like, you can hot glue them on, or, you know, you could even do something cute and hot glue ribbon on the back of this, maybe burlap, like, to make a little hanger. That'd be really cute too. So there's all kinds of stuff you you can do with it. I am not gifted in the singing department, but what I am gonna do with this is put this hymnal— this is Nothing But the Blood. What can wash away my sins? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. What can make me whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. Oh, precious is the flow that makes me white as snow. No other fount I know, nothing but the blood of Jesus. So I thought that was a perfect one for Good Friday and going into Easter. So what I'm actually going to do— this is just— I have several of these old hymnals you can get from churches who don't use them anymore. They probably have them in their storage and they will give them to you. But I love putting hymnals in my artwork. So we're gonna tear this out. I'm not exactly sure how it's gonna fit in yet, but we'll see. We'll see what I come up with. And then back to the original question. So this was from— Paper Studio is a Hobby Lobby brand. I was looking at this sticker because I knew that sticker was from Hobby Lobby. So both of these pads were from Hobby Lobby. Yeah, I may accidentally start singing it to you. It's so— once you get that in your head or humming it, it's hard it's hard to not— hard to not sing it. Okay, so I'm gonna move that, get my art out of the way. I just cleaned my studio desk like 2 weeks ago, and it's already a hot mess again. Things piled everywhere. But that's how the creative brain works, right? I don't know if I'll use any of these or not. I love this pad. This is really pretty. I may want that in here, and we may come back to it. Sometimes when you're doing stuff like this, like I said, you don't have it all figured out in the beginning. You're just kind of playing along. I kind of think this would be pretty contrast too, maybe. And letting it come together, not having a plan, just enjoying the creative process. That's kind of the fun part of it. You know, I have to pull this teal because teal is my favorite color. That one's really pretty too. I mean, they're all pretty. Do I have that one? No, it's a little bit different. I like a little bit of that navy in there. I do like that one too. Okay, I'm just gonna tear all these out and I'm just gonna set them up here and decide what I want to use. Alright, so I know I'm gonna want my cross in the middle here, and I think I'm gonna tear this. I really like the look of torn paper. So I prefer to do that instead of cutting. So, um, I don't know, I think I want this torn over here too, just to tear a little bit of that edge off. I want it to be rustic, and we're gonna try to make like our cross kind of like a rugged old cross. I don't know if you guys saw Brooke from Refabbed. I shared her video the other day. She did one with a hymnal on it, and she did hers, and I loved it. I was like, oh, I really want to do that. But she got twigs from her yard and made a cross out of the twigs, and it was so pretty and simple and rustic. And I loved it. And then I was like, I need to make my own version, playing with some papers and stuff. So I'm thinking I may put this down at the bottom. So I kind of just start out playing around. That's what I kind of want you guys to see, is like, it really is just kind of playing with stuff. And you know, maybe something will capture your eye and then you're like, oh yeah, I want that there. Just trying to decide what I want my background to look like. It may be kind of a hodgepodge of patterns and colors. It may look like— I'm starting to think, what if we did it like even quilt-like? You know what I mean? Like the different blocks on quilts. That would be kind of cool. And then did the, did the cross over top of it. And it doesn't all have to be covered. I may end up tearing some of these. Yeah, if you guys haven't gotten your free painting tutorial, we do have one. It's a free dandelion painting tutorial. I think Tiffany has the link to that. If not, we can we can get it posted later. What do you guys think of the pattern? Sometimes I leave the edges across at the top. Sometimes I have them torn. Like I said, there's really no right or wrong to it, and I don't really want— just for interest, I don't really want all of the sections of color to be exactly the same. Like, these two are too close to the same, so maybe— I really am digging this navy piece of paper right now. Oh, what do you guys think? I like the way the torn papers are looking. The way that overlaps, I think that's pretty cool. And I may have to get another piece of paper. We may need, we may need 6. It's actually going to be a little bit better on our edges to not have it go straight against it. Maybe stagger those just a little bit, and then I think I'll overlap these with torn pieces too. Maybe another like peachy color up here. That's too much. That's too green. Maybe something simple like this, and the hem could go— what if we did this? What if we did this? You guys like that on there? I already did that one. Yeah, Wendy, I do too. I like the rugged lines much, much more. So I'm gonna go around, tear these edges. You guys like it kind of framed like this? I'm thinking I do. We will be doing some paint too. There will be paint involved. Okay, I'm gonna start with this. I think I want this straight on the edges like that. I'm just gonna squirt— this is dried paint, I'm just reusing I reuse my paint plates all the time. So I'm just gonna put some of the Decoupage on the back of this to adhere it. I don't need it super, super thick. If you're doing mixed media, by