Ideas for metallic embellishment with water colour wash tips

 

I have really enjoyed creating for this blog hop, mainly because I love to tinker with ink and see what I can do.  Our theme is Metallic Embellishment and many I'm sure will share some fab ideas for using the new Hot Foil Machine that Stampin' Up! has recently launched. However I don't have this yet and so decided to share some different metallic embellishment ideas with you using embossing powder, embossing paste, flower accents gems and water colour washes.  I hope you like the simple ideas to create some rather different designs.  

Watch the video tutorial to see versions of both these cards being created and a bonus idea at the end.  Enjoy the blog hop.

Thanks for joining our monthly Totally Techniques Blog Hop we share a technique and lots of ideas on the last Friday of each month usually.

Have a great weekend.

Zoe x

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Available to buy from 1st September 

Shop Supplies

Embossing paste

Fluid 100 watercolour paper

secret sea ink refill

Cajun Craze Ink card page

Flower Accents

wow metallic embossing powder bundle

Ink smooshing for Totally Techniques Blog Hop

 

Hi lovely crafty followers it's our May Totally Techniques blog hop today with international Stampin' Up! demonstrators sharing tips and ideas for using the ink smooshing technique.  It's great for creating fun backgrounds for things like submarines and also for creating fun patterns and colour combos on watercolour paper that you can use for die cutting.

I used the Submarine Life stamp and punch bundle to create a fun card to say hello, but the set includes several fun sentiments that could be used and how you set your scene is up to you.  Let's face it who doesn't love a 'yellow submarine' and now you have an ear worm for the rest of the day!  In a past life I spent a little time on a submarine and it was fun. Just like Stampin' Up! has brought lots of new friends and contacts I have lots of fond memories of a previous role where I have great friends now retired from submarines so that is why this bundle of products appealed to me. 

My video shows how to create the ink smooshed background and then I've added an underwater scene using the stamps from the set and a little fussy cutting.  It was fun to create and I know it will bring a smile to the person I'm planning to send it to.  

I used the ink on the glass mat version to lift ink with a piece of window sheet to colour a white heat embossed image for the next card.  It looked a little messy with the whole piece of watercolour paper, but die cut it gives a more arty view and layered onto an embossed background it tones it down.  I embossed the background using my scoreboard which made the even distances really easy to achieve.  The Layers of Beauty bundle is proving popular.  It's hard to believe how many different way you can use this set.  If you haven't fallen for it yet you may want to look out for our June promotion starting on the 5th when you can get a bonus extra 10% off bundles for the remainder of June.  

Thanks for visiting this blog hop I hope you enjoy touring all our different posts to gain lots of tips and ideas.  

Happy stamping

Hugs Zoe x

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Supplies

Submarine Life stamp set

submarine builder punch

Layers of Beauty bundle

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Seaside Bay Delivers Pearls

Hands up who would be happy with a pearl arriving with their birthday card?  Of course this isn't real, but it adds a touch of lux to your birthday card makes especially when used with the beautiful By The Bay designer series papers from the By The Bay Suite in the spring mini Stampin' Up! catalogue.  

When papers have this lovely shimmery gloss you need little else to create a card that pops.  I've stamped the shell with second generation ink as my navy pad is very juicy and I wanted to show off all the beautiful detail the stamp has.  You'll need to judge the inkiness of your ink pad.  A trial on scratch card is always a good start.  

I used the reverse of another sheet of paper to create a matt layer for my die cut and then embossed square to showcase the shell and pearl. Touches of twine and diets and simple sentiments add the finishing touches to a simple but impacting design.  You can make the shell pop more by using stampin' dimensional to make the up part rise up a little.  

You can see a very different design using the Seaside Bay bundle by visiting my previous post about masking techniques. 

Thanks for popping by and come back soon for another example using the Seaside Bay soon. 

Happy Monday 

Zoe x

Supply List

Seaside Bay 

 By the Bay DSP

flat adhesive-backed pearls

In color Bakers Twine pack

Timber Embossing Folder

Tips for using watercolour pencils for cardmaking with the Totally Techniques Team

The weather slipped into winter here in the UK, but at least as I type this the sun is shining and the sky is blue and I have a card to welcome you with cheery colours and pretty flowers from the Full of Love stamp set.  The Totally Techniques team members are sharing ideas for using watercolour pencils this month.  Our Stampin' Up! pencils come in two assortments so you can start with either depending upon your favourite colour choices and hopefully when you fall in love with them you'll want both assortments.  As with everything Stampin' Up! they coordinate with our colour families and so will coordinate with your card, ink and embellishments. 

