{Colour Blast} Gel Plate + Colour Shimmer Dust = FUN!

Hello, hello and welcome to my blog today!! Today's share is for Colour Blast and it is more cards!!

I'm going to start this post will a little confession!! Last June I attended the Brisbane Craft Show and purchased a Gel Press plate - I couldn't wait to get home and PLAY!! When I finally did play, let's just say I was less than impressed with my end results so I put the press away with every intention of trying again "one day." Well, that one day is here so I grabbed said gel press, white acrylic paint, ALL of my Colour Shimmer Dusts, brayer, stencils and paper and off I went!

I started by mixing my paint with my first colour choice of Peacock Colour Shimmer Dust. I mixed this well with a palette knife and applied to my plate with my brayer. I then grabbed my first piece of cardstock and pressed that straight onto the top rubbing firmly to get an impression.

Depending on how thick you do the paint and how much you press you can get multiple prints from the same paint layer. 

Please remember, I was simply playing and I think I still have a long way to go!! I continued with the same technique a couple of times and then decided to add another colour for another layer.

Next up was Paris Colour Shimmer Dust. I did not clean my "palette" so got a deeper green than the Paris by itself would be. I was having so much fun brayering and pressing that I forgot to get a photo of that particular layer however you can see the colour in the next step.

I decided to try adding a completely different colour and this time grabbed the Sunflower Colour Shimmer Dust and white acrylic. You can see the left overs of the Paris on the plate to the left of the photo.

I added in some stencils using  the stencil almost like a stamp and impressing the stencil into the wet paint, removing the stencil and moving it all around the plate and then doing another impression for another layer of colour.

Each time I changed colour families I cleaned my gel plate. Also when I decided to add in the yellow I actually grabbed some old acetate/packaging to create a palette to mix the colour and apply to my brayer.

I couldn't resist trying some pink so grabbed my Lollipop Colour Shimmer Dust and got mixing. I applied a layer of that to my plate and then did a little experiment. I grabbed my Sunflower Dust and sprinkled that in couple of places on the wet paint on the gel plate, added a small blob of acrylic, brayered that and then did an impression. This gave an intesting, much more saturated, effect to the areas where the Dust hadn't completely mixed in.

By this stage I had done a number of prints and thought I should stop then and see what I had. I had also experimented yesterday to see if I could get my idea of Colour Shimmer Dust and acrylic to work so there a couple of extra book pages I did a couple of extra impressions on those. I chose some of the prints I thought I could work with and cut them down to card front size (10cm x 14.3cm) and here are the bases I cut. I also had enough from one of the prints to do 2 10cm square fronts as well. 

I picked 3 I wanted to work with added a couple of more layers! Starting with Colour Paste in Bling to 2 of the card fronts.

When that was dry (I did give it a bit of a head start with the heat gun!) I added in some stamping with gold ink and also black ink. I also inked around all of the edges of the cards to give them a little bit of a defining edge.

I grabbed a few embellishments from my stash - Charms Creations, D-lish Scraps and Funky Flair Studio's mostly - and stuck those on and mounted my card fronts onto cream card bases.

And a photo of each

If you know me well chances are you can pick my fave is the star one. Do you have a favourite??

I have filmed my process which will give you a better idea of the actual process (and just how messy I got ;) ) which you can see here. 

Now that I have broken the printing plate in I can't wait to do some more playing and printing!! Do you have a gel plate you've been "meaning to get to"? Have a play, it is FUN!!

I hope you enjoyed this and I'd love for you to share if you create something inspired by this so please head over the Colour Blast Creative Corner on FB and share away!!

Until next time, happy scrapping!!

Melinda

{ScrappingClearly} Gift Tags with the Minc

Hello crafty friends and welcome to my blog today! Today's share is for ScrappingClearly and I have something a little different to share with you but it's something quick and easy and it made a great gift!!

Yep, lots of little tags which I made for my Mum for her birthday. And before you ask, yes, this is what she asked for!! My Mum crochet's and has found herself with enough beautiful things to last a life time (a bit like us with our paper, right?!) and has decided it's time to sell some off and wanted tags to go on them so with that in mind off I went!!

I started with the GORGEOUS Minc paper pad - brights - these colours are divine!! and got designing on my computer in Word. A very simple design and if you are interested the font I used is called PN Octopus Socks Script. I had my document printed onto the card through a laser printer so I could Minc away.

I chose the holographic foil - it's "neutral" enough to go with all the colours and oh so pretty, I love it!! Because I have the 6" Minc I had to cut my pages down to fit into the carrier thingy - yep, technical ;) so had to do multiple runs through the Minc. You will notice in the close ups some of the foiling is not perfect, I think that was the print and not the Minc itself or the foil as I have not had a single other issue with either! I am quiet happy with the less than perfect look, I mean, I don't often do neat and perfect in either my scrapping or real life ;)

I die cut all of my tags using a metal die from my stash but you could so easily use another tag as a template and hand cut, use a cameo or simply just freehand some tags or any other shape that appeals to you.

