A rock pool treasure niche

During my studio time this week I have been working on a little project, or rather a niche, as this is the theme over at Paperartsy. I was very inspired by Leandra's introduction last Sunday but quite challenged as to what I would make. Now that that I am back outside in my garden studio I can just leave WIP on my desk, which I love. No pressure to clear anything away. I also wanted to combine a couple of other fun challenges including "Through the looking glass" over at A Vintage journey.

Initially I rather struggled with these themes, Niche to me means a little hidey hole to put something treasured on display. I also wanted some different ways of using "glass". I had a brainstorming few days of trying to think of a theme and finally came up with an idea to make a little whimsical piece for my Hb.

As my blogging friends know I always love to collect shells when we go on holiday and my very patient Hb tolerates me very well and sometimes accompanies me on my little searches along the shoreline.
This just one of those moments a few years back on Kephalonia.

Sometimes I spot sea glass which is always a pretty find. We often holiday on the Greek Islands and I always bring a few of my treasures home. I have a big glass jar in my studio and after carefully washing I put them in there. I often use them in my crafting but the rest of the time I just love to look at them and remember our wonderful sunshine filled holidays. When I Iift the lid there is still a slight smell of the sea...mmm. I decided I would make a little niche to display a few of the shells and include a piece of sea glass as a little sunshine reminder for him.

I had no real plan of how I would do this when I started but I often find that my inspiration starts to flow once I get going. I wanted to play with my new Mermaid lagoon Distress ink and I also chose Cracked Pistachio, Tumbled glass (of course for the VJ theme) and Vintage Photo DIs too. I wanted a beachy browns and blues theme.

I made a little round niche box from 2 round die cuts and a piece of card which I added some book pages and stenciling to for texture.

These pages are actually from  Dicken's A tale of two cities which my Hb gave to me for my crafting. He is an avid reader so it was perfect to use for texture.

 I blended the inks and also added archival ink through my latest TH stencil. I used the great free Visible Image stamp from Craft Stamper as it could represent waves. They have a great competition for using it on FB running. I also had a plan for a quote to include on the other side of this piece of card on the right.

I gold embossed my Visible Image stamp quote on the lid. I added perfect pearls too for some shine.

 I didn't want to use ribbon so I used twine and when I added this to the edges of my niche, inspiration stuck me........I would make the inside like a little rock pool and even make a message in a bottle.

 I put teeny weeny shells in the bottle and a little key and tied the neck with twine and a heart which I altered with alcohol inks. This would be "the keys to my heart". This little bottle is only about 1" or 3cm tall.

 Yes I'm sorry I am a born romantic and after 36 years of being with M, I won't be changing.

So here is my finished niche. It was so hard to photograph so thought I would show some photos as it is opens up.

This is the lid tied with twine. To give an idea of size it is 8cm or 3" in diameter.

This is a side view showing the pearl fastening I made

untie the twine....

and here is my love message to my Hb. It's a T Holtz quote stamp.

Underneath you can see my little rock pool niche emerging

Take out the message in a bottle, complete with the keys to my heart ;0)

and these shells and piece of sea glass sit glistening in their rock pool niche

In case you are thinking I have filled it with water...the secret is Glossy Accents and a sprinkle of frantage. I had such fun making this, my always vivid imagination got really carried away. I gave it to my Hb this evening and his initial silence as he opened the lid and read the love letter made me think he quite likes it and it stirred lots of our seaside memories.

I would like to enter my rock pool niche into the following challenges.

Paperartsy Niches
A Vintage Journey Through the looking glass
Rhedd's creative spirit anything goes
Simon says stamp Monday In the middle my rock pool is in the middle of my niche
Inspiration Journal Everything goes
Papertake Weekly words words words
Stamps and stencils  anything goes
That's Crafty  grunge grunge grunge
Simon Says stamp Wednesday make your own background
Cute card Thursday charmed I used a heart charm and a key charm in and on my little glass bottle.

Thanks for visiting me and a warm welcome to my latest followers, it's great to see you here  following my creative journey. I'm off to my Finnabair inspired/Prima workshop on Sunday....I am really excited. I will share my makes with you next week.

Tomorrow we're off to Southampton for some Daisy Jane time. A pretty perfect weekend in my books.

Enjoy your weekend and I hope you get some crafting time yourselves.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x