Simon Says: A Walk on the Dark Side

Hello There!!!!!  I'm absolutely thrilled to have been asked to be this months Spotlight Designer for the Simon Says Monday Challenge.  I could hardly believe my eyes when the email came from Lols.

Wow!!  Thanks so much, Lols and Simon Says Stamp, for this opportunity!!

This week on the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge we have A Walk on the Dark Side.  The challenge is to use Dark Colors or to go with a Halloween theme.  As always, the first week of the month also showcases a product and this week it is Tim Holtz products so if you have some we'd love to see how you use them.  If you don't have any, it's all good, you can still create something for the theme and enter the challenge.

As always Simon Says Stamp will be giving away a $50 voucher to use in their shop.

For my project I went with Dark Colors, and actually one dark color, black.   

I knew for this project that I would use dark colors and had decided maybe I'd stick with black but beyond that I had nothing.  So as I do when there is a deadline and I've got no plan, I just started something.  I took a piece of black cardstock (4 1/4" x 5 1/2") and brayered on some Distress Oxide Reinkers (Black Soot and Walnut Stain).  Shake the reinker bottles and put just a little bit on the craft sheet, run the brayer through the ink a couple times lightly and then onto the card a couple times lightly.  Pick up the rest of the ink and brayer in the opposite direction on the card. 

After drying the ink, I used the Flourish Embossing Folder and then inked over the high spots with Distress Ink Black Soot.  This gave a nice contrast to the Oxide.

The panel was edged with Distress Paint Tarnished Brass, dried well, the edges distressed, and then Tarnished Brass splattered on using Tim's Brush.  

I love to use flowers including the Tim Holtz/Sizzix Wildflower dies so I cut them from black card and sprayed them with Distress Mica Spray Tarnished Brass.

I'd chosen a picture from the Tim Holtz/Idea-ology Photobooth pack and I had left the picture and all the black flowers just laying on the panel for awhile as I wasn't really sure where I was going next with it and while doing other things as I walked past it the thought "Hope Springs Forth" popped in and I thought, "Oh, that would be cool" and I cut one flower from the Wildflowers 2 set from yellow card and spritzed it with Distress Mica Spray Tarnished Brass.  

I pulled out the Small Talk Sticker Book and Metallic Stickers Book and the Quote Chips hoping to put that phrase together.  I found Hope Is Never Lost and decided that would work just as well.  I could have used a Dymo or the computer to create the first phrase, but I like this.  I cut the Quote Chip between Hope and Is, nipped the corners of the Hope piece, inked both pieces with Distress Ink Mustard Seed, dried them, and added Distress Paint Tarnished Brass to the edges.  The whole time I was working on this panel I was planning to make a card.  Once I was this far, I think because I liked it so much, I decided it needed to become a canvas.

I got out a 6" x 8" canvas panel and put both Black Soot and Tarnished Brass Distress Paint onto the panel, sprayed it with lots of water and moved it around a bit.  I was concerned that I'd used too much Brass but, nope, the back overtook it.  I thought about a second layer but chose to just move on.  I knew the center area would be completely covered.

I used the Tim Holtz/Stamper's Anonymous stencil Mesh along with Wendy's Black Embossing Paste and after removing the stencil added Clear Embossing Powder and then heated it all.  Fun stuff..... 

And then I forgot to take any more process pictures.  

I put some Tarnished Brass paint on my Craft Sheet and using a dry paint brush, brushed it on the canvas panel.  Sprayed the paint on my craft sheet with a little water and then used the Splatter Brush to splatter all over the canvas.  Next I stenciled through the Bubble stencil with Distress Paint Black Soot using a Stencil Brush.  When you have a more fluid something that you want to stencil, it can really help to get a nicer image if you use a stencil brush.  The very edges of the canvas are painted with Black Soot.  I die cut another set of Wildflowers from black card and used them without spraying or inking them.  The black flowers and main panel are attached to the canvas as shown.  Finally I added a Metallic Sticker at the bottom.

I do hope you like my project.  Thanks so much for following along!!

Hugs, Wanda

Be Brave, Be You

The More Than Words Mini Challenge for September is to use the word Brave. 

I've created a card for this challenge.  I started with a piece of white card brayered with Distress Oxide Re-inkers, Broken China and Wilted Violet.  I applied white Embossing Paste through a Wendy Vecchi/Stamper's Anonymous stencil, covered the paste with Wendy Vecchi/Ranger Ink Embossing Powder Garden Patina while the paste was wet, tapped off the excess and heated the embossing powder/paste.  I absolutely love the look you get with this. 

There is stenciling in the background through Tim Holtz/Stamper's Anonymous stencils.  The hearts are stenciled with Oxide Ink.  The dots are stenciled with Embossing Ink and then Ranger's Liquid Platinum embossing powder used.  I also embossed the edges with Liquid Platinum  

I used cutting dies designed by Suzanne Cannon for Elizabeth Craft Designs for the words, be Brave.  They are cut from water color paper twice.  One set is colored with Distress Oxide Ink Wilted Violet and shaded with Distress Ink Dusty Concord.  The other set is left white.  They are layered together. 

