“stepping” outside

Good Morning crafty gardeners,

When the July weather starts behaving itself here in Manitoba, I love to bring my projects outside and enjoy the day.  What better inspiration is there than our own backyards and gardens?  So….in celebration of summer, I decided to create a garden stepping stone to add to the numerous pathways in the gardens around my yard.

There are a few supplies that you will need to create a beautiful stepping stone for your garden:

1. a concrete stepping stone – purchased at any gardenstore/lumber yard.

2. any waterbased paint – you can use exterior/interior house paint; I used my acrylic craft paints.

3. paint brush & paint tray

4. Solvent Ink pads (i used StazOn), acrylic blocks and, of course, an assortment of mSB stamp sets.  For this project I used: Neighborhoods, Borderlines, Wishing you Sunshine, Tall Solids I & II and Mini Letters.

5. Vinyl Rub-Ons – my sister cut mine out using her Cricut Machine.

6.  a UV-Resistant Clear Acrylic Coating Spray - I used one from Krylon.

The first thing you want to do is give your stepping stone a good coat of paint.  I painted two lighter coats, rather than slapping the paint on in one coat.  You can choose to get into all the crevasses of the stone, or leave them for a more natural look.  Leave this paint to dry overnight.

Next, choose your favourite myStampBOX stamp sets and some Solvent ink colours and have some fun!!!!  I choose to stamp a tiny little village along the bottom (it’s actually Crystal City, where I live) in Black ink.  I then added giant “stems & leaves” from the Borderlines stamp set in Cactus Green & Forest Green — layering the stems and making sure some of them crossed eachother.  Next, I stamped the circle “flowers” from the same Borderlines stamp set in Fuchsia Pink & Azure (blue), finally finishing the stamping with clouds in the sky using the same two colours.

To add some pop to the stone, I added some dynamic vinyl rub-ons in a bright red that really seem to stand out against the light pink background of the stone.  I love the way they give a whimsical feeling to the stone, playing beautifully with the whimsy of the Borderline flowers.  Hint:  be sure to make sure your rub-ons will stick to your stone.  I cut off a tiny portion from the stem and rubbed it on the back of the stone, just to be sure.

An addition of a bold title (“grow BIG or grow HOME”) makes this stepping stone complete.  To “seal the deal” and make this stone UV resistant and ready for the great outdoors, spray 2 light coats of Clear Acrylic Coating over the entire stone.  I did this in my garage.  Let this dry for 24 hours before bringing the stone to your garden.

You have just created your very own stamped garden stepping stone………are you done yet?!?  It was easy, wasn’t it!!?!

Now, GO, have some more fun in the sun!!!!……..and take those stamps out of the house!!!!!

smiles,