Re-Purposing an Old Book into a Painting with Christie

Hey guys, it's Christie Renee Hawkins with The Social Easel, and I just got done teaching one of my classes this morning in my online group, and I thought I would hop on with you guys and use up some of my leftover paint, get a little bit more, and show you how I you can paint on an old book that you get from a thrift store. Thrift store, if I can talk. Um, today we're just going to paint on this old book. These are super cheap. You can get them at thrift stores and you can make, um, cool pieces of art that you can then like set up and display on your shelves instead of doing something on canvas. So it's just to give a little bit more character And we're just using regular craft paint. All the stuff that I use on my canvas paintings, we're using the same thing on this. Has anyone ever painted on a book before? Done something like this? So I think I'm just gonna— so I showed you the chapel. I think I want to make something that's gonna kind of like coordinate with it that I could put on another shelf. So I'm going to get some of this, and this is just regular craft paint. I'm going to paint the side as well. You could even, um, put like a cute little title on there if you wanted to. I'm going to need a little bit more of my paint, so I'm using DecoArt paint today. I love their paint because it's a little bit thicker. That bottle's about out. It gives you really good coverage. I like doing this when I have like leftover paint. I'm like, I'll just jump on, show you guys another little project I'm working on. But it's so fun to just paint on different surfaces that you may not think about doing. And again, you don't need anything special. This is just gonna stay indoors, so just regular craft paint is fine. And you could choose whether you want to do the spine or not. I'm gonna go ahead and do it. You could put like— so again, I'm making this to coordinate with my chapel. I think I'm gonna put a cross on it. And then do some lettering later. That'll probably be another day once it's dry, but you could do like hand lettering here with like a verse or like a little inspirational quote that would show when you have your book propped. So once I paint this, you know, then I'll like set it up like this, and that's what you would see on your shelf. Okay, so I'm thinking I might use this black here. I don't have this quite planned out. I'm kind of winging it right now. And then I've just got some black. I've got some mixed with a little bit of white. I'm just gonna put a little cross on here, but I want to leave enough space that I can add some words. It might be a few words, maybe just one word. Alright, so my base color is still wet, so it's mixing a little bit with my black, which is fine because I didn't want this to be solid black. I kind of wanted it to be like a gray, so the paint's just doing the, doing the work for me. What color do you guys think I should make the cross? I could leave it gray, maybe lighten it up a little. Does that look okay so far? So I'm just kind of blending it in with that background color. To get that light gray there. Okay, what do I want to do? I'm trying to decide. You know what I think I might do? Because I just love the texture of the palette knife. I think I'm gonna— I've got my base on there, but I think I'm gonna use palette knife to add some, some texture to this, and it's gonna better match my painting that I want this to coordinate with. I'm gonna grab a little bit more white to add to this just for some contrast. Did you guys give me color ideas yet? Yes, this is all acrylic, Angie. I teach women how to paint with acrylic paint. Alright, give me some color ideas, guys. What do you think I should do across while I'm adding in this— these palette knife strokes? I love palette knife because it's messy and fun and freeing. See, did that freak anyone out? I'm not worried about it. It just adds to it. We'll just have a little bit of gray in our background. I kind of like it. Kind of adds a little bit of aging to it. I love this palette knife that I'm using, and you can get this in my Amazon store. You get a set of 5 for only a few dollars. It's super cheap, and they come in all different sizes. So these are some of the other ones, but I love having this little itty-bitty guy because you can get in smaller spaces. But what do you guys think about that texture? Can you see the difference of when you do the palette knife versus just paintbrush? It just gives you a different look that you can't get. Gold is a good idea. You guys must know I love gold, and I wasn't even thinking about metallics. That's a good idea. Oh, thank you, Debbie. You're right. Debbie said the right side of my cross is a little bit narrow, and then once you said that and I looked up at the camera, I see what you're talking about. I think that's better. Thanks, Debbie. Silver would be pretty too. Stephanie, I did not use gel medium for this. This is just, this is just DecoArt craft paint, just their regular. I think it says matte on it. I don't know. No, it doesn't say. It's just Americana acrylic paint. Carol, this is an old book that I got from a thrift store. So this is what it looked like before, and I could paint the whole thing, but I'm not going to today, obviously, because I'm doing the front side for you guys. But it's just an old book, and they're just fun to paint on, and then you can display them on your shelf as little accent pieces. Fun little project for you guys. Yeah, I think I might palette knife the cross as well. I just love that texture. I can't believe there was ever a day that I did not use a palette knife. See how I'm just using— like, you use the backside of it and then you just do these small little scrapes. You can flip it over and get some paint off if you need to. But I love palette knife because it's so freeing and it's okay to be messy. Like, it's okay to not have perfect lines. You're gonna see that here. So Let me find my gold that I want. Give me just a second. It's the closest one. This is DecoArt. They have these metallics and I absolutely love them. They're super bright and super metallic, so they really, really show up. They're not gonna like fade into the painting. Stephanie said, have you ever seen page folding? You could fold the pages and paint both sides and it would be nice on a table or shelf. I have not seen that. I have to look that up. I have to bang this for just a second to loosen my