In the center of the larger flowers I've Brads that are embossing with the Liquid Platinum embossing powder.  In the centers of the smaller flower I've used Nuvo Drops.  "be you" is a Tim Holtz/Idea-ology Small Talk sticker.  Some purple Dew Drops are the finishing touch. 

PaperArtsy #13 Metallics

Happy Friday to You!!!!  I'm thrilled to be back on the PaperArtsy Blog today for their 13th Topic of the Year - Metallics.  You can find the opening post for this topic HERE and my post is HERE (be sure to check out that post First and then come back to read this post for further information).  

My focus for the metallic topic is foil and just some of the ways to add it to our projects.  This first card is using the foil along with regular embossing powder (I first saw Wendy Vecchi do this).  What worked well for me was to heat the embossing powder as normal and then go back to gently reheat some areas.  While still hot/warm, you can press on the foil, pull off the release sheet and some foil will stick to the embossing powder.  This works great if you want random areas of foil or just part of an image foiled.  

I used PaperArtsy Heavy Smoothy card.  I love the weight of this paper and the smooth white surface.  I put a few drops of Limelight paint onto my craft sheet and then used a brayer to put it on my paper.  I wasn't going for full coverage.

I used a stencil brush to add more Limelight through the Lin Brown Stencil, PS044.

The distressed lines from Lin's stamp set ELB29 were stamped with Embossing Ink and embossed with Red Geranium Powder.

Next I reheated some of the image, placed the foil on **Always shiny, colored side up**, rubbed, and lifted the sheet back off.

I did the same thing with the leaf branch using Fern Green Powder.  When I reheated I went up the center of the branch. The branch was then cut out and layered over the red lines.  

I again used the Heavy Smoothy to create the folded card and added Hyde Park paint around the edges. 

Before attaching the main panel to the card I decided it needed a bit more so I used the Embossing Ink Pad along the top and bottom, embossed with Red Geranium, and added gold foil on some areas.  I also added some "controlled" splatter in the top right and bottom left corners using London Bus Paint and a tool I got many a years ago - a piece of wood with some plastic meshy stuff on it.  The words are from Lin's set ELB12 and stamped with Archival Ink Jet Black.

Another way to add foil is with a heat laminator.

I began by brayering on Vanilla and Caramel paint.  

Next I put Golden's Heavy Gel Gloss through the large flower on Lin's stencil PS005.  I decided not to smooth it out but to leave it textured.  This was an experiment as I'd always leveled the gel before if I was foiling.

The Gel has to be left to dry completely so I left it until the next day.  Cut a piece of foil large enough to cover the paper and you need a piece of parchment paper to fold and be able to put your card and the foil inside.

While you are getting things ready, you can turn on the laminator and let it heat up.  For my laminator that only takes about 10 minutes.  You then feed your "sandwich" into the machine.

And the machine automaticly takes it through and out the other side.

Open the parchment paper and this is what you see.

And here I'm peeling off the release sheet.

There were some spots where the highs and lows of the textured gel didn't allow the foil to press into the low spots.. also some spots where there was stray gel because I often seem to have trouble lifting the stencil if there is lots of medium.  It actually gave a really cool distressed look to the image. 

But I wanted you to also see how elegant it can look so I started another piece.  Again I brayered on the same colors but also added some stenciling with the Vanilla paint and the same image.  I added the Heavy Gel spreading it even and mostly smooth.  Again it needed to dry completely before foiling.

Besides foiling gloss gel with a heat laminator you can also foil anything printed with a laser printer.  Wouldn't it be cool to do your own drawing, make a copy with a laser printer and then foil it.  Or how about lettering.  Way cool!!!

For the distressed flower card I added a little Treasure Gold Florentine around the edges and then stitched around also.  Noel is from Lin's set ELB11.  It was stamped with Distress Oxide Ink Peeled Paint, cut out, layered to red cardstock, Wink of Stella Glitter Clear brushed on the edge and then layered to the card with foam tape. 

Another way to add foil is with double sided tape.  You can find the tape in different widths.  I put the tape on the card, peeled off the liner, laid the foil on, rubbed and peeled up the liner.  

Noel was stamped with Archival Ink Emerald Green.

Finally you can use Sticky Embossing Powder to add foil.  This works great if you want to foil a complete image.  

I stamped the image from Lin's set ELB10 with Embossing Ink, covered it with the sticky powder which works just like regular embossing powder, tapped off the excess and then heated it.  The important thing to remember when using Sticky powder is not to overheat it - as soon as it turn clear move on.  If you heat it too much you will dry out the adhesive and it won't work.  Also do NOT touch the adhesive before foiling (or adding glitter or whatever).

Place the foil over the image, rub well, and peel up the liner.  If any spots aren't foiled, press a fresh spot of foil in that spot.

This picture was taken under an Ott Light and you can really see the holographic look of the foil that is harder to see in my other pictures.

I water colored the trees using Distress Oxide Peeled Paint Ink and a water brush.  The edges of the tag are inked with Distress Oxide Candied Apple and some Candied Apple splattered on.  Merry Christmas from Lin's set ELB11 is stamped with black ink on a scrap of Kraft Card, cut out, Candied Apple run along the edge, and attached to the tag with foam tape.  Made a bow and tied it by the hole.