Creating Cards with ColourArte and Blank Page Muse Rubber Stamps

Hi everyone!  I've got a couple of cards to share today using the beautiful ColourArte watercolors, better known as Twinkling H20s.  I will also be using a couple of flamingo themed rubber stamp sets from my friend, Pam Bray, giving my cards a very summery and tropical feel.  I think the combination of the bright Twinks and these rubber stamps go hand in hand.  I hope you do, too! 

I have made a complete step-by-step video tutorial below, including a few tips and techniques.  

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ColourArte Supplies Used:

Twinkling H20s
  Beachhouse Blue
  Blue Bayou
  Bronze
  Pink Crocus
  African Jade
  Key Lime
  Moss Green
  Luv-U-Pink
  Yellow Rose
  Bouganvillea

Other Supplies Used:
Blank Page Muse rubber stamp sets
  Tropical Dreams by Pam Bray
  Flamingo Row by Pam Bray
Lt Blue  and Lt Peach card stock (cut to 6-1/2" x9-3/4" fold in half to make 6-1/2" x 4-7/8" card base)
Dk Blue and Dk Peach card stock (cut to 6-1/4" x 4-5/8" for card layer 1)
Strathmore Mixed Media Paper (Vellum Surface) (2 cut to 6"x4-3/8")
X-Press It Blending Card stock
Acrylic stamping blocks
Tsukineko Tack N Peel cling sheet for rubber stamps
Scotch Removable Poster Tape
Golden Light Molding Paste
Mystic Turquoise Antique Brilliance wax (Prima)
Sizzix embossing folders
  Flowers, Leaves & Twirls, Ornate -Large
  Floral (Tim Holtz)
Cuttlebug Cut N Emboss dies (labels)
Stampin' Up Word Window punch
Warm Gold 3D Metallic Paint (Lumiere)
Blueprint Sketch Distress Oxide ink pad
VersaMark ink pad
Memento Tuxedo Black ink pad
Inking Pods (Darice)
3D Foam dots

I hope you enjoyed watching the process of making these bright and tropical themed cards, and perhaps I have been able to inspire you with your own ideas for using the Twinks from Colourarte, combined with the deeply etched red rubber stamps by Pam Bray for Blank Page Muse.  

As always, thanks so much for stopping by, and have a crafty day!

Barbara

Barbara's Tips for October

Hello everyone, and welcome back.  Well, Halloween is almost upon us, and before you know it, the hustle and bustle of the holidays will be in full swing.  However, this will be my last post as a design team member for Creative Paperclay®.  My term is up and, boy, did it go fast.  I have really enjoyed my short time here, and I hope I have been able to inspire you to play with clay along the way.  The new design team is going to be awesome, so be sure to come back and see what great ideas and projects they have in store for you.

That being said, I have a few last tips to share with you before I go.  

When rolling out the Paperclay® between two layers of wax paper, I discovered that you need to roll the clay in two directions from the middle, first one way, then the other. This will prevent the clay from becoming thick in the middle of the piece.

The second thing I discovered was that part of the reason it was forming this thick part in the middle is because the clay was sticking to the wax paper, which was not allowing the clay to move freely between the two wax layers.  So, in addition to working in two directions, I would also occasionally lift the wax paper and free it from the clay to allow the clay to spread out evenly again.

The wax paper is still quite helpful because my roller is not sticking to the clay as I work, and the Paperclay® removes from the sheet quite easily.  The wax paper does cause some wrinkles in the clay, but this is easily remedied by a wet finger rubbed over it, or texture added from a stamp or texture plate.  I always keep a large spray bottle filled with water nearby so that I can mist my Paperclay® as needed.

The next thing I discovered is, this technique will also work in your clay-dedicated pasta machine, if you have one.  Just free the clay from the wax paper, and insert the whole thing through the opening in the rollers, and give it a go.  Do this each time before decreasing the thickness, and you shouldn't have any problem.

Did you know that if your clay is sticking to your molds, you can mist water onto the mold to form a release?  It allows the clay to be removed from the mold without ruining the clay.  I was using these push molds and the clay would not come off of the mold, even after pushing it through the cutter.  So, I know that water, when misted on clay molds, will release  polymer clay, so why not try this technique and see if it works for Paperclay®.  Much to my amazement, it DID!  I was once again a happy camper.

As you can see in the photo below, the clay remained on the craft sheet, not the mold cutter itself, even though I had to press into it to get the embossing.  

