Simply irresistible challenge reminder

Today I have a couple more emboss resist projects to remind you we would love to see your projects on the Simply Irresistible Challenge. The Foiled Fox and I have teamed up (as we like to do these days) to issue you with a card challenge. You just need to make a card featuring the emboss resist technique, load it up on your own blog or social media platform then link it on our challenge page.

I embossed the Queen Anne’s Lace stamps on hot pressed watercolour paper for today’s cards then painted over the panels with gansai tambi watercolour paints. As you can see in the close ups, the paint resists the embossing and pools darker in some of the enclosed spaces or against the embossed stems. It is such a cool technique.

I played with two colour schemes, my tried and true blue/pink combo and a deeper blue/green one. The gansai tambi paints can be a bit opaque if not diluted enough so I used sufficient water for them to run over the embossing and resist it, not cover it.

Supplies

Stamps: happy wishes, flower sparks (PB)
Inks: versamark (Tsukineko)
Paints: gansai tambi (Kuretake)
Paper: hot pressed watercolour paper, white and black cardstock (Neenah) blue and green cardstock
Also: opaque white embossing powder (WOW)

Playful Emboss Resist

Posted: June 22, 2017 | Author: Heather | Filed under: Playful | Tags: Brusho, Fabriano Watercolour Paper, Kuretake Gansai Tambi watercolour paints, liquid metals, Penny Black creative dies, Penny Black stamps | 12 Comments

I’m still playing with the emboss resist technique, hoping to inspire you to get involved in the Simply Irresistible challenge the Foiled Fox and I have happening right now.

The three cards I’m sharing today were made from panels left over after teaching a class a few months ago. I used gansai tambi paints on the top card and the middle card. On the top card I added gold shimmer to both the flowers and the petals with some Ken Oliver liquid metal.

On the card below I used brusho paints, a red and a green, sprinkled over the embossed panel then activated carefully with water. In places the green and red blended creating some brown/orange tones.

I hope there are a few ideas here that might inspire you to do some emboss resist card making then link it up on The Foiled Fox blog.

Supplies

Stamps: playful, snippets
Dies: omg
Inks: versamark, versafine onyx black
Embossing powder: clear, white and silver WOW embossing powders
Paint: gansai tambi watercolours, brusho crystals, gold liquid metal (Ken Oliver)

Turquoise birthday

Posted: June 19, 2017 | Author: Heather | Filed under: Felicity | Tags: Brusho, Penny Black creative dies, Penny Black stamps | 5 Comments

I am back with the same stamp featured in my previous post, ‘Felicity’ from Penny Black. I wanted to show you another look incorporating the emboss resist technique. I embossed the stamp in white powder on hot pressed watercolour paper then chose turquoise brusho powder to add the colour over the top. I sprinkled brusho then spritzed water and tilted my panel to get the colour to move. I alternated between sprinkling and spritzing until there was enough colour on the panel then used a paint brush to fill the large surrounding areas with turquoise paint. I love the way some spaces captured deep colour and others remained almost white. That is the beauty of combining the emboss resist technique with brusho.

To finish off this card I added a sentiment die cut from foam then coloured it with clear wink of stella to make it sparkle.

I hope you will be inspired to pull out some embossing powder for the emboss resist challenge I am co-hosting with The Foiled Fox.

I’m looking forward to seeing what you come up with.

Supplies

Stamps: Felicity (PB)
Dies: Dies: birthday (PB)
Paper: hot pressed watercolour paper, Neenah solar white cardstock
Inks: versamark (Tsukineko)
Also: white embossing powder, clear wink of stella

Simply Irresistible – A Card Challenge

Posted: June 15, 2017 | Author: Heather | Filed under: birds and banners, Felicity, Guest design | 6 Comments

I am very excited to share today’s post; I’ve teamed up with The Foiled Fox to host a challenge. It’s a fun one and there are some generous prizes from The Foiled Fox on offer. As the name hints, the challenge involves the emboss resist method, one of my recent fave techniques. I decided to use the distress oxide inks alongside some gold embossing because I wanted to see how the DiOxes worked with emboss resist.

I worked on hot pressed watercolour paper, embossing the Felicity stamp first, then blending DiOx inks on top. The gold embossing resisted the ink and remained shiny. Next I coloured inside all the flowers and leaves with a wink of stella clear marker which added sparkle and oxidized the colour making it all lighter. I splattered some sparkly ink of stella liquid here and there also.

I used gold cardstock to frame the panel and create a die cut banner. I stamped on the banner with wilted violet DiOx ink and was impressed by the sharpness of the impression; I didn’t emboss it, just left it to dry. The banner is popped up on violet foam which just happens to match perfectly. Yay!

