Moving Alcohol Inks with Air – Video

Posted: February 3, 2021 | Author: | Filed under: Alcohol Ink, Brutus Monroe, CAS, Dies, grafix, light as a feather, nesting squares, Penny Black, polar bears, Tutorial, Waffle Flower | Tags: , , , , , , , | 16 Comments

I’ve had the alcohol inks out recently and spent some time trying to get soft wavy patterns on craft plastic. I have seen several artists who do this technique beautifully but I am very much still a beginner with it. I have a few cards to share today along with a video showing my process for two of the panels. I worked on white craft plastic from Grafix which is heavyweight and totally opaque. For most of the panels featured today I used only two alcohol inks plus plenty of 99% rubbing alcohol; each panel was created with a metallic and a non-metallic ink.

This first panel was made with turquoise AI and gilded alloy AI; I love the range of blues when diluted with rubbing alcohol. The ‘for you’ Penny Black die cut is two layers of turquoise cardstock topped with one layer of pale gold.

This warm toned card was made with honeycomb AI and mined alloy AI then die cut with a WaffleFlower square nesting die. I used the WaffleFlower additional square dies to cut a larger copper square then added the PB ‘light as a feather’ die cut and a PB birthday sentiment embossed in Brutus Monroe penny embossing powder.

You can see the process for both cards above in the video below.

As I am working on alcohol ink panels I am evaluating my process and working out what I want to try next. I just bought a cheap lazy susan to work on the blown flowers and I’m pretty sure I don’t need to use as much coloured ink when I make the initial drops. You can be sure I will let you know what I discover.

I have a couple more cards made off camera using the same technique shown in the video. The card above features juniper AI and statue alloy AI with the PB ‘many thanks’ die cut from antique gold cardstock and stacked twice.

When this panel was finished it reminded me of photos of the artic and far north where the icebergs and glaciers are made up of beautiful shades of blue. It’s kind of a cross section perspective where we can see below and above the ice the bears are walking on. I did use two blue inks plus a silver for this one, ranger turquoise and stream with pinata silver. The bear die is ‘polar bears’ from Penny Black.

We’ve been watching Cecilia Blomdahl’s youtube channel about her life on Svalbard, an island off the north coast of Norway. She lives in the world’s northern most town. Polar bears are definitely around so you don’t wander outside the village without your weapon!

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Marbled hearts

Posted: February 2, 2021 | Author: | Filed under: Alcohol Ink, All my hearts, Foiling, Penny Black | Tags: , , , | 7 Comments

These hearts were cut from another alcohol inked panel, this one done with only pitch black ink from Ranger. The ink was diluted with rubbing alcohol and moved around on the panel with air and tilting. I also added some bubbles or circles by splattering some rubbing alcohol over the pattern.

I didn’t add foil straight away after completing the panel instead I came back to it days later and ran the panel through the minc with some red foil over the top. The red foil stuck to some nice fine lines as you can see as well as some chunkier sections. What you can’t see is an area where a large blob of foil attached itself. I avoided that area when cutting six hearts using a small heart die from the Penny Black set ‘all my hearts’. I cut six hearts from red foam to pop the hearts up on the card base.

I tried several times to take a photo which would show the dry embossed background behind the popped up hearts but I didn’t succeed. It seems you’re not going to see the shine of the foil and the dimension of the background in one photo. If you click on the photo above you might be able to see the texture a bit better. I used the embossing folder that came with the Gemini Junior, it’s called ‘Regency Swirls’ and it is one of those very detailed 3D folders. I am wanting to add to my embossing folder collection, I’d love to hear your suggestions for some subtle ones and some really fancy ones.

I completed the card with a sentiment from Penny Black’s ‘trust me’ set stamped in red ink and popped up on a narrow banner. Thanks for dropping in today; I will be back tomorrow with an alcohol ink tutorial video.

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Winter Wonder art journal page

Posted: February 1, 2021 | Author: | Filed under: A blizzard, Art Journal, Brusho, Classes, Dies, fir tree, Heather lowercase die set, online class, Penny Black, Pink Fresh studio, Skis 'n' sled, Snow time, winter trees, winter wardrobe | Tags: , , , | 6 Comments

After my son and I finished filming the stop animation intro for my Winter Wonder online class I didn’t know what to do with the painted background and all the die cuts we’d used. They lay on a tray still in their snowy formation for a few months gathering dust until I realised I could keep the scene if I transferred it to my art journal.