I hope you find these tips helpful.  The more I work with Paperclay®, the more discoveries I make about the product.  It truly is easy to work with and quite versatile.  I hope you will continue to visit the Creative Paperclay online store and blog for the new team's  upcoming creations.  It should be fun and inspiring.  

As for me, you can always find me at Black Hole Art Studio.  Please stop by every now and then and say hello.  I am about to embark on another exciting journey, and I would love for you to follow along.  More details about that to follow.  Thanks so much for stopping by today, and as always, have a wonderful week, and keep on claying!!!

Barbara

Barbara's Tips and Techniques for September

Hello Creative Paperclay® fans, and welcome back to the blog.  Yesterday was the Autumnal Equinox, signifying the end of Summer and the beginning of Fall.  I am really looking forward to Fall, with that crispness in the air and cooler temperatures.  How about you?

The more I work with Creative Paperclay®, the more fun things I discover, from how to paint it, to how to mold it.  It never occurred to me, until recently, that the thinner I roll out the clay, the more flexible it is when dry.  I also discovered that it is quite strong and does not break or crack, like you might think.  This is a real asset when you want a piece of clay that is paper thin and will wrap around your project, or just be flexible for whatever purpose you choose.

So, don't think you have to roll out your clay thick, like 1/4" thick or so, unless you need it to be.  Think of it as making your own paper out of clay.  It is, after all, paper in clay form.  See my previous post where I made honeycomb so thin, the holes remained intact.  Or how about the "sheet" of music I made to add to any project, pun absolutely intended.

I also discovered that, since I was rolling the Paperclay® out so thinly, it sometimes wanted to stick to my roller.  The old light bulb went off and gave me the bright idea to place my Paperclay® between two sheets of waxy paper to keep it from sticking.  It worked fabulously.  These were actually the release paper from my Xyron.  Don't throw them away.  They work for all sorts of things.

You can roll it out thinly on a texture sheet, a rubber stamp, or even a piece of lace or burlap fabric, to get a ton of various textures.  You can even mold items without filling the mold to get thinner pieces, if you want it to be flexible.  You are always only limited by your imagination.  So, unless you need something stable and strong, then have some fun making "sheets" of Paperclay®.

REMINDER ALERT

Don't forget that we are having a Halloween blog link up on 5 October, combined with a design team call.  What better way to showcase your work and share it with the world!!!  And you never know, you could win one of the prize giveaways.  So go ahead, give it a try.  Create something with Creative Paperclay® products and link up to the blog to enter to win!  And if you would like to try out for the design team, check out the information here.

I am so glad you stopped by today, and I hope you enjoyed my tips.  Please check out the Creative Paperclay® online store, and visit the blog for more inspiration.  If you have any questions about the link up, please feel free to ask me.

Have a wonderful week, and play with some clay for the link up!

Barbara

Barbara's Creative Paperclay® August Tips and Techniques

Hi everyone. Barbara here with my monthly tips and techniques to share with you. Today's tip is also a bit of a technique, and I actually made this discovery while trying to fix a boo boo. Funny, but I think a lot of ideas come from the need to fix something that did not quite work out. Reminds me of that old saying, "Necessity is the mother of invention".

 So, here is what happened. I was teaching a group of ladies how to use Creative Paperclay®, and we were using all different sorts of things, like molds, texture sheets, stamps, or our own creative imaginations. I opened a brand new package of Creative Paperclay®, which was very moist. We were rolling out bits of Paperclay® onto various texture sheets and removing the clay to air dry. Some of the texture sheets were finer than others, such as this honeycomb texture plate. Needless to say, one person got overly anxious and did not wait until the clay had time to dry out a bit before removing it from the mold. What happened next? Well, she pulled up the clay and left the design in the texture plate.

 Here is where necessity took over, in my mind. The way I saw it, I had two choices: 1) take the texture plate and a stiff brush to the sink and, under running water, scrub away the clay; or 2) roll another piece of clay over the same area and see if it will stick to the clay already "stuck" in the texture plate. I chose to try number 2. Because the clay was so moist, it worked. (If the clay was a bit more dried out, then I would have added, or spritzed, a bit of water between the two layers to get the same effect. Remember, water is like glue to Creative Paperclay®.)  Well, much to my surprise, it worked!!!

However, I made yet another discovery during this process. As I said, I left the clay to dry in the mold and, where I had not covered the "stuck" clay, some of the open design from the texture plate pulled off, too. Here is the result, shown in a couple of close-ups.  I was so amazed to see that even the open parts of the clay came up, too.