lid. Sorry. So again, these come in jars. I'm just gonna wipe off my palette knife here. I think I'll use the lid. So there's plenty of paint in there because I shook it up. It's nice to have that little bit of gray in the background. What do you guys think? Gold a good choice here? So if you guys have not already joined my free Facebook group, I will put the link up when I get off here. I also put the link to my Amazon store and the Chapel paint party if you want to join us with that. So we'll put up a couple links for you, but the free Facebook group is a place for you to take, like, these videos that I do with you live, and then when you're working on them at home, it's a place for you to go post your paintings after you've done the lessons. And just a fun little community of like-minded women, you know, just like you. Who are learning to paint and having fun and trying things out. And when you join the free Facebook group, we'll ask you when you join for your email address, and if you give us your email address when you join the group, you will also get a free tutorial sent to your email. So you get a little bonus as well. So I'm thinking I'm liking the gold on there. Gina, not necessarily. She was asking if when you're using a palette knife if you have to use more gold than you do with a brush. It kind of depends. I'm gonna scrape some of this gold all around as well. I like there to be some variation in my backgrounds. It just depends. Like, that's really— I didn't really use a ton on here. Kind of depends on the type of painting that you're doing and how thick you want it. Trying to decide what I want to add to it now. I feel like it needs— I'm really wanting to add some of like a bright pink or something in there. I'm thinking, I'm not sure. What do I want to do? and I could go back to using a brush again and adding some little details to it. You know what I think I might do? So I've done a cross before where I had like, um, someone just set it kind of like a starburst in the middle where it looks like a flower with kind of loops and stuff, but since I'm doing palette knife, I'm kind of thinking I want to add maybe like a little cluster of flowers in the middle. This is Peony Pink by DecoArt. We're gonna try it. I think I'm gonna add like a little cluster of flowers here. Maybe a little bit of greenery behind them. This is Desert Cactus. It's one of my favorite greens that they have. I'm gonna add another color flower in here too. Just a couple little dots, kind of like some baby's breath maybe. Trying to think what other color— I kind of want like a darker one. This is a pretty plum. What do you guys think of the flowers? Yay or nay? You could do all kinds of stuff on this. Then I think I'm gonna come in with just a little, a little bit of black for my centers. Kind of like poppies or like anemones. Like I said, palette knife painting, a little messy. And I am doing this flat because this is a little bit thicker and you want it to dry flat too. Get in there, black. I said I was gonna leave words or a space for words on here, but I'm thinking I might want to I'm gonna do like a little side border, I think, with some flowers on the sides. But just have fun, you know, like I didn't have this all necessarily planned out. Of how I wanted to do this, and I'm just kind of letting it come together and deciding what I like as, as I go. So sometimes it's just fun to create without, you know, an absolute perfect image in mind of what you're, what you're thinking, and just kind of having fun with the process. Alright, so instead of using a palette knife for these flowers, I'm gonna do— they're gonna be really similar in style. I'm gonna do a little cluster of flowers in the corner, just some big blobs of pink here. And that will kind of coordinate with my— so I'm making it to kind of match the chapel painting that I'm working on, so it kind of ties in those flowers as well. Sorry, I know I can't fit the whole thing in there, but you guys get a general idea of what that looks like. Grab a little bit more paint here. Yeah, I think I do like it. I think I like it with the border. Alright, so I'm coming in with my black. I'm trying to decide if I want to add some white in here too, or another color. I can't decide if I want to add another color or keep it. I think I want a little bit of black around my edges here too. So to get like these little wispy outlines, I'm not pushing down very hard at all, just kind of lightly dragging that tip across, maybe pulling a little black in some of the areas. All right, so if you haven't seen my tip for getting little dots, I'm gonna grab a smaller brush, just like a round, and I'm just gonna use the end of the brush and Okay, I'm going to get paint on it, and you just kind of add your little dots in. I'm anxious to see what this looks like when it's all the way dry. Yeah, I like the black on the, on the cross. It adds a little bit to it. I know not everyone likes this, but I like that little edging look. I'm going to add a little bit of black around my edges too. But see how you get that with the palette knife? You can't get that with a brush because it grabs onto the texture. Of the book. And there's seriously no right or wrong. You could have a larger amount of black showing or just a little bit on the edges. I don't think I'm gonna add any words now. I don't think I left myself any room. So hopefully that was a fun little quick lesson for you and gives you an idea of something you can take an old beat-up book that you get at the thrift store. Some of them, like that one said $2.50 on it. I seriously doubt we paid $2.50 for that. I bet it was like 50 cents. It was probably marked down. They're so cheap. And then, like, I love these. I've bought some from several other artists, like at craft shows. She does Christmas paintings on them and fall paintings on them, and I love them. So you could take— like, this is a little Easter bunny one. I just posted about this the other day. This is a super small canvas, but you could paint these cute little bunnies on a book and put it up for Easter. Or this would be great for Easter too. So bonus lesson for you today. I'll post this in the free group as well and then get those links up for you guys so you can get the supplies that you need if you want them. So Hope you had fun, hope you enjoyed it, and just let your friends know about it if you had fun with it and share it with them. I will talk to you soon. Bye!