Childhood Memories Mixed Media Layout by Mabel Sim

Hi Guys!

This is Mabel here with my first blog post for Meg's Garden Design Team. I'm from Singapore, a small island country in Southeast Asia. Most of my projects involve Mixed Media and today I have a Mixed Media layout tutorial for you using Meg's Garden products from the English Rose Garden Collection.

I picked Paisley & Roses (P6432) as my layout base. I also really love the flourishes on Meg's Garden name card! So I decided to not waste it and fussy-cut out the flourishes for embellishment later.

I also picked out a couple of Meg's Garden products I wanted to use for embellishment later. I have the vintage rose tag cut out from Cut & Create (P6434) which I snipped it into half to make full use of this beautiful tag for layering. I also fussy-cut out the frame from Vintage Ornate Tags 1036.

I briefly arranged my embellishments and photos to determine the area I would like my mediums to go onto. 

I primed the patterned paper beforehand with clear gesso. I used 13arts Ayeeda Matte Coral and Lemon paints as well as Tim Holtz Distress Stain Spray in Tattered Rose and Milled Lavender to create the area I want to embellish later on. 

I wanted to bring out different textures and effects and stamping is a very good way to achieve visual texture effects. I used Prima Marketing stamps from Cigar Box Secrets Collections as well as Finnabair clear stamps with my Black Stazon ink pad. I chose Stazon as its permanent and the ink will not run when I use it more mediums on top of it. 

I continued to bring out more texture for the background by going over my stencils with modelling paste. I used Tattered Grid stencils from 13arts as well as Prima Marketing's stencil. 

While the modelling paste was still wet, I poured on some mica flakes from 13arts to create some sparkle! 

I also added Gold Glitter paint from 13arts as well as creating some splatter with diluted black gesso.

This is one of the trick I love to use when I need to stick alphabet stickers. I placed them on a ruler so I can gauge the length of the entire word, I can also shift them around easily to see where they fit better. Once I'm happy with the placement, I simply tilt my ruler and gently rubbed in those 'open' areas so they stick to the background.

And after embellishing my layout, this is the final look!

I diecut some leaves from Prima Marketing dies. I also tucked some laces as layering for added effect. 

Meg's Garden has got a wide variety of flowers to choose from. I used some of the mulberry papers flowers as they're awesome for altering. 

As mulberry papers are porous, inks can spread easily with water. So I just dipped my brush into Tim Holtz's Milled Lavender Stain Spray and brushed onto the flower near to the stamen. I then wet the areas I want the colours to spread to with water so the ink will flow. This creates a very natural looking flower. :)

More close ups looks of the layout!

That's all for my tutorial! Thanks for reading!

Hope you're feeling inspired by my tutorial. 

Please click on the link below to see more of this beautiful collection. 

To view more of my projects over at my blog, please click on the link below.