 Now, guess what I want to do next? I want to see if I can get an open honeycomb design by spreading a thin layer even with the surface of the texture plate. After allowing it to dry thoroughly on the plate, I want to see if I can remove it without breaking it into a million pieces.  You can see in the photo below that it is thinner in some spots than in others, but you can see the texture of the plate coming through.  I knew it was not going to be completely open, but it is all about experimenting.

Oh my goodness!  It worked again.  You can see in the photo below where I was able to get more open design area from a much thinner application.  And much to my surprise, it is very durable, and even more exciting, it is extremely flexible, unlike my piece above, where I spread it about 1/4" thick.  After all, it is paper in clay form.  How cool is that?

Well, you can imagine the ideas running through my head with my new discovery.  I know, some of you more experienced Paperclay® artists may already know this, but, just in case, I had to pass it on.  I am so excited to share this with anyone out there who does not know this.  I can see so many possibilities and cannot wait to see what else I can discover about this wonderful product.

So, please stay tuned to see what I have in mind for all these honeycomb pieces.  It should "bee" a real treat.  In the meantime, I hope you will visit the Creative Paperclay® online store and blog for products, updates, and more inspiration from the rest of the Design Team.

Thanks for stopping by, and have a wonderful end of Summer!

Barbara Rankin
Creative Paperclay® Design Team Member

Barbara's Creative Paperclay® Tips for May

Hello everyone, and welcome back.  I hope everyone had a wonderful Memorial Day weekend.

Barbara here, and I have a few tips to share with you that I learned along the way while making my project earlier this month.  This is a picture of what I made in my earlier post this month.  If you missed it, you can click here to see how I made it.

The basket of flowers is all made using Creative Paperclay®.  As you can see, there were lots of tiny bits and pieces to mold and air dry.  So, my first tip is this:

1)  Get a ridged plate, like a microwave bacon cooker, from the dollar store, and place a scrap piece of screen wire on top to dry your clay on.  It works fabulously because this allows air to circulate beneath the clay, as well as on the top.

I also found that these Stampin' Up trays, used to hold alphabet stamps, have ridges that will hold the screen wire up off the bottom, as well.  The lid closes and will keep the dust off. 

 

2)  When you want to work on a piece of Paperclay® that you now need to trim with your craft knife, lay it on a piece of white cardstock.  This will allow you to easily rotate the piece while you work on it without handling it, which could possibly cause it to stretch out of shape.  You can also leave it to dry on the paper and then you can easily move it from your workspace.  This was invaluable to me when I was cutting out the basket I had made.

3)  I also found that, while painting my Paperclay® pieces, if I want to dilute my acrylic paints with water, the water would re-wet the Paperclay®, causing it to lose some of its definition.  However, using an acrylic glazing medium (instead of water) allowed me more time to color my flowers without wetting the Paperclay®.  The glazing medium also made the acrylic paint more translucent and allowed me more time to play with mixing my colors,  again without re-wetting the Paperclay®.

I hope you enjoyed my tips this month, and that you will be able to utilize them in your own projects, perhaps making it easier and more fun to create something using this fabulous product.  I hope you will also take a minute to visit the Creative Paperclay® online store, as well as come back to the blog for more inspiration, tips and techniques from the wonderful Creative Paperclay® designers.

Have a wonderful, creative week!

Barbara

Tips and Techniques Thursday

Uh oh.  Too much birthday celebrations this week.  I almost forgot to post a new tips and techniques for Thursday.  So, here are a couple of tips to keep you going another week, I hope.  

Tip 1 - The original size Cuttlebug, Sizzix, and Quickutz embossing folders store perfectly in 4” x 6” size recipe boxes.  For easy reference, I like to use a label maker to label each one with their descriptive title, or write on them with a Sharpie permanent marker.

Tip 2 - Brass stencils can be stored in 4” x 6” size mini photo albums you can purchase at your local craft store.  Just flip through the book for your favorite stencil.  If you have lots, you can store them by theme, or even by manufacturer, and add file labels to the pages.  You can then store them on a book shelf.

Tip 3 - If you recycle, keep a lookout for #6 plastic because it is the same as shrink plastic.  You can use it to make your own shrink plastic embellishments. 

Well, as always, I am so very glad you stopped by today.   I hope you enjoyed today's tips and will visit again soon.

Have a very happy and creative week.  

Barbara