the way, it's just going to be messy. Like, my fingers get sticky, they're a mess. I just enjoy the process of creating, and then I worry about getting all that off my hands and nails later. So I'm just going to smooth that down, and I can go around the edges. I'm just using— I like to use an older brush that I don't care about as much when I'm using Decoupage too, because sometimes it's really hard to get the glue out, and I don't want it to ruin one of my good brushes. So use an older brush, maybe the bristles are stiff or it's not one of your favorites, and it doesn't have to be this big either. You could use something smaller. So you can use Decoupage as a glue to adhere things to your piece, and you can also use it as a sealant on top. So if we wanted to, when we're all the way done with this, we could put the Decoupage over top of all of it and it will seal it. So what I'm thinking is, because we're going to put the cross on here— and you know what, originally I was thinking the cross was going to be in the middle, but now I'm thinking I might like it kind of— what if we did kind of staggered? Maybe we had the cross going this way. This is another cross I did. I did this over on Damon's Deco Art. I DecoArt— Deco Exchange page, but not— it's not gonna look exactly like this. But what I'm thinking is like, what if we did a cross kind of sideways across here with the hymnal at the top? Not gonna look like that, it's gonna be more rustic, but I think that might be cute as far as composition goes. Yes, Sam, you can use— yeah, if you have foam brushes, those are great. To use for it. I need to stick that in the water. Just tear all these edges, and I'm going to leave my scraps over here because you never know, I might want them. Which way do I want that to go? I kind of like them going all crazy directions. I really, really love this pattern. I would have this as wallpaper. This is pretty, and the color of it. Don't let me forget about that stencil either. All right, so we're getting some pieces torn here. You know what I'm thinking, just because I love gold. Before I put all that on. So this is some gold metallic paint, and I think I want this to kind of be on the background before I add all my paper on. Just a little bit peeking through. And all these products are DecoArt that I'm using, and you can find the links in my Amazon store. So if you'd like to do something like this, and it may not be this weekend, but, or general, if you want to play around with some mixed media art, inside my Amazon store are the links for for these products. All my favorite brushes, paints, this fun stuff. Try to give you guys something fun to do, brighten up the world a little bit, and these crazy days that we're living in, give you a little entertainment, give you something to have fun with while we're all quarantined inside our homes. You guys like the gold background? I think it's a little fun. I think a little bit. I'm gonna leave this for last because I want that to be on top. I'm gonna go back over here. I'm just gonna leave this gold in here. Why not add a little bit of shimmer to it? Oh, I like that. It kind of gives it a tarnished look. Let's put some on the back first. So you can probably tell by now I am messy and It doesn't bother me that gold's mixing in and getting on my paper there. I actually love the way that that works. And this is what I mean by, like, with mixed media, you just kind of play along with it and see what happens. Like, that wasn't my intention at the beginning when I first started this, but I love that, that look. And then we're just going to smooth that on. You could use an old credit card if you don't want to get your hands all sticky. I kind of like getting in the mess of it all. Lift it up on the edges if you need to a little bit, and I go back over. You guys like the way that looks so far? And it gives it that little bit of tarnished look too. And then I just go around and smooth it down. With my fingers. I have a feeling we're gonna be using a lot of decoupage on this one. I think that's really pretty. Okay, let's kind of— I think I had this teal one next. What am I doing? What am I doing? Here we go. Never find what I'm looking for. I don't know. And you know, there's something about that. I mean, Jesus is King, and I think of gold as royalty, so it kind of seems fitting. We're gonna, you know, mix the ruggedness— I forgot to share this side— the ruggedness of the cross with the majesty of the gold to represent our King. So I'm just gonna dab because I kind of like that look of the gold, so I'm gonna pick a little bit more of that up. To do on my edges here. I'm liking the way it's coming together. What do you guys think? Now trying to decide which one of these patterns I want down here. I almost feel like this is too much. I need this to be more— I don't like that big focal point. I don't like it. I don't like that big focal point in the middle. I'm gonna pick a different one. No, we need the contrast. That's too close to the color above it. I'm doing that one already. Hmm, which one do I want? Sorry, guys. You're probably like, hurry up and just pick one. I don't have anything White. I don't have anything white. Maybe we'll do— that kind of looks good. You've got the opposite of the light here. And the light there. What do you guys think? Just for fun, we'll use this one. Okay, good. I'm glad you guys like it. I kind of like this. It kind of looks like a crown also. So again, you don't have to go super thick. On your decoupage on the back. I'm just putting a nice thin coat on there to get it to adhere down, and then we're going to go back around the edges. The edges are the main area that you want to pay attention to. I may sand