A Freshly Made Challenge of Details

I have drawers of sentiments...great ones, too.  But I am sorely lacking in single-line horizontal ones.  In fact, I would like to see more of those and more single-line vertical sentiments for stampers. But that is for another day.  Today, it is Freshly Made Sketch 445 that had my attention. The die cut is an alcohol ink piece that has been lying around for months; in fact, I trimmed it down some to fit. 

Those Fascinating Alcohol Inks

Recently, I watched Tim Holtz's videos about alcohol inks.  I've used them for years, but my interest was renewed by the video.  I discovered that I still prefer alcohol ink paper instead of Yupo because I sometimes want to heat-emboss stamping on the background.  These are four cards I made from the backgrounds I created last weekend. 

Freshly Made with Alcohol Inks

I was playing around with alcohol ink backgrounds, and stamped this flower on one.  It worked well with the latest Freshly Made Sketch. Patterned paper, dimensional cardstock for the card, the AI flower and a simple sentiment....all of which were immediately put into an envelope to deliver with flowers to a friend who just had surgery.  I drove 20 miles to pick up the flowers...another 10 miles to deliver them to the driveway of the friend.  Her children picked up the box and card.... social distancing achieved!  

Alcohol Inks for Color Throwdown

I really like the color palette of this Color Throwdown.  I was pretty certain I could use alcohol inks, but I found a piece of Yupo that was already inked in the colors.  I die cut the circle, stacked it on additional white die cuts and popped it all on foam tape.  "Friend" from Gina K Designs was cut in metallic gold cardstock and the piece was added to a dry-embossed layer on the card front. 

Oxidized Metal for CAS Mix Up

 Oxidized metal, stamping, heat embossing, die cutting, alcohol inks

This was a fun CAS Mix Up technique, although I discovered that I didn't have any regular reinkers after my summertime craft room "purge."  I do have many alcohol inks, though, and I decided to use those. The maple leaves are the Maple Leaf Border from Poppy Stamps. I cut the leaves from a lightweight metallic paper and applied various alcohol inks and clear embossing powder.  I stamped the Inkadinkado sentiment on die-cut black cardstock and heat-embossed it with a sparkly gold powder; then I layered it on a heavier gold piece of cardstock.  The dotted metallic layer is a piece of designer paper in a 6x6 pad. I popped the oxidized leaves on adhesive dots.   It is really difficult to photograph black cardstock; I'm adding a closeup of one of the leaves.  (The card in real-life is prettier than the photograph.)  

Alcohol Inks and Typography

For me, large typography stamps just invite an inky or watercolor background.  I really like cards which feature a sentiment as their focus.  For this Less is More challenge, I chose a well-used Wordsworth stamp.  First, I applied alcohol inks with canned air (it's a technique I have never mastered, although I love to do it) and then stamped the sentiment and heat-embossed it.  

Tuesday Card

I've been absent for just about a month, but Chelsea has still received a card each week, except the day we were surprised in Brooklyn with our son's wedding!   When we were in New York for 12 days, I bought a letterpress card with an image of the Statue of Liberty and mailed it to her; when we returned home, I dug in my stash for a card to mail.  Today's card is a new one, but one created from a piece of alcohol ink background.

The flowers are Hero Arts.

Back Home in time for Tuesday's Card

We just spent 3+ days on the west side of Oregon celebrating our granddaughter Ava's first birthday.  What fun!  This morning, I made a very simple card in time to mail to Chelsea.

The base of the card is one of those alcohol ink backgrounds created by Kennedy; I had backed it with black weeks ago, but hadn't decided how to use it yet.  The image and sentiment are a set from Unity.  

CAS Colours & Sketches #265

This is a relatively simple sketch of  CAS Colours & Sketches, but there is a great variety of interpretations in the sample cards. I thought I would like to try something a little "different," so chose a piece of alcohol inked background that was lying around.  The pattern of the inks is really busy and not the best for a feature on a card.  As a background, however, it provided a great choice of colors for the card.  A sentiment by Impression Obsession and a die cut from Memory Box completed the top layer. 

Tuesday Card with Alcohol Inks

For this week's Tuesday Card, I'm using another alcohol ink background created by my young niece. They are just too pretty not to use! 

When I decided to use the piece and the card color, I knew I wanted to accent that vibrant magenta/fuchsia color of ink.  Digging through my endless stash of cardstock, I found two sheets of the perfect color of metallic cardstock.  I don't even recall when I bought it.   The sentiment is from a new sheet of sentiments by Impression Obsession.  (The criss-cross pattern showing on the card is really shadow from the sheer curtain on the window.)

