Technique Tuesday - Perfect Pearls Techniques

I love to use Perfect Pearls pigment powders by Ranger on my cards and scrapbook pages, and other paper crafts projects.  These pigment powders are pearlescent, and come in six color palettes.  They can be used wet or dry to create dazzling pearlescent effects.  Here are three cards that demonstrate just four of the techniques possible.

Dusting 

• Ink stamp with clear VersaMark ink pad, or Perfect Medium.  Don't over-ink your stamp, and be sure to let the image dry for a minute, especially if the pad is very wet and inky. 
  
• Apply Perfect Pearls with a DRY small watercolor brush. To apply, simply dip the tip of the brush into the powder, and brush it onto the part of the stamped image you want that color on. Repeat with other colors, as desired.  If your stamped image is too inky or wet, the powder will smear. Be sure to wait until it has dried a little to prevent this blurring.
  
• Remove excess powder with larger, duster brush.  Simply brush over the powder until all traces of excess powder are removed.  The background and the flower in this card were done with the dusting technique.
  
• No need for fixatives.  For increased sticking, just spritz with a very light mist of water.

 Painting and Spattering

• The resins (binding agent) are built in to Perfect Pearls, so there is nothing to add.  Simply add water to create pearlescent paint. The amount of water you add will determine how transparent the paint is.
• Remove some powders from the jar with the tip of your watercolor brush and place on palette.  Dip brush into water and add a drop or two at a time, and mix, until it is the consistency needed to paint.  The amount of water you add will determine how strong the color is on your image.
• "Paint" the  image with this mixture.  For added depth, color image first with a marker, then paint over the marker coloring with the Pearls.  The flower in this card was painted in this fashion.
  
• Spattering - To create spatters, work up some "paint" on your palette with the Pearls and water, making it quite wet.  Load your brush, then tap the brush while you hold it over your card or page that you wish to spatter.  You can see this look on the black panel on the above card.
  

Batik Resist

 The picture here does not do this card justice, as you can't see the shimmer of the Pearls.  This batick technique is one of my favorites, and it's so easy to do.

• Emboss images on white or light cs (cardstock) with clear VersaMark or Perfect Medium,  and emboss with clear embossing powder.  Create a random design with the embossed images on your card or page. 
• Mix water with dye based reinkers and swirl onto this embossed cs, blending colors.  Do not over-blend as this will make the colors muddy.  No need to cover entire card.  
• Next, pick up some complimentary Perfect Pearls, and some metallic, such as gold, Perfect Pearls with the water brush, and add to the composition.  
• Dab with a paper towel (do not rub) to remove excess wetness.  Let dry a minute or two, then press between newsprint with hot iron till embossing melts off into newsprint.  You can use scrap paper, such as computer paper.  The images that were protected by the embossing will “pop out,” creating a fabulous, shimmery background.

That's it for today.  Check back soon for more blog posts.  I am working on a Fall Colors trading card for a Magenta trading card swap I entered.  I will post that as soon as it is finished.

Right now, I'm off to finish shower invitations.  Hope you have a great evening.

Blessings,

lynda

Winter Wedding!!! Elegant Bridal Shower Invitation

FINALLY, my prayers are being answered.  My daughter, Faith, and Dan are getting married!!! I'm so excited...can you tell?  It will be a very intimate ceremony with a small reception following, as the kids are footing the bill themselves.  It  will be a romantic winter wedding, December 5th.  He proposed by arranging 100 lit votive candles (in holders) in a trail leading from the apartment door to the living room fireplace, where he had them arranged into a heart shape. Under each candle was a pink construction paper heart with a reason why he wanted her to be his wife. 100 different reasons!!!  This is what Faith saw when she got home from work that night.  Now, this kid can give hubby some lessons!

So, now that I've gotten that announcement done, I wanted to share the shower invitation I made for a shower my friend, Sylvia, and I are having next month.

I blocked the address to protect out of consideration to my friend 

The rose was embossed with gold embossing powder, then water-colored.  I added a tiny bow, a crystal on the rose, and a "dew-drop" of Diamond Glaze on the leaf.  I used a border punch along the bottom edge, so the pink shimmer paper shows through.  The invitation itself was composed on my computer, then I printed it onto ivory cardstock, and cut it to size.  It scanned poorly, so it looks like brownish splotches are on the paper, but they're not.  It's just ivory cardstock.  It's 5 1/2 x 5 1/2 inch square, with no fold-over, just a single panel, layered.  Her bridal party loved it so much they asked me to make their shower invitations for them!  Of course, I will.  How can I say no?!

