Dip Marbling- An Inky Technique Tutorial!

Hello!
Thought I'd share some old school, back in the day type ink techniques for my next few posts.... get out stash and tools you already have and create some funky new art!
Today I want to share the dip marbling technique. This is a technique I shared in Craft Stamper magazine a couple of years ago, and as people liked it then, I hope you like it now!
This is the finished piece....

All you'll need are some alcohol inks, (metallic mixatives are fab not not essential!), a container deep enough to have a piece of card dipped into it, and some water.
Fill the container with water....

Drip in some inks. Alcohol inks work because they sit on the surface of the water for a while, something other inks don't do! Adding metallic mixative ink will give you a bit of texture as well as shine! This is an odd picture...looking down onto the surface of the water after I have dripped the ink onto it...

Once the inks are sitting on the surface, dip  a bit of cardstock into the water. Some cards work better than others, thicker is better as it can take more water! Dip the card straight down.....

The card breaks the surface of the water, dragging the inks on the surface down onto the cardstock. Bring the cardstock straight back up through the water. This needs to be done quickly, so the cardstock doesn't take on too much water!

You're now dealing with a very drippy wet bit of card!

Dry it off straight away before it goes all mushy...

The inks give the colour, all be it a little paler than the shade in the bottle! The metal part of the mixatives clump up on the surface, giving a flaky, textured area to your marbling. The mixative that is dissolved in the water gives a sheen to the background, difficult to see in pictures but noticeable in real life!
As both sides of the cardstock  entered the water, you will create a double sided background! This is fab for things like book pages, otherwise it's a difficult decision as to which side to use. This one:

or this one:

I went with the pinker side!

The inks blend together wonderfully....

You can see the flaky bits of metal, some dull and some shiny.
I added to the shine by melting some grains of silver UTEE...

My Stampotique figure is watching over the marbling...

Why not have a go, it's good old messy fun!
Trish xxxxx

getting your chalk on...

hello there, 

I'm chuffed to bits to announce that we have had our full delivery of 

Primas new chalkboard paints. 

Oodles of colours.. 

well, 12 to be exact, but only one is black!  

I am itching to have a play with these beauts. Just take a peep at some of these colours. 

You can use them on tin, wood, paper, plastic, fabric, canvas, glass and plaster surfaces,

and can find the full range here!  

Getting my art on.

Maybe it's the change in the weather or maybe I'm just coming out of a creative funk but I'm having a great time at the moment getting my art on with my journal seeing most of my creative play.

This is the latest page to come off my table with a line taken from a song by Abba (I was a huge fan) which any fan of the movie Mamma Mia  will recognize from I have a Dream,  "I believe in angels, something good in everything I see". Don't ask me why but it was one of those moments when that song kept playing on repeat in my head while I was working. Subconscious trying to help me out or something?

My figures are created from an Andy Skinner, Tando stencil called Hippy Chick.

 The background has been sprayed with Dylusions inks (Squeezed orange and Postbox red). I'd forgotten how bright these colours really are. Note to self : restock the Dylusions! There are some gorgeous new colours in the shop.

While the ink was still wet I used a wet paintbrush to paint circles into the ink, creating the swirly background.

Have a good weekend.

Jaine x

Ti Amo!!

Don't you just love a short cut!! I'm back with another quick card this week altho, at first glance it probably doesn't look like a quick card!!

I love creating my own backgrounds, getting out the gesso, paints, spray inks, texture paste, the lot!

Sometimes however, it's nice to get a little help to acheive that look you might have planned in your head.. especially if time is short! Want to know how?

For the background of this card I have used an already inky piece of patterned scrapbook paper from Glitz Design. I used a 6x6 sheet from the Wild & Free pad. These papers are scaled down versions of the larger 12x12 size and are perfect for card making.

I used a selection of my favourite stamps from Stampotique Originals and some of my favourite ink pads. The choice is yours for the taking...

Here is my quick background...

Next, I stamped my main images and sentiment onto watercolour cardstock. I decided to colour the images this week using Distress Inks and a fine paint brush.

All that was left then was to add some finishing touches using a white Sakura Gelly Roll Pen.