For my share today I started by stamping in black Staz On ink around the edge of a piece of Fluid 100 watercolour paper.  If you look at the stamp set below you'll see that I used the stamp with the letter in the centre and only partially stamped on the border of the paper.  

I then used the pencils to add some colour to the image but not completely covering it.  You can create light and shade by the level of pressure you put on your pencil in the first place and then using a blending pen can drag colour to the uncoloured areas of a flower or leaf.  This reduces the intensity of the colour, but also can leave bold colour on the original application. The great thing is that you can use various shades of one colour also to blend with the pen to create even more depth or you can use a single colour.  The next step is to use a mixture of colours, but I didn't need to do that with my design as the single colours worked really well giving bold and pretty contrasts to each element. 

Once I had coloured the outer border I set to on the focal envelope.  I stamped this on an additional piece of watercolour paper and coloured it before fussy cutting the image out.  I've then stuck it onto the middle of my border piece raising it up with Stampin' dimensionals. My sentiment is from the same set and is simply white heat embossed onto a piece of Gorgeous Grape card to connect with my matt layer of the same colour.

The pencils are very cheap way to grow your colour spectrum and all you need is a good pencil sharper and possibly a stamp case to keep them safe.  It's best not to drop them to protect the colour inside the pencil.  I would never claim to be a great colourer but I'm very pleased with how this turned out and very minimal colouring skill is required so great for beginners and more experienced crafters to use.  

For regular readers to my blog you'll know I like a little bling so my finishing touch was to add some Wink of Stella which you can just about spot in the final picture and so

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me In-color opal rounds.  

Thanks for stopping by and enjoy the hop via the thumbnails or link below. 

Happy weekend Zoe x

Supplies Used available in my Stampin' Up! shop

Full of Love stamp set

Watercolour Pencils 

Blender Pens

Fluid 100 watercolour paper

in color opal rounds

 

Totally Techniques Stampin' Demonstrator Blog Hop sharing Sponge Stencilling

Welcome to the Stampin' Up! Global Demonstrator Totally Techniques  May Blog Hop 

Shannean Moncrieff down in Australia chose our Totally Techniques theme this month and so we are sharing cards demonstrating the stencil sponging or sponge stencilling technique.  I've got a couple of ideas to share starting with this one which also show cases a new suite of products from the 2019 -2020 Stampin' Up! catalogue which is available for shopping on Tuesday 4 June.  This bundle is called the Sailing Home Suite and is going to be an awesome suite of products for male cards, holiday scrapbooking and much much more.  

So to begin I used a layered circle die to create a very simple circle stencil from a piece of vellum.  As you can see I fixed it to my work space using painters tap which also held a piece of whisper white card underneath it just where I wanted it.  I used sponges and a combination of Balmy Blue, Seaside Spray, Pretty Peacock and So Saffron to spong my circle.    I started with the lighter shade of blues and left almost white space to create a moon in the sky and using a small circle punch and a post it note created a mask just to keep a rough circle for this purpose.  The So Saffron gives a glow to create the impression of a not quite dark sky.  

I stamped the sailing boat in Night of Navy ink with the top of the mast just overlapping the moon. 

I then cut the same size circle from a larger piece of whisper white card which was 10 cm x 14.3cm.  I also added a sentiment in Early Espresso and separately stamped the lighthouse and die cut it out.  I used the sponges to add some shading having coloured the stamp with marker pens to stamp a double coloured image.  I gently added light into the top of the lighthouse using a So Saffron marker pen.  I made sure that when I used stampin dimensionals to stick the layers together that the lower layer with the sponged circle lined up with the top layer and did not protrude beyond this top layer.  

I added some silver thread using dimensionals to adhere it to the back of the top layer and some Tranquil Texture  Sprinkles to each thread before sticking across the circle with another set of Stampin' dimensionals.  If you wrap the thread around the dimensional several times and then double mount the dimensionals to give sufficienct depth for the beads to slide as you can see here in this mini video. 