The initial spread was bigger than art journal page so I cut down the watercoloured background panel, cut new snowdrifts out of lighter weight cardstock and added ink blending to help them stand out. I saved the trees, sled, skis, mitts, snowflakes and bird all cut using the Penny Black dies listed below and glued them on. Yes the gluing almost finished me but I persevered and even glued the outline letters from Pink Fresh studio. I found that I do have a glue pen that works if you are patient and take note that enough glue if coming out.

If you haven’t scene the stop motion animation it is part of the promo for my WINTER WONDER class which teaches my methods for making cards with a northern winter theme. I’ll include the promo below just for fun and in case you’re new around here.

The scene shown in the journal page is mirrored outside right now; we have plenty of snow, we’ve been skiing and enjoying winter wonder all around us. Back in October-November when we filmed the class there was little to no snow!

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2021 BuJo – January pages

Posted: January 30, 2021 | Author: | Filed under: Bullet Journal, Dingbat notebooks, Stabilo .88 fine line pens | Tags: , , | 15 Comments

As I mentioned last weekend I have started a new journal or bullet journal or BuJo for short. This is the second one I’ve used and I am enjoying the process of working out what I need and don’t need to include. As you can imagine I am also enjoying making it pretty but in ways that don’t take all the time I should be spending on the ‘to do’ list I write in the journal!

This is my January title page; I know it’s almost February and I should be sharing the Feb page but I will catch up and start sharing ahead by March (I hope). I’m going to have a different theme for each month, otherwise I would get sick of them I’m sure. The January theme as you can see was mountains and trees. Start with what you know, right?

I die cut a 3¾” circle from a large post it then tore some more post-it edges to mask mountain tops while I blended a blue sky with chipped sapphire and stormy sky distress inks and blending brushes. Not too surprising that I would pick my favourite blue distress inks for my first theme. After blending the dark sky I turned the torn edge of the post it on its side to blend shadows on the mountain sides with stormy sky ink. I drew the trees with a Stabilo point 88 dark blue and a Papermate flair grey.

For the month double page spread I used the same products and method but added a circle mask for the moon before blending the sky. At present I don’t have activities outside the home other than groceries and exercise so I am recording those along with birthdays and the meals we make just so I remember what we’ve eaten lately and for ideas later when I don’t know what to cook.

During January I have also been using a habit tracking page for water consumption, vitamins and correspondence, a to-do list page and a project tracking page for design work, blogging and class planning. I’m still working the kinks out of the layouts and content but I used the same mountain and trees theme.

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Stockings are hung

Posted: January 29, 2021 | Author: | Filed under: brick wall, Christmas sentiments, Darkroom Door, Dies, knitting, layered Xmas wreath die set, Penny Black, stockings, Woodgrain | Tags: , , , , | 6 Comments

When I was making knitted panel cards a few weeks back I thought I should create a knitted stocking card at the same time. I also decided to try and make at least one, but hopefully more than one Christmas card each month. Usually I don’t feel like making Christmas cards after Christmas but I’m happy to right now so I made this little stocking and hung it by the chimney with care.

I stamped the Darkroom Door knitting pattern in versafine clair ‘glamorous’ ink, embossed in clear powder then painted over it with festive berries distress ink. I cut out a stocking with one of the Penny Black Christmas Stocking dies. To fill the stocking I cut foliage from watercolour paper using the PB layered wreath set then coloured the die-cuts with festive berries, pine needles and ground espresso distress inks. The stocking needed a bit more trim so I cut out a white cloud shape to and blended some brown ink around the edges.

To create a chimney I used a stencil and a stamp from Darkroom Door, the woodgrain stamp for the mantle and brick wall stencil for the bricks. I worked on hot pressed watercolour paper for both so I could blend distress inks and add watermarks. I stamped the wood with ground espresso archival ink so it wouldn’t blend then painted and blended ground espresso, black soot and rusty hinge distress inks over the top. I blended the same three distress inks through the stencil then spritzed some water over it before lifting the stencil. I blended some of the bricks with a paintbrush and added some black soot splatter.

The mortar around the bricks looked too white so I blended antique linen ink over the whole panel and used some to blend above the mantel too. To finish of the card I added a gold bow and a sentiment from the DD Christmas sentiment strip stamp.

So that’s one Christmas card done so far in 2021! Do you make Christmas cards all year?

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Alcohol ink + foil

Posted: January 28, 2021 | Author: | Filed under: Alcohol Ink, all the birthdays, Concord & 9th, Metropolitan, Penny Black, poppy edger | Tags: , , , , | 11 Comments

When I get the alcohol inks out I always have a stack of panels at the end of the session. Some sit around and never amount to much but others wait for inspiration to hit. This one was created on white craft plastic (Grafix dura-bright white) with ginger and burgandy Ranger alcohol inks and Pinata magenta. I added gold foil using the minc well after the inks had dried.

