Decorated Tin

This is part 1 of a 2 part project that I made as an encouragement gift for a friend.  Part 1 is the tin, part 2 is the contents.

I started with an old oxo tin which had been in my craft room for a few weeks, waiting for me to decide what to do with it.

First of all, I sanded the tin down with some rough sandpaper so that the paint would have something to key into.

Then I got a can of spray paint and got to work.  I took it outside, laid plastic carrier bags down on the table to protect it and got to work.  Lots of light coats is much better than 1 or two thicker ones.  Particularly with your very first coat.  This was a colour with sparkly particles in, and it was weird to watch them moving as the paint dried.

Those photos are after 1 or 2 coats and you can see the building up was a slow process, but eventually I got full coverage.

It took me a while to work out what to use to decorate the outside of the tin.  Eventually I grabbed a set of clear stamps in a swirl design and a pot of embossing powder.  Because this is a metal tin, I went for a pot of Metal Magic by Debi Moore.  I picked that up a few years ago at a craft show and I don't think they make it anymore because I can't find it on their website.  The Metal Magic is a large grain ultra thick embossing powder which came in a range of metallic colours.

I took the straight swirls design and positioned it from a corner, using a versamark pad. I then switched the stamp around the other way and matching it up as carefully as I could, worked from the same point on the other side of that corner.  I did the same at the diagonally opposite corner.

Stamping on something 3d like this, that has a tendency to flex when you press on it isn't easy.  I placed the stamp on an acrylic block and placed that down on the table, stamp facing up.  I then took the tin to the stamp, rather than the other way around.  This meant I was able to provide an even impression from inside the tin, all over the stamp area.  Even doing it this way there were a couple of failed attempts, where I realised once I sprinkled on the embossing powder that I had missed a section of the stamp.  I just wiped it all off straight away, before using the heat gun, cleaned the surface up and began again.

When decorating the lid I did much the same, but using two sizes of corner stamps in the same swirl set, rather than the straight one.  I also grabbed a new embossing powder silicone mould that I picked up from the WOW embossing stall at last week's craft show.  You melt embossing powders down to liquid form in a small metal tin or melt pot, then pour them into the mould.  Once it has cooled you can trim excess bits of with fine scissors or a craft knife. I had chosen a miniature picture frame mould and used the same embossing powder as I had used to decorate the tin.

I measured the size of the centre of the frame, then printed out a picture of my friend, that tiny and cut it out.  I took another pot of embossing powder from Debi Moore (Again not one I can see on their current website), called ____ and using a versamark pad, embossed that all over the tiny picture.  I then glued the picture into the frame and glued the frame onto the lid of the tin.  I did also emboss her name on the tin lid, but have removed that from the photo in post edit, in case she doesn't want everyone to know about it.

Finally I took some decorative papers, and lined the bottom of the tin, and the inside of the base and the lid.

Come back tomorrow for part 2, where I share the encouraging cards which I put inside the tin.


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