Space Adventure in a Box

To infinity and beyond… (or at least Arizona). When I was at Creativation this past January, I was introduced to a product that was new to me – Rinea foil paper. It is a crafting paper that is foiled on both sides. The thing I really like about it is that it is pliable like a metal foil and will hold its shape when you manipulate it. They are having a contest and I cooked up this out of this world Treasure Box project to showcase their products. (Grab a drink, this is a long post and tutorial! ;-) )

I wanted the outside to be grey and monochromatic, like a lifeless moon or asteroid.

Then, when opened, you see a colorful and shiny alien landscape:

… and a few resident aliens:

A few more landscape details:

All the foliage was cut using Tim Holtz's Funky Florals type die sets and the Rinea foil paper. (It cuts well.) I could easily 'style' the plants by curling leaves etc. and they stayed put.

On to the tutorial!!

Step 1 - I die cut the pieces for the box out of matboard and assembled them. I coated the outside with clear gesso to help seal the matboard from the moisture of the Stone Effect Paste I was planning to cover it with. I was hoping it would help keep the box from warping too much. I think it did help a bit but I still got warping. At this stage I also prepared the front panel graphic. I matted the rocket image with some of the black Rinea foil (it has little stars on it, perfect!)

Step 2 - I searched for vintage space artwork. Some I found free online and the figure is scanned from an old sci fi paperback book we have. I did some Photoshop work to remove text and fill in areas to make it big enough to work as my background.

In a graphics program (Adobe Illustrator) I laid the graphics out to fit the inside of the box.

Don't glue them in yet!

Step 3 - I used some of Finnabair's Prima products to add that cool texture! The paste is the 'Concrete' jar from the Stone Effect Pastes trio. While it was wet I sprinkled on the different sizes of Art Stones. Once it was all dry I tried to bend the box back to straight sides as best I could. ;-) I also used DecoArt Media Fluid Acrylics to add a wash of color over the paste and stones.

I attached the lid to the base at this stage using some hinges I had in my stash. I also added the Hitch Fasteners for the closure.

Step 4 - I glued in the background and added the sleeve for the drawer (cut using Eileen's Stacking Drawer die). I cut separate matboard pieces to fit the bottom of the lid and top of the drawer and gave them the 'rock' treatment too. Once dry and painted, I glued them in place.

Step 5 - Ghost Inking! I'm really excited to play more with this technique. Rinea has a great video on their website to show how to do it. (It's easy!) For the drawer front, I embossed a piece of foil paper, rubbed the Ghost Ink pad over the embossed areas, dried it with a heat gun and then (here's the magic), wiped it with a paper towel dampened with alcohol and the color lifts right off. Cool!! (The black piece was a practice one I did.)

Step 7 - Sculpting the aliens! I used to do a lot of work with polymer clay but not as much in recent years. It was fun to dust off those skills again with some Sculpey Souffle clay samples I also got at Creativation. I wanted the big alien to look like it was crawling out of the drawer so I actually baked it in another drawer I cut out so the hands etc. would be in the right places.

Messy desk lol!

Step 8 - Finally it was time to put all the insides together. I die cut a whole bunch of 'plant material' from various colors of the Rinea foil paper so I'd have a lot to work with. I then just used quick grabbing glue to start placing the different parts into the interior.

Thanks for stopping by! Check out Eileen's blog posts and if you are not already a member, join the Facebook Eileen Hull Fan Club group. It is a warm, supportive group with lots of inspiration and sharing going on. You'll just have to answer a few simple questions when asking to join (to keep out spammers) and then you'll be added. ;-)

Dies:
Eileen Hull Sizzix
Stacking Drawer ( Sizzix / SB )
Treasure Box ( Sizzix / SB )

Tim Holtz Sizzix
Funky Florals 2 ( Sizzix / SB )
Funky Florals 3 ( Sizzix / SB )
Funky Festive ( Sizzix / SB )
Tiny Tattered Florals ( Sizzix / SB )
Iron Gate & Starry Night Texture Fades set - retired

Other:

Rinea Foil Paper
Rinea Ghost Ink
Prima - Finnabair Stone Effect Pastes - Concrete
Prima - Finnabair Art Stones - Mega, Regular, Mini
Prima - Finnabair Clear Gesso
Prima - Finnabair Mica Powder

Sizzix mat board
Xyron 3in Sticker Maker
Sculpey polymer clay
DecoArt Media Fluid Acrylics - Paynes Grey, Dark Grey Value 3
DecoArt - Extreme Sheen Gold paint
Tim Holtz Idea-ology Hitch Fasteners
Hobby Lobby - Spaceship Pendant

Sizzix and Scrapbook.com links in this post are affiliate links which do not affect the price you pay but allow me to earn a small percentage of a sale. Thanks! (My husband also thanks you!)

Outer Space Treasure Box
by MonalisaH -Lisa Hoel
Scrapbook.com