I had fun using two unexpected craft materials in this 10 x 10 canvas piece: Tissue Paper and plastic reusable fish shaped ice cubes.  I made two versions, one that is easy for the kids to duplicate and the version above.

I got the fish shaped reusable ice cubes at the big box store and could hardly wait to make this collage with a blank 10 x 10 wrapped canvas, three shades of tissue paper and some Mod Podge.

Tear one sheet of the tissue paper into “odd” strips and sort them so the straight edge (where you started the tear) is at the top of your pile so you can keep track of the straight edges.

After you apply a little Mod Podge to the canvas edge with a brush, line up the straight edge of a strip so it covers the Mod Podge. Next, straighten out the strip to see it’s “path”, then lift it up and  apply Mod Podge under the “path”. The last step is to apply a light coat of Mod Podge on top of the strip.  It sounds complicated but these steps go really fast, just light coats of Mod Podge and your brush will do the work.  The cool thing about lining up the straight strip is that each “path” will be different so you don’t have to work too hard to get a fabulous design.

Work from each side with the straight edges of the tissue only at the sides of the canvas.

The sides are covered with the individual strips on both sides.  However, there were some white spots left which I covered with strips of tissue paper that was tapered at both ends so the visual flow of the water was continued.

I placed the fish on the canvas to demonstrate how the kids could finish their picture with the plastic reusable fish ice cubes.

Since I am making this collage for July Art Walk, I added some gold foil lines to the canvas and decorated each fish with copper foil.

This is the pen I used to make the lines on the canvas.

After a few minutes, the adhesive is dry and you place a piece of gold foil over the adhesive.

Gold foil is very fragile, so I don’t worry about it falling apart, I press down on the foil and then just rub it all over until it sticks to the pen adhesive.

This is the metal gold leaf I used.  (I am an Amazon Affiliate, if you click and buy any of these products, I get a few $$ at no extra cost to you)

The gold foil breaks down quickly and I just continue rubbing until there is some gold on my lines.

This is the adhesive I used on the front of each fish (after I cut off the water plug and squirted out the water).  The adhesive is milky and turns clear when it is dry. It is amazingly easy to apply the copper leaf to the fish, just place it face down on the sheet and presto, it’s covered.

This copper leaf is what I used to make each fish shimmery and transformed like magic.  All that was left was to hot glue each little fish to the canvas.  Ta Dah!