Heat Embossing on Wood!

Hi friends! Today’s technique is a fun and useful one that can be used to make embellishments, gift tags or even Christmas ornaments!

We are going to emboss on wood!Are you ready to get inky? Than watch today’s video!

Tutorial sponsored by Top Flight Stamps Use coupon code thefrugalcrafter10 to save 10% on your order! They also have free USA Shipping over $50!

Supplies:

• Stamps
• Paint
• Wood shapes
• Cardstock (heavy)
• Black Eyelets
• Wire
• Beads
• Watercolor crayons (I used Lyra and Caran D’Ache)
• Small flat paintbrush
• 1/2″ flat paintbrush
• Craft Mat (or waxed paper)
• Dies  Honeycomb and poppies, butterflies and grids
• Scrapbook paper *Make envelopes first and then cut shapes from scraps.
• Black embossing powder
• Black embossing ink
• Heat tool

Tips!

1. If you have leftover paint, brush it over cardstock to make matching decorative paper!
2. Make an envelope first from 12″x12″ scrapbook paper and use the scraps to die cut embellishments.
3. Make a batch: It only takes a little more time to make multiple cards while your supplies are all out. As a bonus you’ll have less to file away when you are done. Use up those scraps now because they may never get used if you file them away. (At least that is the case in my experience.)
4. Be careful when heat embossing your small wood tiles so you don’t burn your hands off.
5. If mailing these thick cards place them (envelope and all) in a bubble mailer to prevent snags in post office machinery.

I hope you give this project a try, and til next time happy crafting!

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Do More with Your Ink Pads! Stamp School!

Hi friends! If you are new to stamping you probably don’t have every coloring tool out there. You might also limit your supplies due to storage space and budgetary concerns. Maybe you have everything you could ever want but you want a small kit of supplies that you can take on the go with you so you want your supplies to do double duty. Whatever the reason I am going to show you 3 different ways to use your ink pads to color your stamped images.

I will show you 3 methods of coloring in this video!

Sponsored by Art Neko *Save 10% off your next order of any size or get free shipping on orders over $50 (whichever discount is greater you get!) just by mentioning thefrugalcrafter!

Supplies:

• Stamps: Bird and nest from the Flowers and Whimsy set
• Dies: Spellbinders
• Bristol (what we stamped on) Canson XL
• Stencil brushes (small sizes)
• Color duster (Judikins)
• Sponge tip daubers (Darice)
• Waterbrush: Pentel
• Card bases: Micheals (or make them from cardstock)
• Patterened paper: DCWV
• Dye ink in several colors
• Burlap ribbon
• Bakers twine
• Doily
• Black Pigment ink (VErsafine onyx black)
• Black detail embossing powder
• Homemade anti-static tool (cornstarch in a fabric pouch)
• Adhesive (glue-zip-dry, Tape ATG)

Examples

This first example was colored by using small stiff bristles stencil brushes. You can get a similar look by using cotton swabs to apply the ink.

This example was done with a sponge applicator. You can get a similar look with sponge tipped eye-shadow applicators. The daubers I used in the video are called Embossing Brushes  (even though they are not a brush) and are made by Darice and came in a pack of 16 for around $5

The final example is watercolor and this is a great option if you don’t have many ink pads because you can mix colors easily on a palette before bringing the brush to paper.

Directions:
1. Wipe bristol board with corn starch pouch. Stamp with black and heat emboss with black powder.

2. Die cut stamped panels. Cut mats for the panels if desired.

3. Assemble cards, all but the stamped panels, and set aside.

4. Color each panel as shown in the video experimenting with the different ink applications.

5. Glue stamped panels to cards.

I think limiting your supplies expands your creativity! If you have any clever ideas for getting more from your ink pads or other supplies let us know in the comments! Happy crafting!

How To Scan Your Artwork & Print Cards at Home!

Hi friends! When I painted this cute deer watercolor I mentioned how I planned to scan the painting and turn it into Christmas cards.

Many of you were interested in scanning your paintings to turn them into cards as well and in today’s video I will show you how!

Keep in mind that if you don’t have a scanner you can take a good straight on shot of your painting with a camera (even camera phones do a great job these days!) and follow the steps after the scan portion of the tutorial.

