Creative Chemistry: Days 9 and 10

Day 9 - Perfect Pearls - Didn't make my own mist with Perfect Pearls because misting with just water is an art I've not yet mastered in the crafting world (I'll get it on you if you sit next to me), although I do think that painting with the Perfect Pearls powder is pretty cool and gives a neat patina.. just need practice. The tag on the left is various Distress Inks blobbed onto a craft sheet with goops of pearls powder sprinkled on and then misting, running the tag through, misting, running the tag through ad nauseum..."Perfect splatter distress."  Nice patina (I guess) but Tim's big "OOOHHHHH"  was kinda my big "NAWWW"... Technique No. 1 looked so bizarre when Tim did it and on his sample that I didn't even try. The patina on neither of these shows up well on camera but it is a very metallic, shiny finish that really sets the image off.

Day 10 - Dimensional Mediums had a long lecture and a short project.  Basically inking, stamping, heat setting and then wiping through Rock Candy Distress Stickles, spreading the stickles over the image and letting it dry which is a shiny but not "glossy accents" shiny effect.  But "someone" didn't heat set enough so a few blurry leaves.. heat set is my new favorite phrase. Again, camera doesn't pick up real effect of the stickles.

Tomorrow he posts the gallery i.e. the Holtz gallery and I can't wait to see what some of this mess turned into and what some of the neat ones turn into  There are a couple of techniques for my Alaska scrapbooks in here and a few for cards, some just for fun and, after all, isn't that what crafty days are all about?  But I still love my Copics and watercolor crayons best.

Creative Chemistry: Day 8 (love it!)

Today was Paint Primer day using distress stains, Adirondack paint daubers, crackle paint and the first thing I should do is go back to Joann.com (huge huge sale till 3/31) and order more colors of stain! Wow.. I loved all of these techniques but two really don't show up well in my photo so I've also included Mr. Holtz' picture.

On my left (and his left) is "distress crackle."  The thing with both the crackle paint and the rock candy crackle (his hearts, my buttons) is timing.  Because I've played with these before I know it can easily take an hour for these to dry and then aren't really amenable to heat setting.  So I peeked at today's samples this afternoon, put on the Scattered Straw crackle and rock candy and let 'em sit for 3 hours... Crackle paint will take distress stains into the "cracks".. you can mist and gently rub over, dry and add more color.  Adding color to "non crackled" portion of tag can be with stains or distress inks. The bottom picture shows the "cracked" effect this paint has after it dries and the Scattered Straw has taken the Peeled Paint and Weathered Wood stain into the cracks.

My middle sample and his far right (hearts) is the "shattered stains".  The rock candy crackled dries clear so you can just rub the distress stain into it for a stained glass effect, using as much or as little and blotting and drying until you get the desired effect which I did, but it doesn't show up!  And I didn't have colors I really waned to use -- Dusty Concord, Tumbled Glass and Pine Needles and maybe some Barn Door as I love the effect on Tim's samples.

My far right and his middle sample is "paint dabber resist" which he did on canvas but I did on Kraft paperand is it quick 'n easy (finally).  Using his Adirondack paint dabbers, you "dab" paint onto a stamp, quickly stamp the image (as it is water base but dries waterproof). Then you clean off the stamp with water ASAP - i.e. it dries waterproof, heat set the stamped image, lightly mist tag with water and apply distress stains (walnut and wild honey) onto the tag... the painted image resists the stain, apply as much or as little and heat set... voila!

Tomorrow is perfect pearls powder painting.. have had 'em a year and no idea what to do with them so that will be interesting.

Creative Chemistry: Day 7

Embossing basics, otherwise known in my craft room as "embossing is basic, but it's a pain in the tush to get it all out" or "why I have a half circle watermelon rug covering a burned area of the Berber carpet..."   Several techniques:  "nostalgic batik," "rusted enamel," and "distress powder resist."  These were really relatively easy and I'm done at 9:30 pm, which is amazing (due mainly to only 1 small box of cards to the OWH shipper today).  The "distress powder resist" (center)  really can only be done with Tim's distress emboss powder; I used Tattered Rose which was almost too dark and I really don't like the result (the word 'cherish') but would try again with Antique Linen and then inking with darker colors of browns, blue to see what happens.  The nostalgic batik (left) had an ironing step at the end that I paid no attention to but the embossing, then distress inking, wiping off excess ink and then stamping to give a sort of "stamp-a-ma-jig" effect is pretty cool.  The enamel (that would be the right side) might be a neat background in the right colors for an outdoorsy scrapbook page using a 5x7 piece of manila folder instead of a tag... maybe.... Tomorrow is the slow drying crackle paint -maybe I can get dishes done while it dries ;)... or Tim will sing? his praises maybe ::not nice::

Creative Chemistry: Day 6

Ah, the much anticipated Distress Markers class.  I was able to find 12 of the markers at LSS's and altho it's not an ideal dozen, it worked for the class and is a decent palette to go with the inks.  I sell Stampin' Up! and find their markers do just about the same thing as the Distress and since I'm seriously into Copics and watercoloring with crayons, not sure if I will get more of these.  The only really "new" thing for me in this class was the technique (left hand tag) of stamping on Ranger Specialty Stamping paper with markers, then blending over the image with Distress Ink, followed by the elusive "spray and flick" to get the watermark effect.. jury's out on that one.  The second butterfly on the far right tag was colored after wetting the watercolor paper with water.. kinda like that effect but wouldn't do with Weathered Wood and Chipped Sapphire again.