Sponging and Blending Fun
At our Tips & Tricks event the other night we did some sponging and blending with ink, using sponges and Blending Brushes. It was a lot of fun to try different colours and different ways to create some pretty backgrounds.
We started with Blending Brushes and Poppy Parade, Flirty Flamingo and So Saffron ink, blended in a random pattern all over our Basic White cardstock. Using the Blending Brushes gives you a smooth, blended look, and can be as light or colour intense as you want, depending on how much pressure and ink you apply while blending
We made a couple of backgrounds this way, then moved on to using sponges, and an oval mask to create a focal background.
Back to Blending Brushes, to make some skyline backgrounds.
With all our backgrounds complete it was time to make some cards!
I used the Sweet Strawberry stamp set and Strawberry Builder Punch to make some strawberries to decorate the first card.
Some layering oval die cuts as a backdrop for the berries and some Silver Edged ribbon finished off this card.
One of the attendees at the Tips and Tricks wanted some ideas using the Dog punch that will retire soon. We used the oval masked background to create a pretty place for our dog to sit. The sponging for this was was done with Balmy Blue and Smoky Slate ink. I used the Stitched So Sweetly Dies to cut a ruffled frame for the card and added some Basic Pearls to embellish the card. The sentiment is from the Free As A Bird stamp set and seemed very appropriate to provide a double meaning when sending this card to a friend that is dog person!
We used one of our evening sky backgrounds to provide another background for our second Dog punch card.
Not wanting to leave out the cat lovers in the crowd, we made a second card with a dusk sky to provide the background for our Cat punch card.
The other request for our evening was some inspiration for Mother’s Day cards. Depending on Mom’s tastes, any of the above cards could be suitable for Mom, the last card is a more traditional type of Mother’s Day card. Changing out the sentiment would make this a great card to celebrate Mom.
The background for this card was made with the Blending Brushes and Balmy Blue, Highland Heather and Blushing Bride ink. I die cut an oval in the front of my Highland Heather card base, and framed it with a Balmy Blue frame layer. I die cut three small butterflies using the Brilliant Wings Dies from some Gorgeous Grape cardstock that I had spritzed with the Champagne Mist Shimmer Paint. Some Pearl Basic Jewels add a pretty touch to the butterflies along with some Gorgeous Grape Sheer Ribbon on the sentiment block. The sentiment on this card is from the Friends Are Like Seashells stamp set, but could easily be switched for a Mother’s Day sentiment. My initial thought was to adhere the blended background piece to the back inside of the card front, but in looking at it, I decided that the colours were light enough, and too pretty to hide at all, so instead I adhered it to the back inside of the card. The butterfly in the centre of the frame then shows when the card is closed or open!
We had a great evening sharing tips and tricks for creating pretty backgrounds, two step stamping, and more along with lots of inspiration for card making.