Blessings,

     lynda

Garage Sale This Weekend - Saturday and Sunday 9/26 & 27

The element where I had the garage sale details and a really good map has been giving me trouble and not working all the time.  It goes up for a while, then blanks out, so here is the info again:

DATES:  THIS WEEKEND SATURDAY AND SUNDAY 9/26 & 9/27
               
TIME:  9 AM - 4 PM BOTH DAYS

Stamps, supplies, scrapbook supplies, papers,  accessories, embellishments, and MORE! Everything marked way, way down.  Most at least half price and many items 70% off and more!!

WHERE:  65 DALSTON ROAD, ROCHESTER (GREECE) It's near the old, old store that was up on Dewey by the Dutch Mill.  If coming down Stone Road (Off Ridge Road), turn right on Dewey, then right on Dalston.  Carbone's Pizza is on the corner.  Or you can Google it.  If you still need help, call Karen at 585-414-1440 or me (lynda) at 585-663-0073.

Hope to see you there.

Technique Tuesday - Direct-To-Paper Inking Technique

Sometimes I will distress my cardstock or even decorative scrapbook papers using ink directly on the paper.  Here are some ways to do this:

• Peaks and valleys:  Crumple your paper, then smooth it out (sanding is optional). Skim the paper with an ink pad, applying ink color to the peaks.  Do not press too hard, you just want to skim along the tops.
• Light coverage:  Put the ink pad face down on your paper and lightly tap it to apply color.
• Heavy coverage:  Put the ink pad face down on your paper and skim it across the paper, pressing the ink pad firmly down as you go.
• Edging:  Hold the paper in one hand and ink pad in the other hand.  Run the ink along the edge of the paper.  This is especially effective with a metallic pigment pad, like gold or silver.

I rubbed this scalloped edge directly with an ink pad to highlight the scallop.

• Sweeping:  Tap the bristles of teh stippling brush onto the ink pad.  Hold the brush at an angle and sweep it across the paper to color.
• Tapping:  Tap the bristles of a stippling brush onto the ink pad. Hold the brush perpendicular to the paper and gently tap it onto the paper.
• Masking:  Tear a scrap paper the length of your card or page and lay it over your card or page where you want an inked edge.  Run an ink pad along the torn edge of the scrap paper and onto the card or page, creating an inked torn-look.
• Emboss designs on your card with white or clear embossing powder.  Apply pigment ink directly to the paper by rubbing on two or three complimentary colors randomly.  Rub gently with a tissue to wipe ink off of embossed areas.  The embossing will act as a resist.

Hope you enjoyed some of these direct-to-paper inking techniques.  Come back next week for more techniques, and stop by frequently for updates to the blog.  I will be posting later this week to show a wedding shower invitation.  Check back soon.

Technique Tuesday - Blending Colored Pencils

Everyone loves to learn new techniques, or brush up on techniques they may have forgotten about or need a refresher on.  That's why I'm going to dedicate Tuesdays on the blog for techniques.  Technique Tuesdays each week will feature a technique for stamping and/or scrapbooking.  
For our first Technique Tuesday, I'm going to show you a new technique I learned.  It is like the Gamsol colored pencil technique, which I taught at the store, but instead of Gamsol I am using Hero Arts Ultra Cleaner.  It's their clear design stamp cleaner.  I don't know how to do videos yet, so I had to take some pictures.  A couple are a little blurry, but you will get the idea.  This is the technique I used on the flower on the 8 x 8 scrapbook page I blogged about last week. 
 

Colored Pencil Blending With Hero Clear Design Ultra Cleaner

• Stamp image to be colored with permanent ink.  I use India Ink Black.

• Choose three colored pencils in graduated shades.  For this card, I chose a light orchid, medium lavendar, and deep purple.  And, yes, there is a difference in colored pencils.  I use Berol Prismacolor - it's an artist quality pencil, with a consistently soft lead for smooth color.
  

   




Color image lightly and completely with the lightest color (light orchid).

   

Add medium tone (medium lavendar).  Color part of the petal near where it attaches in the center with the medium tone.  Do not cover the entire petal.  Leave 2/3 of the petal with the light orchid.  Do not worry about the 'line' between the two colors.  We will blend that in the last step.

  




Add the final darkest shade (deep purple), using just a small amount where the shadows would be.  The petals underneath, and the place where they meet in the center would be darkest.  Again, do not worry about the unblended lines. 