Tools and Equipment needed:

• Scanner or camera: I am using an Epson Perfection v19 scanner
• Image editing software: I am using Paint Shop Pro 12 software but Photoshop, or the free open source software Gimp or (maybe) Picasa can be used. There is also a free app online called ipiccy that will work for laying out your images and basic editing if you need it, it is very easy to use but is not similar to what I show on-screen.
• Color printer: HP Photosmart D7360 printer (Discontinued but still works great!)
• Matte photo paper
• A2 greeting card bulk packs from Micheal’s Craft Stores ($5 a 60 pack last year)
• ATG adhesive (double-sided tape)

Your process will differ a bit if you are using different equipment but the basic steps are the same:

1. Scan painting at a quality of 300dpi using the color photo setting or take a high-resolution photo of your painting.
2. Adjust levels using the curves tool or an intuitive “photo fix” button.
3. Open a new 8.5″ x 11″ document and copy and past your image in it.
4. Resize the image so it will fit on 1/4 of the paper. Add text if you wish.
5. Merge the text to the image but selecting the text layer and choosing merge down then copy and paste that combined image in each quarter of the paper.
6. Merge all layers and print using the best quality setting and nice quality matte photo paper.
7. Trim images and adhere to card-bases.

I hope you give this a try, it might take a few minutes to get used to using your photo editing software, there are many options out there and I recommend you use what you have or try the free gimp or ipiccy options before investing in expensive software. If all else fails you can use Windows picture editor to print 4 images on one sheet so don’t despair if your image software is difficult. That is what I mentioned ipiccy, you can upload your image and drag and drop it into cells and print but you do lose some control over what you can do in editing software. The way I learn any new software is to play with it, you are not going to break it:) Good luck & happy crafting!

A Quick Folded Christmas Tree Card! {video!}

Wow, how did it get to be December 3rd already?!? My husband subtly hinted that we need to be getting out Christmas cards out soon. Well, this quick and easy design can be made in a flash with inexpensive supplies from Papermart and it is flat enough not to require extra postage! Watch the video to see how it is done!

I used the Tinsel Wire and Corrugated paper in Lime green. I love how when you buy from Papermart you get a large quantity for little cash, it is perfect for mass producing items such as Christmas cards or making stuff for craft fairs and it is even better for supplying classroom art projects.  To save on shipping costs I suggest you plan ahead for other items you might want and if the quantity of an item is too great ask friends if they want to split it with you. That reminds me, I’m running low on the clear bags I display my handmade cards in at craft fairs! I don’t want to run out of those! I hope this project had inspired you to send handmade Christmas cards this year. Thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!

By Request: Clay Flower Tutorial & WOYWW!

Happy Wednesday folks!  Last week I posted a recipe for Hybrid Art Clay and I had lots of sweet comments on the tutorial. I also had a request for a video showing how to make the clay roses. I decided to film a tutorial on how to make them as well as these simple Calla lilies:

 

That would also be pretty for Mother’s Day! I’ll also show you how to make the fluffy stamens from wire and styrofoam!

Here is a look at the roses you will also learn to make in todays free video:

The video is shot in frame (gasp!) so you can actually see what the heck I am doing (I really hope you appreciate this because I had to re-shoot it LOL!)

Because it is What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday I’ll show you a picture of my clay drying rack I made from old wire storage cubes. Do you remember those?  They used to always go on sale for $10 a set at Ames about 10 years ago and I probably bought 5 sets ha ha! I like how you can re-configure them in minutes and then take them apart and store them in a flat stack. I explain how to make it at the end of the video but in case you don’t make it that far I’ll recap. Assemble a 5 sided cube with the metal sections and corner connectors. Use small binder clips or zip ties to place as many shelves as you need inside. I used binder clips (you can get packs of 12 clips at the dollar sore) so that I can quickly take it apart. The clay is light so the clips are fine. If you want to use this for storing paper you can, just use zip ties instead to make it strong enough. I lined the shelves with window screening (you could also use sheets of plastic canvas) so the clay does not fall through but also so that air can circulate from all sides preventing warping and hastening drying time.

