April 2016 Papertrey Ink Blog Hop

Today is the Monthly Blog Hop for Papertrey Ink and I spent a considerable amount of time figuring out my project for today.  Nichole always has the most interesting inspiration photos for us to launch our projects from and this month is no exception!

Inspiration Photo

Astronomy Chart

The image on the left is our inspiration photo. It made my head spin with all the different possibilities I can see in it. Do you see pulley's and gears, clock faces, medallions, kaleidoscopes, astronomy charts or something else entirely? It could be the center of the universe, the center of an eye or probably a hundred other things.  There's no wrong or right answer it's all about perspective.

For me, as soon as I saw the inspiration image, I thought of Mehndi Medallions and Hands of Time.  Ultimately, I couldn't choose between them so I incorporated both into this card along with the Mehndi Medallions Mini Stamp Set.

For this card I started by doing ink blending using Ranger Mini Ink Blending Tools on a 4.25 x 5.5 inch piece of Canson Bristol Watercolor Paper with Lavender Moon, Hibiscus Burst and Plum Pudding.  Once I had the color applied, I misted it with Tsukineko Sheer Shimmer Spritz which has quite a bit of moisture in it and helps the inks to blend and move on the watercolor paper, giving a softer blended line where the color changes not to mention that gorgeous sparkle. Twinkling Paper is my trademark afterall. *Ü*

Once the ink blended panel was completely dry, I used both clock faces from Hands of Time Stamp Set and some of the smaller medallions from the Mehndi Medallions Set.  I stamped with Versamark and heat set using Ranger Gold Tinsel Embossing Powder.  This embossing powder has gold glitter in it so no matter what you are using it on, it looks rich and regal.

I also misted a piece of Lavender Moon Cardstock for the mat to the watercolor panel. Funny thing about the Lavender Moon Cardstock --  It's more pink than purple.  Both of these were die cut with the largest of the Simon Says Stamp Stitched Rectangle Dies.  To get the smaller frame, I carefully realign the paper into the die and cut again making it just slightly smaller than the original frame but bigger than the next size die.

I cut the "Awesome" word from a Waffle Flower Die using gold foil poster board which is all I ever use anymore because it is so cost effective.  I talked about this in a previous post here.

Like many before me, Heat Embossing was my "aha" moment in Stamping and Card Making and I try to incorporate that as often as possible into my cards.  You can find embossing powder in a vast array of colors but I use Gold most often.  I like both Gold and Gold Sparkle Embossing Powders followed by Platinum and Platinum Sparkle.

I'll be adding this image over on the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Blog for their theme of "Show Us Your Metal" and their Wednesday Challenge Blog for "Make It Girly".

Thanks for joining me on the Papertrey Ink Monthly Blog Hop.  I love reading your comments if you'd like to leave one and I hope you'll come back soon to see another project.

Ink Blending

One of my favorite techniques in card making is ink blending on Watercolor Paper. For this Card I am using Canson Bristol Watercolor Paper.  It's a lot of fun to take a plain piece of white and watch it magically become a beautifully colored background. It's also a really fantastic way to create a one layer card that has lots of hints of depth and dimension. If you combine that with another favorite technique, heat embossing, it can create a visually impactful card.

I have a couple of girlfriends who are battling Breast Cancer right now.  One lives near and the other lives in Carolina Panther Territory.  I have made them both several cards. For my girlfriend who lives nearby, I take a home cooked meal out before each Chemotherapy Session so that she doesn't have to cook for a few days following her infusion.  Growing up in a family of 6 kids and 2 parents, I have still never learned how to make smaller portions, so I have enough homemade Chicken and Noodles to feed a small army!  Between me, her family, her church family and her friends, I hope she has enough food for quite a few days and I hope I'm doing enough to help.

Angie's favorite color is Orange and I wanted to make a card to take out with the meal we're dropping by tonight.  Normally, we take it out the day before her infusion but I won't be around this weekend so we're going to drop it by this evening.

