Gears, gears, and a Balloon?

Hello yall! This is my first Design Team piece for Sandee&Amelies Steampunk Challenge! The theme this month is Gears! Remember to check out the rest of the DTs work by visiting each of their blogs. Here is my finished piece. 

This is an 8x10 flat canvas. I started by applying Gesso to my canvas and then added texture paste through 3 different stencils. 

Then comes the sprays and mists! I made my own spray box so I could happily spray all day and not worry about color going everywhere. Just a cardboard box and some paper towels. 

I used LSG sprays, Luminarte sprays, and Smooch sprays to achieve the Steampunk look I like. I also added alcohol ink for the patina look. I could have stopped here but there are no gears!!!!

I then used Silks to go over the texture and make it subtlety pop. Then came the gears!

I love using Creative Embellishments chipboard pieces. They have a wonderful selection of Steampunk pieces to choose from and I actually won the chippies I used in this piece. :) I painted all chippies with Gesso first, then dabbed Distress Paint Bundled Sage here and there on the gears, next I spritzed with a copper spray and edged the piece with black archival ink. I adhered the gears with TomBow Multi. 

Next came the hot air balloon chipboard piece. I started by creating my basket out of leather strips that I weaved together. Then I used Acrylic Metallic paint for the balloon part and added copper wire around the balloon. Then I added ribbon around the "handles" of the basket and adhered it with Tombow as well. 

I used copper embossing powder on the chipboard word "Create" and lightly brushed it with black archival ink to give it a grunged look. Hope you enjoyed! Carpe Diem! ~Niki

Want to try Steampunk, but you aren't sure where to start? Throw caution to the wind and just give it a go! Join in for this months theme of GEARS! Just remember to use some gears and you are golden! You never know what you will create! xx