All You Need Is A Steady Hand

Oh my!! This was one of the hardest crafts I've ever done! My friends finally, and quite SUDDENLY, moved into their new home. I wanted to give them something personal, but needed to make it in an evening since the house-warming party was the following day.  I looked around, pulled out an attractive red glass plate that I'd bought from IKEA several years ago. "I can work with this." I told myself.

Difficulty: hmmmm, Extreme (Read on to learn here's why)

Materials Required:

1) a surface - glass or wood anything

2) tube/s of puff paint or 3-D paint

3) glass marbles (optional)

Tulip dimensional paint from Joanns

Begin by preparing your surface - cleaning with Windex or whatever necessary depending what you'll be decorating. (I used the glass plate that I already mentioned.)

New glass plate.

Next, choose your surface paints/colors. 

Dimensional paint

The design or pattern you decide on is of course up to you, I wanted an arabesque pattern, with lots of paisley-shaped swirls and dots. I doodle these designs regularly. Piece 'a cake. 

I pulled out some glass blobs, otherwise known as marbles (or gems).

Glass gems from Joanns, take the shape of slumped marbles, flat on one side.

I visually quartered the plate for symmetry and strategically laid out some dots to assist me in my free-hand design. 

Sectioning of the work surface

This was quite fun, after I accepted it's NOT going to turn out as I had envisioned. Despite most of my paint being from the same manufacturer and purchased together, each seemed to have its own consistency, making each additional colour a new learning curve. 

Plate in progress

What I learned:

1) Murphey's Law is alive and well. If you have a child in the house, they will place a toy on your project. If you are drinking anything while doing this, you will spill it on your project. If there is an air bubble in the tube of paint, it will spurt across your artwork. All this , and more. Seriously. 

2) If you have time, wait between colour applications. It's nearly impossible to wipe up a small mess without destroying en entire section. 

3) The tube WILL have air bubbles. 

4) The tip WILL get clogged, suddenly. Wipe the tip frequently. 

5) It's very difficult to consistently apply he same pressure to the tube while applying. Ie: the hand gets tired, the paint amount decreases and requires more pressure. Forgive yourself and move on.

6) Thicker lines and dots are better. As the product dries, it becomes somewhat translucent, especially if too thin. Don't be afraid to go bold. 

7) What saved this project? More. . .  More, more, more. Utter chaos. Without it, the design would show each flaw. I hope she likes it!

Finished plate

Close-up of finished plate