down on the sides later. Maybe a little bit of gold on here. I'm liking the gold. All right, so let's get this— these last few pieces positioned on here. This is probably going to be covered up by the cross. We'll see. I'm gonna put the pink down first. This can be done on canvas or wood. I'm using a canvas board because it has a more solid, stiff background, so it's easier to do it on. If you do it on a canvas that has some give, I would put something solid behind it so that it doesn't move so much on you. And if you guys, um, comment on here, if you want to get— this is something new that Tiffany's my community manager, by the way. She's the one on here helping me during my Facebook Lives, posting links and stuff for you, and she's amazing. And has, like I said, takes care of all this tech stuff that I don't know how to do. And she has set it up to where if you guys want to be notified when I go live so you don't miss them, because sometimes Facebook doesn't always send out the notifications right away, like there's like a delay on it, or if your settings aren't correct, you're not going to get notified when I go live. So anyways, if you comment what, anything, you will get a Facebook Messenger message from us, and it will ask you if you want to give us your phone number. And it's not for me to call you, trust me, I don't have time. I don't even like talking on the phone. I'm not gonna call you, I'm not gonna harass you. It's just to give you a text reminder before I go live on the page so you don't miss them. Now that was already starting to stick a little. I will say, when you get done with this, it reminds me of being a kid. That's probably why I like it. You know when you like played with rubber cement when you were a kid, then you had it all sticking all over your hands when you were done with art time at school, and then you're spending the rest of the day peeling off the glue off your hands? That's kind of what it's like. After you do a mixed media piece. I find myself still picking at it later. Good, I'm glad those messages are working for you guys. I think it's super helpful. I know for myself, I always have my phone around with me, and even if I— some— sometimes I don't have the ringer on on purpose so I'm not too distracted by it. But you see your phone kind of light up or go off, it's better than getting an email, it's better than getting a Facebook notification because none of that pops up on my phone. You know what I forgot we need to do? I think I want to put Maybe I was gonna say the stencil, but maybe I want to put this on first and let the stencil overlap some of the, some of the hem. See, I love those— when I was flipping it over to put the decoupage on the bottom, see how it picked up some of that gold in those random spots? That's what I love about stuff like this, just random. Tell that Type A part of your brain to turn off and just have fun with it. Let's get a little bit of this on our edges here. See how I just use my fingers and just kind of push it down? It's literally all over my nails. We'll see how long these nails are gonna last. They've made it about 3 weeks, but we just— it just got announced yesterday that our schools are closed for the rest of the year. I have 3 daughters, for those of you that that are new to my page. So that means now not only am I working from home, but I'm homeschooling from home too for the rest of the school year. There was a reason I was starting to say that. What was I gonna say? I lost my train of thought. Started talking about the kids in school. Dang it. Can any of you read my mind and tell me what I was about to say? There was a purpose. Oh, my nails. That's what it was. I don't know when businesses are gonna be able to open back up again. Non-essential. I know that nails are considered non-essential, but these are dip nails, if any of you know what that is, which means it's kind of— they're my nails, but it's kind of like a hard shell on top of them, and it is like impossible to get off at home. Like, you have to go to the salon to get it fixed. Yeah, the schools are done. I mean, honestly, I think it's for the best. I think we need everyone to just stay at home other than the essentials, like I said, you know, getting out, getting your groceries, stuff like that. By the way, our Walmart has toilet paper again. You guys have toilet paper again? There was a whole bunch of it. A lot of my friends use the Color Street nails, Rhonda. My nail— I love the dip, I'm not gonna lie. I mean, it is literally like a shell. They do not break. They— I just love having them, and I don't want to mess with my nails breaking all the time. So I know they're not super healthy underneath this, but it's a nice hard coating, and it works great when you paint as much as I do. But yeah, I was gonna say, when you paint as much as I do, you can just scrape it off your nails. You don't have to worry about the damage. Okay, so here's our background. I do think I want to add a stencil on. I have soaked— I mean, I know you can, but it's really gonna like rip my nails apart. I've done gel because I used to do gel before I did dip. Those are much easier to get off at home. But the dip is some hardcore shelling. Good idea, Tiffany said I need to foil my nails with Jennifer's stuff she sent me. And have any of y'all used oil pastels? This is upside down. We could even use oil pastels in this mixed media piece too. I found these in Sophie's room the other day and I was super excited and I was like, oh, I need to do something with those. I haven't played with oil pastels in forever. These stencils are from DecoArt and I also have them listed in my Amazon store, I think. This might be kind of cool on this edge. Now what color? I