Friday Focus: Burlap and Jute

Welcome back to another Friday Focus.  Linda here this week, sharing another shabby crafting product that is close to my heart - burlap.  I had some fun this week playing around with various pieces of burlap to see what I could come up with to decorate some cards.

The first thing I made was this cute tag.  I cut the burlap and a kraft tag separately with a Spellbinders die (simply because the Spellbinders don't cut through two layers) and then glued the burlap to the kraft with Claudine Hellmuth Multi Medium Matte. Then I cut snowflakes with my Mini Snowflakes Movers and Shapers die from felt and burlap.  The burlap for the snowflake was cut from a piece that I had brushed the reverse side with Multi Medium Matte which keeps it from falling apart.  The burlap in my shop is pretty stiff and has been treated with something to keep it from fraying, but when I die cut it, and the die cut has very small parts, I like to reinforce it with the MMM.  

Then from the same piece of reinforced burlap, I die cut this Carved Ornament and gave it a bit of gold gilding by brushing on some Gold Paint Dabber and also painted my white corrugated cardboard snowflakes with gold paint dabber too.  

Next up is a flower cut with the Tattered Florals die.  This burlap was not reinforced, plus I treated it a little roughly by crunching it all up and unfurling it carefully.  I painted a couple of layers with gesso to give it more of a rustic look and add some contrast to the layers.  

Next up a pine tree cut from reinforced burlap and given a sprinkling of snow with gesso.

For the next few pieces, I cut a stencil using Tim Holtz Mask Sheets and Movers and Shapers dies (be sure to save your die cuts to use for masking on other projects).  For this one, I arranged the two Mini Tattered Florals dies and one Mini Butterfly die and passed the masking sheet through my die cutting machine.  Then I moved the mask sheet and passed it through a second time to get the next three cuts.  Then I used the stencil to stipple gesso onto the burlap, moving the stencil one time to stencil the next three shapes.

I followed the same procedure for this white-on-white piece.  I also sprinkled the wet gesso with some of the new Clear Rock Candy Distress Stickles Dry Glitter, but unfortunately the camera didn't pick up the sparkles.

Love this wide red burlap ribbon which is new in the boutique.  It worked beautifully with the snowflake stencil and gesso.

Hope you enjoyed this burlap tutorial.  The entire Burlap/Jute section of The Funkie Junkie Boutique is on sale 15% off this week for Friday Focus.  Check it out - there are so many jute ribbons, burlap thread, burlap ribbon, etc.  Stock up for your holiday crafting while I still have a good supply of all these products.

Let me know if you have any questions on these techniques.  Have a crafty weekend!

All of these products used are available at The Funkie Junkie Boutique:

White Jute Mesh Burlap	Natural Jute Mesh (Burlap)	Multi Medium Matte	Claudine Hellmuth Gesso
Alterations Tattered Florals Die	Mini Tattered Florals Movers & Shapers	Acrylic Paint Dabber - Metallic Gold	Distress Stickles Dry Glitter Clear Rock Candy
Red Jute Mesh (Burlap) Ribbon	Tim Holtz Carved Ornaments Die	Movers and Shapers Die - Mini Butterflies	Tim Holtz Idea-ology Mask Sheets

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