Steampunk Tic-Tac-Toe

How does Steampunk and Tic-Tac-Toe fit together you may wonder? Well we've done it over at SanDee&Amelie's Steampunk challenge. Pick a row (vertical, horizontal, or diagonal) from the board below and create anything you would like as long as it is Steampunk(ish).

We have not 1 but 3 prizes to give away for this challenge. The lovely Retro Kraft Shop, La Blanche and Irish Teddy's are our sponsors. Awesome sauce right? You have to join in to win! 

I used the middle vertical row: Top hat - Metal - Rust. 

If you want the template for the hat and a total step by step on how to create the structure click HERE. 

This is what I started with: beautiful right? 

I cut all my crafters foam and glued it together, then gave it a coat of gesso.

 I then started dry embossing metal foil tape. I used alcohol ink in Pool and Rust along with some generic black ink. Note to self: only use real alcohol ink as the generic black ink kept coming off on my fingers (I fixed this by painting all the foil tape with DecoArt Matte Varnish). I then traced all the panels on the metal foil tape and cute it out while leaving the backing on the foil tape

A lot of the metal foil tape ended up in the trash due to operator (me) error. Oops. Anyway, once the varnish was dry I applied each panel to the top and sides of my hat. 

It was a process but I get 'er done! I outlined all the panels with a black marker to hide the white. Now I am not sure why I painted it white in the first place. Hehehe!

The middle panel was done with a clock embossing folder and I added TH clear crackle to it just for fun. You can see that panel better in the very first picture.

The left side of the hat was embellished with a Create light bulb, film strip, feathers, and half of a gear that was inked with the AI and stamped with a script stamp.

The gears for the top of the hat are Cheery Lynn dies that I painted with a silver metallic paint and added LSG sprays to. 

Hats are really hard to photograph so please excuse the random seeming angles. If anyone has a neat trick to photographing odd shaped art, please let me know. :)

I do so hope you enjoyed this post. And for further enjoyment I have added some lovely pictures of my hat being modeled by some gorgeous and handsome models. These models work for Milk Bones so I was able to reserve them for future posts and modeling gigs as well. 

My Husky, Nanook, modeling my hat. I think he is giving me the "eye"

The new puppy, Keen, wondering how this hat got on his head. :)

Hopefully you have many ideas swirling around in your creative minds and join in with all the fun!  Thanks for stopping by and I look forward to your sweet comments, it sure does brighten my day! Hugs and Carpe Diem! ~Niki

I would really love to share this mini top hat with:

Rhedds Creative Spirit-Anything Goes 

Altered Eclectics-Anything Goes Altered/Mixed Media

Mixed Media World-Masculine/Father's Day