Altered Gift Wrapping Tube

During my crafting weekend at Belstead House we celebrated the upcoming milestone birthday of one of our friends. A beautiful display of cupcakes was presented, each one sitting on an approximately 2" length of cardboard wrapping paper inner tube which had been covered in white paint and had music stamped on to it.  As we chose our cake, we were challenged to alter the base it sat on during the weekend.

I started by covering the tube with Tim Holtz brushed corduroy distress ink and then spritzing some Dylusions chocolate spray ink onto my craft mat and rolled the tube through it and then finally spritzed Tattered Angels marshmallow glimmer mist. Next I cut a kraft cardstock circle just bigger that the tube which I attached to the bottom and another one the same size as the tube to sit on the top which effectively created a mini top hat. Next I added faux stitching in black pen to the edge of the top hat brim before covering the whole piece in Claudine Hellmuth matt multi-medium. As this was our last weekend at Belstead House due to its imminent closure I used that as my theme. I punched a couple of tickets and love hearts in kraft cardstock and wrote my sentiments and faux stitching before covering with Tim Holtz rock candy crackle paint. I attached the first ticket to the side of the hat and attached the other 2 pieces to acetate and stood them up on the top of the top hat. I then cut a Tim Holtz elegant flourishes in sticky backed cork and added it to the other side of the top hat. I cut 3sets of Tim Holtz tattered florals in Glassine paper and leaving the largest flower out, I distressed the 9 remaining flowers by scrunching them and covering with distress ink and glimmer mist, I attached them together with a gold brad and added them to the top of the top hat. Finally each of our cup cakes had a friend quote flag  in the top and mine says 'A friend is someone who reaches for your hand and touches your heart', I inked the paper quote and the cocktail stick it was attached to and poked into the top of the top hat.

I am entering this piece into this week's Out of a Hat Creations challenge 35 - Music. I think I might be stretching it a bit this week but hopefully it qualifies although the music stamping is now rather hidden by my inking and distressing but if you look closely you can just about make it out.

To give you an idea, this is how the tube started out.

Thanks for looking!
Tracey x