Ms. Ruin's Playthings: dye

Welcome Smeared and Smudged Hoppers and Happy Skull Appreciation Day to you! My project didn't turn out as cool as I wanted but I had this vision of decorating an altered wallet --so I did. Again, not superb, but hey, it has skulls on it!

I first started with this little canvas wallet by Maya Road. These are very durable and they are great to alter and keep as decorative pieces. However, I want something that I can carry and use and throw in the washer if necessary. You can also dry these in a dryer but I will not be doing that with this one because I used embossing powder. Can you imagine?

My first step was to stamp MS. RUIN on the front of the wallet with acrylic stamps and an embossing pad. I poured black embossing powder over the letters and then applied heat. I made the mistake of taking a brush and brushed embossing liquid onto some of the letters and then went through the embossing process again. I didn't really care for that method so some letters are darker than others, but that's okay.

I then stamped skulls all over the back side also using the same embossing process. These cute little skulls are by Dyan Reaveley from her Dylusions line.

Check out this cute little lightning bolt. I drew it on the canvas wallet with a marker then I took a paint brush and dipped in embossing liquid and filled it in. I then poured the black embossing powder and applied heat.

Okay, so how did I dye it? Well, I took a small plastic tub and put hot water in it and then added Rit liquid dye --just like this one shown here. In fact, I used the wine color. I then dipped the canvas bag in it and let it soak for about 5 minutes. I also dyed the white lace which turned it into a pretty mauve-ish color. I rinsed everything under cold water and then placed them outside to dry. Once everything was dry I adhered the lace with hot glue. Remember, hot glue is your friend!

And that my dear friends is how I made this very easy skull appreciation day wallet. Now I just need some money to put in it. :)

As a bonus I am going to feature a tag I made a couple of years ago featuring a dapper skull man. I now see all the things I would do differently had I created it today. But I didn't...so here is my throwback skull tag to add to today's hop!