I used a paper punch from my stash paired some of the offcuts from around the tags and also some vellum to create some very simple embellishments for each tag (you could of course use ANY type of printed vellum as well, that would look great too!), lightly stuck the layers together and ran them through my sewing machine. A little bit of glue and my final touch was some twine.

Like I said, a pretty simple project but Mum loved it and it was fun to put something a little different for together!

There is a process video for this - it's not very long - but I hope you enjoy!


Thanks so much for stopping by, until next time, happy scrapping!

Melinda

{Scrap The Boys} Love You ~ April 2018 Chellenge

Oh my goodness!! April ALREADY! Now that I am over the initial shock that the first quarter of 2018 is done onto my share!! Today's is for Scrap The Boys and we are going geo this month!! My very 1st thought was STARS, of course, but I decided to do something different and went with squares/rectangles - rectangles because free handing squares is too hard to get it just right ;) lol

Here is my page

And process video

This month we are sponsored by Cocoa Vanilla Studio and I have used mostly some of the new More Than Words collection, but have also thrown in a couple of pieces from older collections and love how this page came together!

This was super fun - I loved doing the stitching in the back ground the most I think!! For those lines I used my t-square ruler and drew 3 vertical and 3 horizontal lines without paying any attention to exactly where they were, I used them more as a guide for straightness than a "stitch here" guide.

Of course, mixed media fun in the back ground using some of my fave Colour Blast colours and you can see all of that on the video!

Here are a few close ups, I hope you enjoy and we would love to see you share your take over on the blog this month. Make sure you pop over to check out all of the other A-MAZING girls' takes on the challenge for lots of inspo!!!

Until next time, happy scrapping!!

Melinda

xx

{Stash} Masters Entry ~ Challenge 1 ~ 5x7 photo with eye contact

Hey, hey my scrappy friends!! 

So, following on from my first post with Challenge #2 here is my entry for Challenge #1. Using a 5" x 7" inch photo with eye contact.

Here is my page

My blurb that got sent in with my entry

"This photograph was specifically taken to tell these stories/record these quotes. The photograph and stories are from when he was 4 years old and I just love hearing his logic and seeing parts of this world through his eyes! This kid is a cracker and I am both excited and terrified of the young man he will grow into! I chose this range because to me it speaks of the everyday. The extraordinary, average day to day that is life. I love the graphic design and the challenge it presented to me to work with it with lots of clean lines, white space and pops of colour."

Some close up shots

And my products list

Pink Fresh Studios – Live More – 12x12 paper “Freedom”

Pink Fresh Studios – Live More – Foiled Die Cuts

Pink Fresh Studios – Live More – Studio Puff Stickers

Pink Fresh Studios – Live More – Acetate Alphas

Pink Fresh Studios – Live More – Phrase Stickers

Cocoa Vanilla Studio – You Rock – Ephemera

Teresa Collins – Basically Essential – White Alpha Stickers

Stash – flair, tags

No process video for this one. This one I went back and forth with for AGES and just couldn't make any decisions. I adore this collection, the clean, graphic lines but oh boy I struggled!! I do, once again, love how this page came together in the end and am excited to include it in Hunter's album!

Until next time, happy scrapping!

Melinda

x

{ScrappingClearly} What About Your Happy Face ~ A Scrapbook Layout

Hey and hello and happy Monday scrappy friends!!

Today I am playing along with the March challenges. Well, the March challenge, both have been rolled into one which was a bit different and fun!

Here is my take

And here is my process video

As I'm certain you noticed, I ended up flipping the page and am really happy with my end result. 

Again, I've started with one of those super cool Ella & Viv papers, "Cardinal and Gold" to be precise and built my layout on top of that. I chose that paper because it included almost all of the colours from the mood board - the only colours missing were the pink and green but I ticked both of those boxes, one with messy mixed media and the other with, of course my Minc ;)

I've used some Dylusions acrylic paint in Polished Jade with my silicone brush to apply my first messy layer on the background, sticking fairly closely to the sketch.

In line with the sketch my next layer was some watered down black gesso. I found a cool little dropper tool that had been buried in my stash but you could very easily use a big paint brush or a pipette to get the same effect by splattering from high above the page.

I added some pink as a mat under my 3 photos using some of the Heidi Swapp Minc cardstock. I've added more pink using some of the Heidi Swapp pink foil on the title - using the Minc Alpha Stickers - and the sub-title - using one of the Jumbo Words.