Purple for Less is More

I believe "ultra violet" is the Pantone color of the year, and what a beautiful color it is.  Purple has been my very favorite color since high school --very long ago!  Less is More's challenge of the new two-week format involves "Purples," so I went to my alcohol inks and Yupo paper.  The fancy feather die from Impression Obsession created a beautiful purple feather. The sentiment is from Wordsworth.

Color Throwdown 465

I love the color purple...and red, and turquoise, and blue...but purple has been my "favorite" color for decades.  I couldn't pass up this Color Throwdown of purple, black, and white.  From the beginning, I planned to use alcohol inks, which required some experimentation on my part--some which didn't work at all.  The feathers were die cut from a piece of Yupo inked with Amethyst (which is the blue purple I like the best) and Soot Black alcohol inks and then swirled with a paintbrush full of rubbing alcohol.  (The technique was one I watched recently on Jennifer McGuire's blog.)  The feather die is from Little B's "Autumn" set; "awesome" is from Verve.  

A Tuesday Card

About 6 years ago, I began sending a card every Tuesday to my wonderful friend from college years when she was diagnosed with cancer.  Three years ago, I added a young friend to my Tuesday mailing; she was living with her family on an isolated cattle ranch miles of narrow gravel roads from "civilization."  My old friend passed away in July of last year; I continued sending cards to my young friend.  This month, she and her husband moved with their three children, 150 cows and calves, a few horses, and several dogs to a new home in the valley just 35 miles from me.  During the time they were moving, I didn't send a card, but I've resumed the practice.

As I said in the card, the sentiment (from Technique Junkies) seems perfect for their situation. Her husband no longer has a regular paycheck, and she is taking a job as a visiting nurse.  Their children, who were the only students in a tiny one-room school, will be attending a school a few miles from their new home.

Obviously, alcohol inks were used to create the colorful background.  My 8-year-old great-niece organized my two containers of AI colors while I worked on the card.

Mixing it up with Alcohol Inks

Alcohol inks are a favorite medium for me, so it's fun to have a challenge using them.  This month's CAS Mix Up provides some alcohol ink fun, plus some stamping and a Penny Black die.  (The ink technique involved dropping the AI's onto glossy cardstock and adding some blending fluid.) 

A Second Smoosh

I've already done one card for this CAS Mix Up challenge, but my "choice" was only layering a complementary color of cardstock.  Today, I decided to "smoosh" alcohol inks for another card.  This is a technique I used to do frequently; I have every alcohol ink color Tim Holtz and Ranger designed. Something else I decided to do -- inspired by the dramatic ink colors -- was to use one of my many "face" stamps. Years ago, I made cards that would probably be considered "edgy" and my face stamp collection grew in number. However, they've been languishing in a drawer for a long time.  

For the background, I mixed Mermaid, Aqua and Wild Plum with silver mixative and alcohol blending solution on a craft mat and then "smooshed" a piece of Yupo paper.   The stamp is an old Tin Can Mail image from Inkadinkao and the "dream" is a Penny Black die.  (I did discover that inked Yupo doesn't hold up well to a heat gun when trying to dry stamping.)

My card features stamping, smooshing, and a die cut. 

Less is More with Splatters

"Splatters" -- the theme for Less is More inspired me to take out the alcohol inks again.  This time, I also used canned air.  The image is from the Tim Holtz collection of Stampers Anonymous.

(EDIT:   This was supposed to be a one-layer card!  I failed to read that bit of direction, obviously.  The interesting thing is that the glossy paper was cut from a card...so this could have been one layer if I had followed directions.  So....I made a second one, but the splatters didn't work as well!) 

Less is More -- The Color Purple

I used to make some "unusual" cards a few years ago, and then I changed my audience.  When Less is More determined that purple would be the color for Week 279, I immediately thought of alcohol inks on glass.  Instead of a glass tile, I found an acrylic one that was the size I wanted.  And because of the limited size, I went to my "faces" stamp drawer and found the Stampers Anonymous eye.  Perfect.  (The tile is adhered with spray adhesive.) The sentiment is from Hampton Art Stamps.

Tuesday Cards

I pulled out the alcohol inks and played on glossy paper for these cards.   It's so easy to over-do it, and I have 3 "throwaways" to prove it.

Tuesday Mailing -- Alcohol Inks

I continue mailing cards to two friends each Tuesday; this design is the latest.  It's alcohol ink moved around with canned air.  The stamp is Poppy Trio from Penny Black.

Tuesday Mail

I've actually added two friends to my Tuesday mailing; this photo shows only three of the cards I mailed today.  The fourth one went as a Christmas card.    This is an alcohol ink background accented with a die cut snowflake (Simon Says Stamp).