think I want— I really want a dark, dark navy, I think. This is Ultra Blue Deep, and then I'm gonna add black to it because it's not the color I want straight out of the bottle. Would you guys like a lesson? I was thinking about doing this next week. Would you guys like a lesson on color mixing? I love color mixing. Help you not feel like you have to use exactly what you find in the store, exactly what's in a bottle, so you don't feel like you have to have my exact colors of paint. So I'm gonna mix this together. I love color mixing. It's like my favorite. I think it's, again, kind of with this— kind of get the sense that I really liked being a kid. I liked how fun everything was when you're a kid. We're gonna try this and see if I like it. The color mixing, mixed media, all of it's just kind of childlike and kid-like. You're just playing. Seeing what is gonna happen, not worried if it's right or wrong, not worried if you're perfect, not worried if someone's judging you, just enjoying being creative. So I'm gonna leave that like that. I'm gonna add a little bit of white. Can you guys see how I'm just doing that kind of here and there? I don't want it all one solid color there. I got brushes everywhere. All right, let's peel it up and see what it looks like. Let's see what this looks like. That's pretty. Gives it a bold little area down there. Do you guys like that? I think I'm gonna do it again up here. Just A little bit. Now you could use a foam brush for stenciling on. I'm just using a paintbrush just because I have it here and it's a little easier. Maybe a little more black in the corner even. Ooh, that gives me an idea. I should tarnish all the way around the edges too. I'm gonna show you guys all kinds of techniques in this. I'm liking it. Okay, set this aside. I'm gonna try something really quick. So I'm using that oil pastel and doing a little black and rubbing it in along my torn edges to give it a little aging. Sorry, I'm making this a really long live, aren't I? But I like this edging here. Okay, so I wanted to add a little of the tarnishing there. I need to soak my brush. I think I want it— I'm trying to decide, do I want— because, okay, so my cross is gonna go across here, so I'm deciding how much of this. I think maybe the smaller one. This has— so what I should have done when I was done with this was clean my stencil off, and I didn't. This has some medium on it that got stuck on there. We're not gonna use that side, but I'm trying to decide what color. Do I want it to be gold, or do I need something a little more contrasting. I also have this— it's called Titanium Gold, and it's kind of like a bronzy color that I really like too. White might be pretty. That's true. I have this. This is called Plum Suede. I'm just kind of obsessed with this color right now, because I like how kind of calm these colors are— navies and teals and corals. So I don't want something super, super bright. We're gonna try this first. I'm gonna see if I like it. So we're just gonna do a little test. I just love this color. I think it's too subtle. Let me do it over the hymnal. You know, I say it might be too subtle, but sometimes it's just that little extra layer, that little extra touch of a color of paint that is, is subtle, but you still see it peeking behind. It just adds another layer to the painting. If I don't like it, I'm gonna go back over it in silver. Or, you know what, let me grab a little bit of white. We talked about white earlier too. Change it up. It doesn't all have to be the same either. We're just gonna play around, see what happens. Well, it's not too pretty. I'm not gonna lie, it's not too pretty, but, um, it adds a little bit of texture on there at least. I think I'm gonna go back to my big one. But see how it still is like a cool little section to have on there. Peggy says she thinks I'm holding back and you think I can sing. I may think I can sing sometimes, but I don't know. We're gonna try this. I don't want that color, though. What do I have up here? I think maybe I still need— bear with me, I'm just thinking my way through this. Now here's a different— this is a little bit darker. This is Plum. That other one was Plum Suede. So just to kind of show you the pretty big difference, but still nothing super bright. And if I want to make it darker, let's just pull a little section over here. I'm just going to grab a little— a little bit of black goes a long way, by the way. And just because this entire stencil is laying down here doesn't mean I have to fill in everywhere that stencil is. Another thing you can use, um, disposable makeup sponges. When I used to teach in like classes locally, That's what we would use, and you cut them in half like the triangle wedge makeup sponges. Cut them in half and they're just these little itty-bitty little triangle wedges. They work awesome for stenciling when we used to do lettering, like use my Silhouette Stencil Creator, and we'd use it to do hand lettering that way. Oh, that's pretty. Can you guys see that? I like that. I think that's a pretty contrast. I may just go around this outer loop of the stencil. And it doesn't have to be You know, it can be more faded in some areas, more solid in others. It's like the magical reveal. That's cool. I like the way that looks. Someone did mention upper left. I think I'm gonna do it super small here. Yeah, I like the overlap of the stencils too. You know, I thought I didn't like that, but I actually do. I just like having the different textures all over it. So here we're going to do our cross. I'm debating on how I want to do this exactly. I like these two. These two are about the same size. I may cut it to begin with and see if I like it. What do you guys think of