Check out the video for the hidden extra  HERE

A second way to sponge stencil is to use a pre-made stencil similar to one in the Stampin' Up! pattern party decorative masks pack.  Using the same stencil I created with the vellum above, I used it to create a mask to reveal only a circle of the card layer.  I slid the decorative stencil/mask under the vellum.  As shown below.

With sponges and a dauber I added different colours over the stencil.  To control where the colour went I used the circle die cut to create the top layer for the first card to mask parts of the circle and more painters tape.

Additionally for the small circles I used a marker pen to add a deeper shade of blue.

To control the amount of ink that is on each sponge I use a piece of acetate, plastic embellishment bag or the stamp a ma jig sheet if you still have one to rub small circles having added ink to each sponge directly from an ink pad. This allows the ink to sink into the sponge and reduces the chances of having a heavy spot of ink when you first start to add the ink.

To finish the second card I stamped a simple sentiment and added some rhinestones and basic adhesive backed sequins to the design and then mounted the stamped/stencilled layer onto a  matt layer of Pretty Peacock before adding to a whisper white card base.

Copies of the new catalogue will be coming through your door very soon if you've shopped with me in the past 6 months or indeed will be given out at my new catalogue launch party on Saturday 22 June.  If you are local and would like to come along please email me for the details.  However if you'd like a copy to browse please do contact me to arrange for one to be posted to you.
You can contact me at zoetant@live.co.uk or message me on facebook at www.facebook.com/zoetant

Now please do carry on with our Global blog hop and see more inspiration for this inky technique.  You can visit the other demonstrator blogs by clicking on each picture below.

Thanks for visiting Zoe x

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Mothers Day Make

Here in the UK we celebrate Mother's Day at a different time to many countries and so I made my card last week for my lovely Mum as we celebrated yesterday.  It was a lovely sunny day, my parents came for lunch and Olivia surprised me by popping home from university for the day and of course she and Charlie bought me some beautiful flowers. Some arrived by post which is always exciting on Friday and more yesterday with a fun and special card.  

My card was a big hit with Mum and I'm so pleased. It is bigger than many I make, but I know my mum loves to make bigger cards so I used a sheet of A4 for the base. I added several  matting layers which I embossed using different folders.  The first was just a tad smaller than the card base and I used one of the Stampin' Up! Petal Pair folders which are long and thin. I first embossed one end placing the folder just under half way down the card from the top and then again the same placing it from bottom up.  The next layer was smaller and embossed with the Subtle folder which is I have to admit not easy to see in the catalogue or on this picture, but the one above shows the linen effect it produces.  The next layer is again a tad smaller than the previous one and is embossed with the Tufted folder.  It made me think of a quilted pin cushion and fitted in with the Stampin' Up! set images of the Needle and Thread set.  I created a faux embroidery hoop using the Swirly Frames set and used my layering circle dies to cut out the image.  Next I built up an arrangement of the faux embroidered flowers. Needle and Thread is a Stampin' Up! DisINKtive set which gives a 3D impression and allows it to look like individual embroidery threads.    You can see more examples on my stampingscene scrapbook post and cards I made for onstage using the Needlepoint Nook suite and here. 

I also used a couple of the leave dies from the Stampin' Up! spring catalogue Wonderful Floral framelit dies.  One of them embosses at the same time as cuts but to create a deeper emboss you can also use the embossing mats from page 221 in the annual catalogue to create a deeper impression.
Quick Tip I die cut vellum leaves and then removed the vellum from the die carefully. I put Versamark ink on the die and replaced the vellum leaves.  I then used the embossing mats to push the ink onto the vellum leaves before adding copper embossing powder.  Once you've heated it it highlights the veins of the leaves.  You can see it peeking out at the bottom of my floral arrangement.

If you celebrated Mothering Sunday yesterday with your mum or without I hope it was a day of special memories. 

Perhaps if you received some spends for your craft you might like to look at the new Stampin' Up! Storage which launched today. 

You can order any of these pieces and that gorgeous grid paper in my Stampin' Up! Online Shop

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Thanks for checking in.

Zoe x