Now that you have seen how easy a little emboss resisting is please let the inspiration flow then link your card up on The Foiled Fox blog. The guidelines and link up are on their blog and you have two weeks to participate. I will be popping over there regularly to see what you have dreamed up. I can’t wait. Here’s a short cut if you are ready to post or looking for inspiration Simply Irresistible Link Up

Market news and a gilded card

Posted: June 14, 2017 | Author: Heather | Filed under: Gilding Flakes, Hypnotic | Tags: Gilding, Penny Black stamps, Penny Black stencils | 5 Comments

I know there hasn’t been much popping up here on the blog lately. My excuse is definitely craft market preparations. If you are a local please come and check out CraftFest 2017 this weekend. The market will be held on Albert Island which is not far from the War Museum. There will be close to sixty vendors on Saturday and you will find me at the Paper Duet booth with The Crafty Cigale and guest artist, Connie Schulz. We will have cards for all reasons and seasons along with bookmarks, gift tags and wine tags. I would suggest parking at or near the War Museum then walking the short distance across the bridge to Albert Island. Directions.

My recent gilded cards will all be on sale at the market including this bright blue and silver one. I used a Penny Black stencil and the Tsukineko Essential Glue pad. I sponged the glue onto a panel painted with colorburst powders. After removing the stencil I added silver gilding flakes.

I used the same technique mentioned in my previous post to create a gilded sentiment and tucked a little stamped ‘you are’ in behind the silvery die cut ‘wonderful’.

I will be back on Friday with an exciting post the Foiled Fox and I have dreamed up. Make sure you check back in.

Supplies

Stencil: hypnotic (PB)
Dies: awesome (PB)
Paint: colorburst powders
Adhesives: essential glue pad (Tsukineko), Stick it adhesive
Shiny things: Nuvo silver bullion gilding flakes
Cardstock: hot pressed watercolour paper, Neenah solar white cardstock
Also: adhesive backed foam

Gilded butterflies

Posted: June 9, 2017 | Author: Heather | Filed under: butterfly charmer, Gilding Flakes | Tags: Nuvo gilding flakes, Penny Black creative dies, Penny Black stamps | 4 Comments

I’ve been gilding again! This time for a guest post on the Foiled Fox blog. These lovely gilding flakes came from the Foiled Fox and I think they are so very pretty. I have shared two techniques for applying the flakes so far (here and here).

For today’s cards I used another technique and I was pleasantly surprised to see how well it worked. I used a glue pad to stamp the large butterfly charmer stamp on black cardstock. After stamping I let the glue sit and change colour before pressing the flakes onto it. I used both gold and silver flakes.

I had fun gilding the sentiments too. I cut both from adhesive backed foam and pressed the gilding flakes directly onto the adhesive side then smoothed them all over and into the nooks and crannies. I then stuck the gilded die cut sentiments onto my butterfly panels.

For more details on my process please visit the Foiled Fox blog. The supplies I used are linked below.

Supplies

Stamp: butterfly charmer (PB)
Dies: birthday, dream big (PB)
Adhesives: essential glue pad (Tsukineko), Stick it adhesive
Shiny things: Nuvo silver bullion gilding flakes, Nuvo radiant gold bullion gilding flakes
Cardstock: Neenah epic black cardstock
Also: adhesive backed foam

Lustrous roses

Posted: June 2, 2017 | Author: Heather | Filed under: Lustrous | Tags: Penny Black stamps, Ranger Distress stains, Tsukineko Versafine inks | 8 Comments

I am featuring another of the new floral stamps from Penny Black’s Poetic release on today’s cards. This pretty rose stamp is called lustrous. I used the same technique to create these panels as I did for my blue daisies yesterday. I worked with distress stains and a MISTI to add one colour at a time to hot pressed watercolour paper. On the card above I started with spun sugar stain, then worn lipstick and finally some abandoned coral on the petals and buds. The leaves and stems are once again forest moss because I always reach for forest moss for foliage. I did the rosehips in coral and festive berries to make them darker than the petals.

On the birthday card above I started with scattered straw instead of spun sugar stain so the undertone would be more yellow and the end result more apricot than pink. The very pale print on the anniversary card below is second generation stamping using the stain left on the stamp after creating one of the panels above. I just spritzed lightly then stamped again.

It is not surprising that my first panels with new brushstroke stamps are done with distress stains. I love the way the stains blend on the hot pressed paper. The sentiments are all from the banner sentiments set. True to my new resolution I stamped envelopes at the same time as the panels and these three cards are already packaged and ready for the craft market on June 17!

Supplies:

Stamps: lustrous, banner sentiments
Inks: onyx black, satin red versafine inks (Tsukineko), versafine ink spun sugar, worn lipstick, abandoned coral, festive berries, scattered straw, forest moss distress stains (Ranger)
Paper: hot pressed watercolour paper, red cardstock

Dancing Daisies

Posted: June 1, 2017 | Author: Heather | Filed under: dancing daisies | Tags: Fabriano Watercolour Paper, Finetec artist mica watercolour paint, Penny Black stamps, Ranger Distress stains | 10 Comments

It’s been a bit quiet here on the blog lately. I’m spending my time on the less exciting tasks of stamping matching envelopes, stamping my new name stamp on the back of cards and packaging up said cards for the upcoming craft market on June 17. I have made a new resolution to stamp a matching envelope at the same time as I make the card. It is a bit time consuming pulling out the stamps and inks to try and match what I made weeks or months ago. I know I don’t have to have matching envelopes but they are pretty.