Sometimes it is possible to make the foil stick soon after finishing the inking. There is a sweet spot as far as letting the ink dry enough that it is not gooey but not so much that it is dry to touch. The sections that will hold the foil are the ‘seams’ between colours where the ink is thicker. If you press foil on these areas when they are a bit tacky you can get it to stick with just a bit of burnishing. If the panel has dried it sometimes possible to get foil to stick by running the panel through a minc or laminator using some heat. This can be risky as sometimes the foil sticks to more of the panel than you expected.

When I ran this panel through the minc I was happy with most of the foiling but there were a few sections that didn’t look great so I just used the part that looked good and covered the rest with this pretty poppy edger from Penny Black. I finished the card with a gold embossed sentiment from the PB ‘only you’ set.

This second panel amazes me because it was created with only black alcohol ink plus rubbing alcohol. The blue and burgandy tones appeared when the black ink was diluted. Cool huh? I pressed the blue foil onto this panel at just the right time to get it to stick when the seams were tacky. It is hard to get it to show in the photo but there are small sections of blue foil here and there across the sky.

The inking on both panels was pretty experimental, a drop here and there some rubbing alcohol and tilting and blowing the ink to make a random pattern. I cut the Penny Black metropolitan die from both black and blue cardstock then stacked blue on black without removing all the window cut outs. I ended up using spray adhesive on the back of the blue die cut because gluing is not my gifting.

The sentiment is from the Concord & 9 ‘all the birthdays set stamped in black and embossed in clear then stacked up on two layers of black cardstock. More alcohol inks next week; I’m having fun.

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Snowflake Skies – Video

Posted: January 27, 2021 | Author: | Filed under: Alcohol Ink, grafix, neighbourhood border, Penny Black | Tags: , , , | 5 Comments

I teamed up with Grafix to create a couple of snowy projects on their Duralar plastic films. The card you see on the left and below was inked on white craft plastic, also know as DuraBright white. It is totally opaque and has a bit of weight to it. For the votive wrap I used Dura-Lar matte film which is lighter weight and has a frosted transparent appearance which was what I wanted so the light from a votive would shine through.

I used stream and denim alcohol inks and felt to apply the inks to the plastic films. To create the snowflake patterns I die-cut a Penny Black snowflake from felt and stuck it to the wooden back from a old stamp. You can see the whole process in the video below.

I cut the Penny Black neighborhood border from Dura-Bright white for both the votive and the card.

You can see in the video and the photo above how the colours in the votive surround look different with a light inside; I guess it would depend too whether your battery votive candle was a white one or more of a yellow glow.

I’m really enjoying working with the Dura-bright white for alcohol ink projects and will be trying more techniques on the Dura-Lar matte in the future. If you are looking for the bright white remember it also goes by the name white craft plastic. Crop A While might have some and Deserres does carry it.

I’ve been working on a few different alcohol ink techniques so there will be more cards to share and another video next week.

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Big & Bold thank you cards

Posted: January 25, 2021 | Author: | Filed under: Brutus Monroe, Colorado Craft Company, Concord & 9th, Daisy & Dahlia, Karin brushmarkers, phrase builder you, Pink Fresh studio, simple serif alphabet dies | Tags: , , , , | 9 Comments

I’ve teamed up with the Foiled Fox again, as I love to do and I’m sharing two cards featuring the Colorado Stamp Company’s ‘daisy & dahlia’ stamp. I made a couple of cards last year with this stamp using a very different colour scheme.

On the card above I wanted to show you how much depth and variation you can get from single Karin brushmarkers. I was so happy to see the light and shadow I could achieve on each petal with one or two dabs of ink from the marker then blending with water. The blue flower on the right which is barely showing was coloured with a bold dark blue but as you can see it was possible to dilute it to a pale blue. I used the following Karin brushmarkers on the panel: black, henna, cool grey , rose wood, cyan, turquoise, royal blue.

It’s not easy to see but you might notice a white on white embossed image on the card base; it’s the same stamp providing a bit of texture. You can learn more about my process by visiting the Foiled Fox blog today

I kept some of the colours but went for a bolder look on my second card embossing the same large stamp in white on black cardstock. As you can see this stamp works as a coloured image and and a black and white image. White on red, red on white, blue on white, there are many colour combos which I’m sure would also look bright and beautiful.

Make sure you check out all the details on the Foiled Fox blog and take the time to check out Shauna’s stunning floral card from last Friday; it is a beauty.