Like me, Angie likes a little bling.  I used SU!'s Calypso Coral with a Tim Holtz Mini Ink Blending Tool to ink up this background panel, applying a heavier concentration of color toward the center. Once I had that done, I spritzed it all over with some Iridescent Gold Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist. The Glimmer Mist I have is several years old and was purchased locally when I lived in Dallas although that store is closed now and Simon Says Stamp doesn't carry it but I think the Tsukineko Gold Shimmer Spritz would do the job for you. I think you can catch a little bit of the sparkle and shine in the photograph, but it's so much more beautiful in real life!

One of my favorite things I've discovered recently is Metallic Glitter Embossing Powders.  For this card I used Ranger's Gold Tinsel Embossing Powder with Papertrey Ink's Mehndi Medallions and Graceful Greetings which is my current favorite sentiment set.  I just love the typography of this font and I hope that Betsy Veldman will create others.  It's important to note that the ink and the shimmer sprays must be completely dry before you attempt embossing and you do need to use a powder tool, powder pouch or even just dust the front off with cornstarch before you attempt to emboss it so you don't get powder where you don't want it.

Once I had all my stamping completed and heat set, I used the largest Simon Says Stamp Stitched Rectangle to die cut the panel and adhered it to a top folding A2 white card base made from Stamper's Select White Cardstock.

The Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge this week is one-layer cards so I'll be entering this card over there.  The Mehndi Medallions make really quick work of a lovely looking card that stays flat for mailing.  Thank you so much for stopping by today and I hope you'll come back soon.

Mehndi Medallions

If you know me, it goes without saying that I am a big fan of bling on my cards. I've started using the WOW! Metallic Sparkle Embossing Powders quite a bit lately and I love them.  In fact, I need to get more to fill my containers a little fuller.  I wanted to make sure I liked it first so only ordered a small jar initially. "Like" would be an understatement.

I had pinned this card a few years ago from Pinterest that was made by Laurie Willison with the Papertrey Ink Mehndi Medallion Stamp Set. Mehndi refers to what we commonly call Henna.  I love this card and when I checked, they still had those in stock so I ordered one and I sat down to play with it a bit last night.

After studying Laurie's card for a minute, it was pretty clear that she had done ink blending on her panel although in her case I think she embossed first so it would resist the ink.  Since I planned to use a glittered embossing powder, I wanted to emboss last so I wouldn't knock all of the glitter off in the process of ink blending.  On a piece of Canson Bristol 96# Watercolor Paper, I used Simon Says Stamp Teeny Bikini and SU! Crumb Cake inks for my card front with my Ranger Mini Ink Blending Tool in a circular motion.  I inked up the center first using the Teeny Bikini and then went around the outside edge with Crumb Cake. Laurie actually used Tim Holtz Distress Inks to do hers, but I just used the inks I had in similar colors.  As long as they are a dye based ink and not pigment ink, this works.

After I had the ink blended the way I wanted to, I misted it with Tsukineko Sheer Shimmer Spritz and set it aside to dry before I did my embossing.  That makes the colors just kind of melt into each other for seamless blending or you can use plain water spritzed on there if you don't want the shimmer. After that dried I used my powder tool over the entire surface of the card to prevent any stray embossing powder particles.

This set has several sizes of these medallions in it and there is a Mini Mehndi Stamp Set that has matching/coordinating stamps in it. I stamped the medallions first then heat set them using WOW! Metallic Gold Sparkle Embossing Powder. Then I stamped my greeting which came from PTI's Graceful Greetings Stamp Set and heat embossed it with the same embossing powder.

I cut that panel with the Simon Says Stamp Stitched Rectangle Die and adhered it to a top folding Ivory card base. Over all, this was a quick, simple card that is a single layer which is great for mailing.

I love the look of layers and my next project will probably have layers, but I have also come to appreciate the CAS (Clean & Simple) style as well for mailing purposes. Since I mail nearly all of the cards I make, that is important to me and this card proves that clean and simple doesn't have to be ugly!

I'll be entering this card over on the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge Blog in the "Something New" category as I used a new stamp set.  I cherish each comment that is made here on my blog.  Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!