This month on The Designer Crafts Connection blog, we are featuring U-Paint metals and Colorique by Lisa Marie Jimenez. The theme of this hop is holidays. So I chose Our lady of Guadalupe since a huge part of my holiday decorating is Mexico folk art! I decided to make a shrine. Enjoy! The metal shape I used for my shrine was 4" x 9" but you can use any size. The Colorique paints I used were Ruby Slippers, Honey Bee and Pacific Ocean. You can see all the colors here. Before painting, I washed the metal with hot soapy water to remove any residue. Then after drying I went over the whole thing with a little bit of rubbing alcohol. I primed the piece with a bit of gesso. Next I made sure it would fit in my shrine. This particular shrine is actually a cigar box with the lid removed. The Colorique paints flow very nicely and can be thinned with water if desired. I chose primary colors for easy blending and mixed some with the gesso as needed. I started off coloring in the flesh tones and yellow first. Then I set the metal piece aside to dry in between colors while I worked on the shrine. I painted the shrine with bright acrylic paints and constructed the rest of it using cardboard remnants. This particular box had a convenient rim all around the outside of the box. I painted those cardboard pieces and glued them in place onto the rim. Next I randomly decorated the inside of the shrine with paint, clip art and washi tape. I continued painting the metal piece, color by color, letting each hue dry before going onto the next detail. When I was done, I painted the piece with a thin layer of clear sealant. Then I added extra paint details, glitters, embellishments and flowers. I glued the metal piece in place on a small piece of wood that came with the cigar box. I used clear drying adhesive to add all the extras. "Highlights" on her robe were made with some shimmer paint. Lots and lots of glitter and bling! Thank you for coming by to see my creation! Be sure to visit The Designer Crafts Connection blog to see more painted metal idea's!