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2021 Bullet journal – an intro

Posted: January 23, 2021 | Author: | Filed under: Bullet Journal | Tags: , | 4 Comments

New Year, new journal. I started a bullet journal/dot journal in 2018 and used it off and on for the last three years. I created some pretty spreads with coloured pens and carefully planned layouts but also some loosely organised lists and scribbled reminders. I used it for meal planning, book logging, exercise records and blog planning. I switched between different coloured pens and went through a phase of adding old magazine pics to my layouts. There were lists of cards sent and received, chore lists and notes about craft products waiting to be used in projects. I abandoned it for months at a time and came back to it with new ideas. It was handy and it gave me a chance to work out how a bullet journal could work for me.

The first journal was a Fabriano dot journal which was a great size and price; it sat flat and had pages you could easily remove (a plus and a minus). My new dot journal is a little more upmarket; it is a Dingbats notebook from the Earth collection with a hard cover, sewn binding, slightly heavier weight dotted paper, numbered pages and a few designated key and index pages at the beginning. The fact that is is my favourite colour with an embossed image symbolising the Great Barrier Reef on the front is just a bonus. It has two ribbon bookmarks and a pen holder on the side.

After learning from my first bullet journal experience I plan to use the new one as both a planner and a recorder. I already have pages ruled up to log books read in 2021. I’ve created a chore list to keep track of when I last cleaned this or that part of my house. My exercise log is up to date with days I’ve done boot camp, x-country skiing, walking or running. Those are all pages for the whole year. I’ve also designed and started using some January pages I will share with you next weekend. I’m hoping to post bullet journal pages on Saturday or Sunday starting today with my 2021 title page.

You know what it’s like when you have a brand new notebook or journal; it can be nerve wracking to make a mark on the first page. I decided to keep it simple so I wouldn’t mess it up. I sketched the numbers in pencil, went over them with a dark blue Stabilo fine 0.4 marker then used the same marker for the circles and lines. To add colour I punched circles from a post-it note and used it as a stencil to blend through with a range of archival inks. Safe and simple for my first page.

I will be trying different inks and markers through the year as I try to keep the bleed-through to a minimum. You can see some of the design through the back of the page so it will be interesting to see how other products compare.

I would love to hear if you are keep a bullet journal (BuJo), dot journal or something similar. There are thousands of inspirational designs and ideas out on the interwebs; I’ve spent more time than I should browsing through instagram and pinterest. If you have some hot tips or tried and true techniques please let me know. If you’ve never heard of bullet journaling, don’t worry, I’ll be back with cards on Monday!

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Wish upon a star

Posted: January 22, 2021 | Author: | Filed under: Celebrations, Dies, Penny Black, We R Memorykeepers | Tags: , | 14 Comments

Shaker cards are very very rare around here: I think I’ve only put one on the blog before today. I bought the nesting star dies recently on whim (I think they are discontinued but other companies make similar dies ). This card is for a little girl who turns five next week so I thought a little shimmer and shake might be fun.

I had the plan in my head with a starry sky watercolour panel for either the front of the shaker panel or the background then decided both would be best. I had pretty micro beads in six different colours so I thought it would be cool to co-ordinate the sequins, beads and inks.

Making the watercolour panels was very straightforward; I smooshed Papertrey ink cubes on the glass mat, spritzed shimmer spray (homemade water + gold pearlex powder) on the inks then swiped the panel through the ink several times until it was mostly covered. I finished the coverage using a paintbrush to add ink here and there. There was masking fluid already on the panel before I started so that added to the night sky look.

Once I started doing the ‘shaker card’ steps I remembered why I don’t make shaker cards. For me this one had an extreme fiddliness factor! I will happily spend hours no-line watercolouring an intricate flower but taping around all the points of five stars to seal the shaker area of each one was above and beyond! But then I put the micro beads, sequins and stars in each section, attached the watercoloured background, turned it over and…happy sigh, it was as cute as I’d hoped.

I won’t describe the process for making a shaker card; I think you would be better off watching a video from someone who has made more than two! I know there are many ways to build them up but my layers were: die-cut star watercolour layer, acetate layer, foam layer with star die-cuts then watercolour background layer. When I had all the layers stuck together I attached it to a square of shimmer blue cardstock and die cut the PB ‘make a wish’ sentiment from the same cardstock three times for stacking. I realise now I should have cut it from a brighter colour but the glue is stuck!

I’m happy with how it turned out and I love how it shakes (the micro beads move a lot while the sequins cling to the acetate) but I think it might be another five years before I make another one. How about you, do you whip up the occasional shaker card?

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