I did a little research and found that you can still get these but the price is higher. Target has them for the lowest price, around $25 online but I’d call before heading out to your local store to make sure they carry them and that the price is good. They were $44 at other stores online like walmart. Or wait for a yard sale, for some reason people like to get rid of these, little do they know how handy they can be!

That’s all for today and til next time happy crafting!

How to make varnished paper!

I’ll admit I love the cool varnished scrapbook paper that has been popular the last couple of years. That little touch of glossy goodness is just the right accent for so many projects. Did you know you can forgo the expensive store-bought variety and make your own? Oh, yes, and it is very easy. I used some homemade varnished cardstock for the background of this card:

Stamp Credits: On card(Oriental Tradicng Co.), on bookmark/tag: Bottle cap (Inkadinkado), Alpha (PSX)

 This is simple but perfect when you want a wee bit of subtle glam (subtle glam?!?) to add interest to a card or scrapbook. All you do is use clear embossing ink to stamp a design, sprinkle it with clear embossing powder and blast it with a beat gun. Here is how it looks on plain cardstock. Even though the ink and powder are clear it really shows up well and is guaranteed to match! You could add watercolors over the design too for a neat batik/resist look!

That is just the tip of the iceberg. You can use an embossing pen to color design elements on a sheet of patterned paper and clear emboss of a custom varnish look or stamp designs in color over a subtle patterned paper for a look that is tres chic!

Cool tip: Make your own wheel stamps with texture mats!

I was digging around in a drawer that had some old stamping tools  and I came across my old rubber Sculpey and Amaco texture mats. They are designed to press polymer clay against to make cool textures or to use the Colorbox styluses with it make little custom stamps. Well, the Scupley brand ones are the same size as the Rollagraph/Stampin’ Around jumbo wheels and I happen to have a few dozen blank wheels around so I used double stick tape to attach it to a wheel and that is how I made the varnish background in the first card. I am committed to this idea now so I think I will attach the rubber to the wheels with rubber cement. The Amaco sheets are larger so they would need to be cut down to fit the jumbo wheels. Don’t you love it when you can find 2 uses for the same product?

 

I put a Sculpey texture mat on a blank Stampin' Around Wheel to stamp this background. An Amaco mat is pictured laying flat. Mmmmm, texture 😉

 Another tip I have is to save the cut out parts from pretty die cuts. On both this card and tag I used the leftover inside swirl from the heart die cut from my Decorative Doilies SVG set:

I inked and shimmer misted the swirl on the card and I left it plain on the tag. Also another cheap trick: Place a strip of adhesive along the bottom of you card and pleat a strip of pretty paper along it, notch the ends and you have a cheap & chic border!

Oh, and one more tip! When making a tag for a gift think beyond the one-time use! This tag was purposely made flat so it can be used as a bookmark later.

I hope you can use some of these tips in your craftroom! Thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!

LSS weekly wrap up and a Mother’s day sale!

I hope you are all having a happy mother’s day! If you still need to make a card for mom (or treat yourself to some new crafty goodness) hop over to Lindsay’s stamp Stuff where everything is 40% off today only!

Here are 3 cards I made with the new Build-a-Blossom SVG set. I am going to package them up with matching envelopes and put them in the gift basket for my mom, you can never have too many ready-made cards and these were such fun to make.  Cutting all the pieces were a breeze using my Cricut machine and SCAL software. You could even leave them blank and stamp a sentiment in when you need a card.

The DT has some great work for you this week.  We say goodbye to long time DT member Margie (sniff, sniff, we will miss you girl!) but we are joined again by Cassandra so that is a real treat! Let’s kick off the wrap up with Cassandra’s cute card using the doodle flowers digistamp set:

Next up is Rhonda’s beautiful watercolor card using the Fancy Flower digistamp set:

Karin made this sweet card for me, my cat of 15 years (but he was 18) passed away last week and I was so upset, she sent me this lovely card using the kitty image from the set Stick Dog & Cat.  This set is actually free and it’s and add-on set to the People Mix and Match set available in the  shop.

Micki made this clean and simple card using Elegant & Shabby School Scrapbook and Card Papers set and School Rules Digi Set:

Again I want to wish you a happy mother’s day and remember to snag some great deals at Lindsay’s Stamp Stuff today! Til next time happy crafting!