that? Obviously I'm going to cut this down. I have to leave it sitting here for a second. I'm going to trim this down a little, but I'm thinking, you know, everything was torn in the background, and again, we want to think about contrast when we're making a composition. So by having these edges cut instead of jagged, and I think it looks a little bit more like wood, that's just giving more more contrast to the difference of this versus what's in the background. Hey, if you guys can't find, um, if you don't have a hymnal and you don't have something like this, you can Google like hymnal images, and you can even find stuff you can print from the computer and do something similar to this. All right, now here's the other decision. Do I want this overlapping the cross, or do I want it underneath? I think I want it underneath. I want the cross to be the focus. And I'm gonna show you two different ways again how you can kind of age— I love the flowers at the bottom too. I'm gonna leave those. I think they look really cool there. Two different ways you can kind of age the edge of this. Okay, let me get Where is my burnt umber? Burnt umber is my favorite dark brown, but again, there it is. Even out of the bottle, I don't think it's dark enough, so I always add black to it. So I'm gonna show you this first. We're gonna do this I'm gonna move the cross out of the way. We're gonna have that right here. Everyone is voting for under. I agree. So I'm gonna pull black into my brown, make it darker. And I'm watering this down. If you guys haven't seen my lemon wreath tutorial, it's free, it's on YouTube. I posted it the other day on here as well, how you can use acrylic paints like watercolor. And we're just gonna go along these edges. And then I'm gonna get more water. I want very little color in there. I'm gonna scoot this over for just a second. So I'm just getting some excess out of there, and I'm just gonna lightly Kind of drag this over. So I'm just using a paper towel even right now, just to give that a little bit more interest, a little bit of aging. Then we're gonna jump back to our Mod Podge here. Deco Podge is what I'm using. Now this is the back side. Don't think I'm going over everything here. And then we're gonna protect this by covering it in the decoupage. Also, I'm gonna rinse a lot of that brown out. There may be a little bit left in there. I'm digging it. Okay, so that's one way you can tarnish edges. Another way is if you have a stamp pad— I hope this is not dry. That's pretty good. This may not be dark enough though for the wood. I thought it was darker than that. I don't know where my black one is. Hang on. If I can't find my black stamping pad, I may just do— I'm gonna do the same thing on the edges of my cross. What I was gonna say, and I'll go ahead and show you, you can take an inking pad like this. You might be able to see it better on this side. And rub it on the edges, and you get— see how that brown shows up on there? That might work. I'm going to end up paper cutting myself here. All right, but I'm going to do a little bit of the same. So I just want these edges to stand out just a little. So I'm just going to go along the edge of the paper with some watered-down brownish black paint here. So you guys see how I'm doing that? Gives it just a little bit more definition when it lays against this. What do you guys think so far? Did I do the wrong edge? I did. That's the wrong one. This is the one I had going this way. It's already dark. We'll just go a little bit— well, I still needed that one done, but we're gonna go a little bit darker on this edge too. I had no intention of this live being as long as it is, so thanks for hanging out with me while I'm creating it. It's what happens when you don't have a plan, but everyone's occupied. It's okay. Do you guys think that's the right size for the cross? I've got to pause and look at it for a second. Shorter crossbeam. I think it may need to be just slightly, slightly shorter. If you hear hammering and nailing in the back, it's just us. Building on a deck to the back of our house right now. Oops. I'm thinking about like this. I gotta pause and look at it. I think I want to take a little Just make it a little bit more rustic, a little finger painting, so I remember where it's going across. So I'm just going to do a quick little squirt of this over here just to kind of get that finish on there a little bit more. That was just more of the decoupage that I just put on top. Now I did say I was going to show you guys how to use this gold. Like I said, I'm gonna use— see how bright gold that is? And then you can just smear that on. You could use a brush or whatever you wanted. Also. It's not coming off the way— I wonder if I let it dry out too much. I'm gonna see if I can get some with my brush. All right, I think I'm gonna call it done. This is— it's called Metallic Luster Gold Rush. I also have it in silver, and it's like a hard wax, but you can use it to accent with the gold. All right, what do you guys think? Do you like it? So I hope you guys try it out, and, um, I want you to post inside the free Facebook group. We have a post at the top of the free Facebook group that says like, what have you created, or what have you made, or something like that. I can't remember what it says. And underneath that is where where you can post whatever you're working on. So I would love to see your creations. I would love to see what you guys have done with this. Have fun with it. Just kind of enjoy the process and how it all comes together. But I'm really happy with it. I like all the different patterns and everything on there. So, all right, you guys have an awesome weekend, and I'll be back in just a little bit. Bye!