  



Blend shades with a blending tool (I use a Dove Blender pen but instead of the Dove blending fluid, which won't work with colored pencils, I filled it with Hero Arts Clear Desing Ultra Cleaner).  You can use blending stumps or tortillons. I find the Dove Blender works really well, as the tip is firm and will not mush quickly.  Also, I don't need to keep dipping the tip into the fluid to use it.  I used an eye dropper to fill the pen with the ultra cleaner.

• To blend, start at the lightest part of the design (petal) and rub the fluid into the pencil pigment.  You will see it liquify and blend like magic.  Pull the light color into the medium and darker color.  Keep doing this till all the color is blended nicely.  You can clean the tip of the blender by rubbing it on scrap paper.

That's it.  It's easy, fun, and very elegant.  I learned this technique on the Hero Arts Blog.  If you haven't joined yet, be sure to check it out
http://heroarts.com/blogs/club/.


This is the finished card:

The flowers were "colored" using this technique.  I stamped the flower frame once on the aqua cardstock.  I stamped the flower portions three times on white cardstock.  I colored the flowers with the blending technique, cut them out in sections, and layered them with foam tape.  I distressed the card layers, punched the bottom of the green layer, punched the butterflies, and added gemstones. The purple strip behind the frame image is from the frame stamp.  I just stamped the background portion onto the strip.
 
This is the stamp I used, Hero Arts CG116, Thinking of You.


Hope you liked this Technique Tuesday.  Stop back often to check out other fun things I'll be doing on the blog.

Hero Arts Blog

 I discovered a gem on the internet a few months ago, and I'd like to share it with you.  It's the Hero Arts Blog.  Many of you probably already know about this terrific blog site, but if you haven't seen it, do yourself a huge favor and head on over.  There are posts every day, with lots and lots of ideas and fun.  There are many different bloggers on the site, so you get different styles and types of projects and ideas.

A Stamped Knitting Journal

My Article on HubPages about my foray into the knitting world

It was a busy, busy weekend.  We had our granddaughter, Keeley, since Thursday and just brought her back to Buffalo today, Sunday.  Hence, no postings since Wednesday.  It's late, and I'm tired, but just wanted to share this journal I made for my knitting obsession hobby.  I use it to log my completed projects (with pictures of course), details about yarns I have on hand, needles and sizes, and thoughts and ideas on knitting.

This first picture is the front cover.  I stamped knitting images (all stamps from Magenta) all over the green and lavender paper.  I wrapped the paper onto an 8 1/2 x 8 1/2 cardboard piece, and added the purple strip where they joined.  I added a piece of lavender cardstock to the backside of the front cover to hide the raw edges of the tucked under paper from the front.  I then stamped the sheep stamp onto natural cardstock and layered it, then foam mounted it to the top section.  The three images in the bottom section were stamped onto natural cardstock squares, then "painted" in with a waterbrush.  To do this, I just touched the brush to the outline of the image, and pulled the color in from the outline.  You can do this with dye inks or markers.  I used markers to "ink" the stamps, then stamped them and immediately used the waterbrush to pull in the color.  This is how I was able to get green and lavendar inks on the images.  Then I cut them out, layered them up, and finished up with some fabulous yarn around the cover and through the punched holes along the left edge.

This next picture is the back of the journal.  I stamped  phrase and quote stamps from Penny Black randomly along the back pieces. 

I added several pieces of natural cardstock to the inside before tying the journal together with yarn and ribbon.
That's it!  It's fast, it's easy, and mostly, it will be fun to use.  I can't wait to make more.  Hmmm, one for my doodles, maybe one for books I've read.  A quote journal would be fun, and how about one for the holidays.  I made one a while back for a friend who has tea parties every year, so she could journal and record her tea party pictures and ideas.


Here's a link to my story on HubPages about my journey into the world of yarn and knitting:
http://hubpages.com/_quhng16s2trb/hub/Yarn--Knitting-Needles--and-Socks--Oh-My
Now it's getting late, and I'm off to catch some zzzz's before work tomorrow.  Hope you liked this little project.
Blessings!
     lynda

Cling Rubber Stamps - Why I Love Them

I won $100 worth of Hero Arts products from a contest I entered a few weeks ago.  One of the stamps I selected is this new cling stamp, (CG115 Thank You).

I have been having so much fun with it, and discovering it's versatility. But, before I go further, let me tell you how wonderful Hero Arts cling stamps are! They are etched very deeply, so the image stamps beautifully. They cling to the acrylic easily, and unlike many cling stamps, they have an index on the top, so you can see the design through the acrylic mount.  If you have ever used cling stamps, you know how great that feature is!

