Boo! - an (almost) all Tim Holtz Shadow Box

Yessss! It is that time of year again - time to get out all my Halloween dies and stamp sets, which are mainly Tim Holtz design ones....yes, I simply can't help buying his stuff. Almost everything he designs is a must-have for me...lol
But I know I am in good company with being a Tim stash hoarder. And I know a lot worse ways of how to spend my pocket money ;)

Some of Tim's stamp sets simply call for being used for fun dioramas and shadow box projects - like the cute Haunted House set. Perfect to create a little Halloween scene shadow box!

I haven't done any steps images as I was being carried away during the process (I will add the links to the mentioned dies and stamp sets instead).
A process that started out while browsing my Halloween stash and deciding to use as many of my treasures in a single project as possible....lol. The project was also inspired by the lovely Holiday Shadow Box die set by Katelyn Lizardi. You can definitely do so much more with that one than a winter or Christmas themed shadow box (but everything you need to create one of these comes with the amazing dies set).

 I just used the main parts for the shadow box (the front and back and hills with the glue taps) and simply snipped off the leaves from the trees to get a spookier look.

I combined some of my other favourite Tim Holtz dies - the On the Edge - Graveyard die, the Drip Edge and Twisted Edge Thinlits dies and the Vintage Spirits die set - with stamped images from the Haunted Mansion and Mini Halloween #5 sets.

They all came together just beautifully! I prepared the background for all the die cut pieces by using an artists sponge and dabbing on mixes of grey, white and black for all the construction parts and mixes of reds for the Drip Edge and mixes of greens for the "boo" and the Twisted Edge. I used the same acrylic paints to colour part of the stamped images to visually fuse all the elements. 

Once all the stamped, painted and fussy cut parts had been darkened with black archival ink and an ink blending tool they were glued to the die cut "hills" with the glue tabs. The witch was fixed to the back of the front trees with sticky foam pads. 

The Graveyard was also stuck to the back of the front using sticky foam pads. This way there was more room inside the shadow box to create sufficient depth. 

I especially love the top of my shadow box front - it reminds me a bit of a toy theatre. 

To repeat the white from the top piece with the red eyed owl, I added the small quote to the bottom. 

If you have any questions, please, use the comments function or email me. But I think everything is quite clear. There's a short instruction included with the shadow box die set as well. If you want to add more than three layers, simply trim the glue tabs to a smaller width, so there's more room for more glue tabs on the bottom. 

The background was done before assembly of course. I used Tim's background stamps from the Haunted House set and also added acrylic paint splatters using a splatter brush. 

Some detail shots:

Creating this shadow box was such great fun! Halloween - here we go! I am all ready! 

Hugs and happy crafting!

Claudia

xxx