With the background being so bright, colourful and busy I didn't feel like I needed to add much more so I added my journalling which I typed up in strips and 2 of the Heidi Swapp Sequin Shapes - Disco Arrows and one of the Cocoa Vanilla Studios You Rock Rubber Charm pieces.

I have added 2 dates onto this page - one the date the photo's were taken and the other the date the page was made/journalling done. I think I will pop this in his current album so the journalling continues in chronological order.

Make sure you play along with our challenge this month for your chance to win a store voucher. Head over here to the FB page to upload your entry to the correct album. I can't wait to see how you interpret this month's 2 challenges in 1!!

Until next time, happy scrapping!!

Melinda

{Colour Blast} My Special Boy ~ A Scrapbook Layout

Hey, hey!! Happy Saturday, Melinda here with you again today and I'm sharing some "special" photo's of my big boy that I had lots of fun scrapping!!

I can't wait to pull these out for his 18th or 21st, or heck whenever it seems funny to show some embarrassing kiddie photo's!! This page started with these photo's and title - I knew when I had these printed this HAD to be the title. I chose my alphas and then my colour scheme was picked for me - Just Blue and Bling!!

There is a process video here that you can watch and see my whole process and step-by-steps coming up!

Black cardstock base - after I realised I had NONE I stocked up and went straight for it for this page. A text stencil in the background and Just Blue Colour Paste for some texture and colour - I just LOVE the way the shimmer products POP on black!

After the Colour Paste was dry - I may have helped ;) - I grabbed my Just Blue Colour Shimmer Spray and Singin The Blues Colour Shimmer Spray and simply sprayed onto my background over my stencilling.

Because the background was not prepared with gesso it dried pretty quickly so I got to splattering - I have used a combination of the Colour Shimmer Spray's in Just Blue, Singin The Blues and, of course, Bling and also the same colours in the Colour Shimmer Pots/Cubes.

Time to build all my layers - I have used almost ALL Australian suppliers including Cocoa Vanilla Studios (You Rock collection), D-lish Scraps, Rainbow Splendor & Corbett Creations and also Flutterby Designs. Lots of blues and whites and then some extra texture with the wood veneer. The Bear may not make sense but I have always referred to my big boy as my Baby Bear and at the age he was in these photos he was OFTEN referred to as just that!

My final touches were some journalling using a white paint pen, some white thread and white splatters. My white splatters were a combination of Heavy White Gesso and water using a paintbrush and I love how it lifts the whole page!

Here are a few close ups

I just did a big batch of photo's recently and included some of these older photo's and am loving remembering the stories and scrapping them, I have so many ideas now!!

I hope I have inspired you to maybe pull out some black card stock or perhaps some older photo's and have a play!

Until next time, happy scrapping - remember, the messier it is the more fun it is lol

Melinda

{ScrappingClearly} The Good Life ~ A Scrapbook Page

Happy St Patricks Day to you lovely ScrappingClearly fans today!!

I don't really have anything green to share with you though there is SOME green in my page today so I hope you enjoy!!

And there is a process video available over on my channel or just click play and sit back and enjoy!

I was sent a couple of these super awesome papers by Ella & Viv and WOW they are so vibrant, busy and fun. I did hesitate for a while before jumping in to use either but chose the Boombox paper for my background, I thought it worked better with my photo choice and I knew I wanted to play with some Distress Oxides!

Because that paper is so busy I used a relatively light coat of white gesso using my Prima 2" silicone brush to put a layer between my photo and the background where I could add some extra colour and kinda soften the busy-ness. Kind of.....

I've used some black Versafine ink and done some background stamping and then went in with the packaging technique and my Distress Oxides in Faded Jeans, Blueprint Sketch and Cracked Pistachio. I also pulled out Fossilized Amber which I ended up stamping with and added splatters after all the other colours were dried. I also decided to add some splatters with my Sunshine Colour Shimmer Pot because the yellow wasn't bright enough for me ;)

I used my Minc and some Gunmetal foil to create my title. I've used one one of the pieces from the Paper Phrases by Heidi Swapp - The Good Life - this photo is the perfect representation of my biggest boy totally in his element at a friends place helping to look after their horses.

I have used some plain vellum to back my photo tearing the edges and layering it a little.

I decided I didn't need too much embellishing so went with some Heidi Swapp wood veneer which I made black using the same black ink from earlier and a couple of the grey rubber charms from the You Rock collection by Cocoa Vanilla Studios.

When all my layers were stuck I wanted to lift the page so watered down a little white gesso and sprinkled away.

I added my journalling & date with my Fude Ball pen and my page was done!

Another little story told and in his album and I just love that fun back ground paper and loved the challenge I gave myself to use it!

Until next time, happy scrapping!!

Melinda