Wednesday, April 13, 2011

GC98: Mists

It's Wednesday! That means another Gingersnap Creations post!! Today we're playing with Mists!

I have a VERY GOOD local stamp/scrap store. Kathy is great at bringing in traveling teachers. Several months ago, Fred B Mullett came to teach some messy but FUN classes. I took THE ELEGANT MESS. This is just one of the techniques we did that night to make incredible, 0ne-of-a-kind backgrounds!

One of the papers we used was Oriental Calligraphy paper. The best way to describe this is really stiff tissue paper. It's very thin but will hold up to lots of water. You can find it here on Fred's web page.

We used Adirondack Colorwash in a variety of strengths, but any color wash/mist will work. I used Glimmer Mist for this card. I chose 4 colors (Key Lime Pie, Sunflower, Turquoise Blue, and Tiger Lily) and started with the lightest and randomly sprayed on part of the paper.

Then I used several kitchen items as masks (penny sink mat, sushi mat, rubber shelf liner). Spraying other colors over the masks, flipping them over onto other sections, and making an "elegant mess".

Then I let it dry for a bit. You can use a heat gun to speed things up - I did to finish the drying.

24 hours before I started, I choose three Twinkling H2Os (Dreamsicle, Summer Breeze, Apple Blossom). I filled each pot up with water and let it sit. The water made the H2O's very "gloopy"...kinda like Elmers Glue.
By scooping a little color out onto my mat and adding a bit more water, I could stamp with it (Apple Blossom and Memory Box Sonoma Print). Or fill my brush and fling it. The final result is a large piece of background that can be used for multiple card!

In Fred's class he had little window template so you could figure out where in your sheet you wanted to cut. He has one on his web page - CROPPING TOOL TEMPLATE. There's also a short video. Note the PDF template does not have the marking holes.

He also has a template for the card base - the rectangle works perfectly with the template. As you can see this card would be perfect without any further embellishments. I choose to stamp the Stampin' Up geisha over the color block. Even my "sits on top of everything" Archival black wasn't 100% crisp.

The final touch was a double coin knot. I used a thick paper cord in a turquoise blue.

Stamps: Stampin' Up! DREAM GARDENS, Memory Box SONOMA PRINT
Paper: Oriental Calligraphy paper, Neenah Solar White
Ink: Archival Black
Accessories: Glimmer Mist, Twinkling H2O's, found masking items, Japanese cord

Please join us in using MISTS at Gingersnap Creations! You have a month to make your entry.

7 comments:

  1. What a fantastic background - I love the circles! Is that a shelf mat?

    Thanks for sharing the technique. I will definitely try it.

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  2. Wow, what a great technique and great card !!

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  3. Oh my, this is amazing. Thanks for the tutorial and links! I am totally going to try something like this!!

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  4. Wonderful and fun tutorial on your elegant mess. Learned something too about twinking h20..thanks for sharing your beautiful card. I loved it. yr fellow ginger, gerri

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  5. Beautiful card, love the BG - thanks for the tutorial!

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  6. Love how you created the background! Gorgeous! As soon as I saw it, I felt transported back in time and across worlds!

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  7. Fantastic piece, love the background.

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