Stamps from Penny Black’s new ‘Poetic’ release arrived in my mail box last week so I have been itching to create with them. This new cling stamp, Dancing Daisies, should possibly be yellow, or pink, or orange if you are looking for realism but I really wanted it in blue. I wanted a particular blue what’s more and as I didn’t have an ink that colour I stamped with three different distress stains to get the blue you see in the centre of the daisy above, right next to the yellow. I inked part of the petals with salty ocean distress stain first and stamped that, then switched to dusty concord and finally added blueprint sketch. I cleaned the stamp between applications so I didn’t contaminate the dauber on the distress stains. I used dried marigold and scattered straw on the flower centres and forest moss and crushed olive stains on the stems and leaves.

My second attempt is a little different as I used some of the same colour stsains but also pulled out my pearlescent finetec paints and painted some directly on the stamp and the panel, blue on the petals, green on the leaves and gold on the flower centres. It is hard to see in the photo but there is definitely some shimmer happening.

Both panels were stamped on hot pressed watercolour paper with the help of the MISTI so I could add the colours one at a time.

Supplies:

Stamps: dancing daisies
Inks: salty ocean, dusty concord, blueprint sketch, crushed olive, forest moss, dried marigold, scattered straw distress stains (Ranger)
Paint: finetec pearlescent paints
Paper: hot pressed watercolour paper

Silver Dragonflies

Posted: May 26, 2017 | Author: Heather | Filed under: Flutters, Gilding Flakes | Tags: color burst, Fabriano Watercolour Paper, Gilding, Penny Black creative dies | 9 Comments

My second gilded card also features dragonflies, this time little silver ones. In my previous post I shared a card gilded in both gold and silver flakes; this time I just used silver because I think silver and blue look so very pretty together. I used stick it adhesive once again to attach the gilding to the watercolour panel and colorburst powders to create the background panel.

I sprinkled three colours of colorburst powder on watercolour paper then sprinkled with water. Once the colours were blending nicely I used a brush to spread the colour to the edges of the panel. I dried it with a heat tool then added droplets of water a few at a time and dabbed some of them up with a paper towel. I dried the panel in between each batch of water droplets so I could get a mass of water marks. I die-cut three dragonflies from stick it adhesive then applied them to the watercolour panel, removed the backing paper and rubbed silver gilding flakes on top. I burnished with a plastic scrubby pad to remove the excess flakes. It’s finished with a frame of silver spiderweb fabric that comes from France and happens to match the gilding flakes perfectly.

Supplies:

Dies: Flutters
Cardstock: Neenah solar white cardstock, hot pressed watercolour paper
Also: stick it adhesive sheets
Shimmery Stuff: silver spiderweb fabric, Nuvo silver bullion gilding flakes

Gilded Dragonfly

Posted: May 23, 2017 | Author: Heather | Filed under: Dragonfly Frame, Gilding Flakes | Tags: Gilding, Penny Black creative dies | 11 Comments

The lovely folk at The Foiled Fox have been spoiling me again, this time with gilding flakes. I tend not to add sparkly elements to all my cards but I do like the option of a little or sometimes a lot when a card asks for bling. I had no idea just how much I would like playing Midas with the Nuvo gilding flakes. They arrived on Friday, I experimented with them on Saturday and turned my panels into cards yesterday. If I didn’t have classes to plan and groceries to buy I would probably play with them more today.

My initial experiments have resulted in six cards which I will share over the next little while. I played with a few techniques for adhering the gilding flakes and today’s is possibly the most effective so far. A word of warning, the gilding flakes are lighter than feathers and they do go everywhere! Jennifer McGuire suggested a swiffer cloth for clean up so I might just need to get one of those! To create the gilded background I cut a piece of ‘stick-it’ adhesive sheet larger than my dragonfly frame die and stuck it to a piece of white cardstock then removed the backing paper. Next I cut the dragonfly frame from black cardstock and positioned it on top of the adhesive rectangle on the white cardstock. I gently laid both silver and gold gilding flakes onto the adhesive panel and pressed lightly. The gilding adheres effortlessly to the ‘stick’it’, filling the entire area not covered by the black die cut. I burnished the flakes gently with a scrubby which breaks off excess pieces and makes sure all the adhesive is covered. The scrubby tends to turn the shiny silver and gold to brushed silver and gold so if you want maximum shine then burnish with your fingers or something smoother than a scrubby.

I trimmed the panel keeping a gilded border round the die cut frame. I wanted something extra behind the panel but not too much so I wrapped a strip of silver spiderweb fabric around my black card base then attached the gilded panel over the top. I finished the card with a white paper panel inside to write on and an envelope decorated with the die cut dragonfly. I am training myself to complete a card/envelope combo each time rather than have to catch up with envelopes at a later date. I have a booth in a craft market next month so most cards I make at present will be heading to Craft-Fest 2017 on June 17 here in Ottawa. More about the market in the days to come.

Supplies

Die: dragonfly frame (PB)
Cardstock: solar white, epic black (Neenah) textured white paper
Also: stick it adhesive (Ken Oliver), silver bullion gilding flakes, radiant gold bullion gilding flakes (Nuvo), silver spiderweb fabric from France