AECP Irresistible Inking Techniques

Whoo-hoo! It’s turning into a whirlwind June as I’m trying to wrap up my Level 1 AECP courses. I love that I’m continuing to learn and expand my skills in card making with each class and today’s card is no exception

My last class in the Level 1 Altenew Educator Certification Program is Irresistible Inking Techniques. This class provides instruction on several techniques for utilizing ink pads in different ways to bring depth and interest to card projects.

There are a couple of techniques that I am excited to try on some future card projects such as using a brayer to ink a background and inking a stamp block to create a sort of faux watercolor background.

For today’s card, I’ll be using the Simple Layered Stamping technique with a twist. I am utilizing a newer stamp from Altenew called Calming Reverie. This stamp set features a large, gorgeous, stippled rose and a solid outline background as well as some leaves and a fun scripty “hello” sentiment. It was a must have for me because I love stippled images.

Before beginning my card, I was playing with my Altenew inks and the Calming Reverie stamp set. As a cardmaker, I know what colors I’m naturally drawn to. I’m sure some of you can figure it out by looking at my past card designs.

If you guessed a cool color pallet you’d be correct. My favorite go-to colors are in the purple, pink and teal color families. I love bright, bold colors and I find more inspiration to create with those colors.

However, I find it difficult to create with colors that I’m not fond of and don’t feel as comfortable utilizing. These would be the warm colors like orange, yellow, red and even browns. Does anyone else have this struggle as well? It seems that I naturally overlook those colors as I gravitate towards my favorites.

For my card, I challenged myself to get out of my color comfort zone. I pulled out my MISTI and stamped the solid flower background with some Buttercream Altenew ink. It’s a lovely, soft yellow color. Since this was a trial run, I didn’t worry about double stamping. Next, I stamped the stippled rose layer from the Calming Reverie set on top using the Altenew Azurite blue ink.

My initial reaction to my test image was to throw it away. I walked that test stamping to my trash can. I held it at arms length trying to look at it from a different perspective and thought what if I added some dimension?

I grabbed my Caran D’Ache colored pencils and started adding a bit of darker colors under the petals. Then I added a bit of darker yellow. The colors felt familiar and reminded me of a comfortable pair of Levi’s jeans. At that point, I knew I had to make this flower with those colors. Below is the test image I almost threw away.

Setting my sample image aside I cut some 110lb Neenah Classic Crest Solar White cardstock to a 6 x 9 size. I stamped the base of the rose and two sets of leaves with the same Buttercream ink. I stamped all 3 stippled images with the Azurite ink. Double stamping this time to get a good impression.

Rather than color in all of the dark areas of the leaves on the rose, I decided to use the Calming Reverie Mask Stencil and placed it over my stippled rose. Mask stencils are a great tool that can be used to create additional depth and dimension with stamped images. It allows you to build up your color for an image that may not have multiple stamping layers. .

Using an ink blending brush, I blended on some Altenew Warm Sunshine and small amount of Snapdragon ink to the center of the rose. This provided a wonderful base color with some depth.

I went in with my colored pencils on both the leaves and rose and added some additional depth to the images.

When I was finished with the added details on the leaves and rose, I placed my cardstock back in my MISTI to stamp the 2 layers from the flower center using Milk Chocolate and Dark Night Altenew inks. I added some additional stippling details to the center with a micron pen.

Once everything was finished with the stamped images, I fussy cut them and set them aside.

I stamped the Rustic Linen background stamp onto some 110lb white cardstock using some Versamark. I heat set the image with some Brutus Monroe Night Shift Blue embossing powder. My plan was that my flowers would be layered on top of the background. Ultimately, I decided that the background was too busy against my finished flower and leaves.

Instead I opted to cut my Rustic Linen background down into a frame with some thin gold frames outlining it using a layered rectangle die set. I used some navy cardstock for my central background. I really like it so much better as it helps my flower image to pop off the background. I stamped the hello sentiment from the Calming Reverie stamp set and heat embossed it with some white detail embossing powder.

The finished rose and leaves were added to the card front with some dimensional foam. The finished card size is 4 1/4 x 5 1/2.

To add a bit of bling to my card, I added a few blue pearls to the card front and I used a Sakura Jelly Roll sparkle pen to add some fine shimmer details to the veins on the leaves and for the center of the flower.

Thanks so much for stopping by! I hope you’ve enjoyed today’s card creation. If you are looking to learn some new skills for your card making or scrapbooking, be sure to check out all of Altenew Academy classes. There’s something for every crafter of every level.

Hugs,

Tonya