For those who have never used, or heard of, cling stamps, I'll provide some information to help you understand what they are.  Cling stamps are regular rubber stamps, except instead of being mounted to wood,  the adhesive side of the foam mount is attached to a piece of cling vinyl. This allows your rubber image to be used with acrylic handle mounts,  as you would with clear acrylic stamps.  The image is sandwiched between the vinyl and the foam so that it cannot be washed, rubbed or worn off. You can use Cling Rubber stamps with any kind of ink you'd normally use with your wood- mounted stamps. They clean the same way, too.  To use, simply press it to an acrylic mount, ink, and stamp!

Some advantages of cling stamps:

• Same quality as wood mounted rubber stamps, because they are rubber.
• Closely trimmed rubber and cushion allows you to see where you are stamping, allowing for precise positioning.
• Lightweight and easy to transport, taking up very little space.
• Storage - Simply attach onto a smooth surface, and file in a magazine holder or three ring binder.
• More cost efficient than wood mounted stamps. 

Now, back to my Hero Arts Thank You Frame Stamp.  I have so many ideas I want to try with it, and will be posting some of them as I make some cards with it.  

The frame begs to be cut out, the flowers layered and mounted.  The Thank You in the center can be eliminated by simply not inking it, or, cutting out the inside before mounting.In this 8" x 8" scrapbook layout, I stamped it in black ink onto white cardstock, three times. I cut out the entire image, and mounted it to scrapbook paper. I then cut out the flowers twice, the first time around the outside of the flower, and the second cut was the inside petals of the flower.  
After coloring with colored pencils, I layered them onto the frame with foam tape.  Some gem stones and Stardust clear gel pen added the finishing touches.  The stamping along the bottom of the page was done with pink ink using another Hero stamp (K5232 Dot Flourish Border).  Although this is a wood mounted stamp, I just had to have it. It is perfect for borders, but, oh, so much more!

I still need to add my journaling, and perhaps a picture, and then it will go into a special 8 x 8 album I'm making for my daughter, Faith, for her birthday in December.
Soon I will post the secret to blending the colored pencil I used on the frame and flowers.  Check my next post later this week.
Blessings,
     lynda

A Weekend With "The Boys"

Labor Day is over, and it was back to work and routine today, but I'm still basking in the glow of the lovely weekend I had. Hubby went to camp with his brothers for some fishing and camping in the woods (NOT my idea of a good time), and I stayed home. I brought home "the boys" Friday night (Ben and Jerry - cherry garcia ice cream), watched four, yep, FOUR chick flicks. Saturday I went to the farmer's market, ate rice pilaf from a box, drank wine, stamped, scrap booked, and wrote. I spent Sunday with my inspiring scrapping buddy, Karen, and on Monday I organized my craft room!
Phew, I'm getting tired just writing about it.  But, oh, did I have fun!  Yes, it is good to have hubby back home, but the weekend reprieve was exhilarating, and just what I needed to jump-start my creativity.
I'll post some pictures later in the week of some pages from an 8 x 8 album I started making for my daughter. Have to wait for daylight to take pics, as the lights in my home wreak havoc on the true colors of the papers and inks!

I did post this card to Hero Arts gallery a couple of weeks ago for their monochromatic challenge.  Don't get too upset with me that it's a winter card! I know, I know, we really haven't had much of a summer here in upstate NY, blah, blah, blah, I know. BUT, fall is on the horizon, and winter will follow. Can it ever be too early to start thinking (dare I say it) holidays?

The Hero Arts stamps I used are all from the clear set CL234 Winter's Butterfly! I love, love, love this set. The snowflakes are all individual, and you can arrange and stamp them any way you want. I added some gemstones, and highlighted with the Stardust Gel Pen. A little sponging and distressing, and it was done. I did a similar card on blue papers, with blue ink, and highlighted with a white gel pen.  The possibilities are endless.
So, I hope I didn't scare you off with the winter card! I promise I will bring it back to summer, well, late summer, and early fall, in my next post.

If you are following me from my old website, this is where you will find me now. I have replaced it with this blog/website. I will be able to post more often here, as it's a lot less work than maintaining a website. 
If you would like to read some of my writing on HubPages, just follow this link and you will be able to read any or all of my hubs (articles):
http://hubpages.com/_quhng16s2trb/profile/DoodleLyn

I love feedback, and welcome your comments here or on my HubPages pages articles.  If you would like to comment on this post, just click the box down below that says "comments."

Blessings,
     lynda