My finished card...

Thank you for calling. Wishing you a lovely weekend. Gez

Stuffed Heart!

Hello!
You may have noticed the heart I created as a sample for the Colour Challenge....
(You didn't??? All the challenge details are HERE!)
Today I thought I would share how I created it!
Finished heart looks like this:

This is a nice and simple way of creating some unique home decor items!
Sketch out a shape on some fabric, then sew around your shape, leaving a gap for stuffing. Add your filling...

I had run out of wadding, so I used dried out baby wipes to stuff the heart! Waste not, want not and all that!
Sew up the gap once your shape is stuffed...

Now, I wanted to paint my stripes straight onto the heart, but as fabric is porous, the paint will bleed out slightly, leaving a blurred edge. I would recommend giving any home decor fabric piece a good coat of gesso before you paint on to it, that way you have a good surface on which to add your painty detail...

Once the gesso was dry, I painted on my stripes..

Yes they are wonky on purpose!
I thought it needed a few extra doodled details...

The embellishment is a chipboard circle, a button, a punched out heart and some dots!

A hole in the top bit is perfect for threading ribbon through, so your heart can be hung up!

I love making these, great for Christmas decorations too!
Have a lovely Thursday!
Trish xxxxxxx

Art.... ingredients and extravagance....

We've recently had a bumper delivery of new products from Finnabairs new range with Prima. 

The Prima deliveries always, but always make me oooh and arrrh, and spend lots of time stroking.

Art Sugar is super super fine granuales of glitter that add a really intense sparkle to projects. You can use them with any liquid glue, or add them to gel mediums, pastes, or even paint. There are five colours to choose from, light pink, black, charcoal, silver and white.  

Next up, Glass Beads.  

If you are a jewellery maker these will be very familiar to you and your beaders needle.  

For the rest of us these tiny glass beads come in 2oz pots 

(not bags to split and go all over... yep, I've been there)

Again there are 5 colours to choose from, all fairly neutral lending themselves to adding dimension and to your projects.  Add them directly to the surface of a project with wet glue or gel medium, or thread them on to wire for accents. 

Mica Flakes... Mica in the form of a flake with a hint of luminosity and sparkle. 

Yep - more sparkle. Its a very sparkly release this one.

These come in 1oz pots, and 5 colours. . 

1oz may sound small but there are a lot of these flakes to an ounce. 

Back to proper glitter again now.. 

These new Art Ingredients Glitter Sets really made me go ooooh when I unpacked them. Now I'm not a glitter girl, but the colours in these sets are stunning. More of a traditional sized glitter, so not as fine as the Art Sugar, each set has 6 little flip top pots, each one being 8 grams.  

And last but by no means least... 

Glass Glitter!

 These are finely cut glass pieces with a luminous, shiny, and sparkly finish. 

We haver also taken delivery of the full Art Basics and Art Extravagence texture pastes and mediums. They will be on the website very soon, so keep an eye on the new in page, or the home page as we will post there are soon as they are online!

 Feel free to email me at sales@asprinkleofimnagination.com 

if you want more info or to reserve some of these products before they hit the website. 

Vicki 

Summer in the City.

I love love love the colours in this months challenge, see them here.

When I was going through my stash to see what I had to match the colours I was pleasantly surprised to find this sheet of paper from Echo Park in my collection called Bokeh Blur. It's part of the Capture Life range and as soon as I saw it I had the perfect photo to create a layout with.

The stickers all come from the Finnley collection from Glitz and blended in wonderfully.

 There's plenty of time to enter the challenge which closes on the 12th October.

Jaine x

acrylic paint sale...

We still have a selection of Claudine Hellmuths Studio Line paints, in both pots, mini bottles and kits still available. Some colours are now running low stocks. These paints have always been one of my favourites with the creamy texture of these highly pigmented artist quality acrylic paints. With a collection of 15 semi-gloss shades you can create an endless palette of colours by mixing them without them going muddy. We do still have some stocks left of the multi-mediums and extra-time as well and you can find those here

We are now running on very low stocks of the Jenni Bowlin Dabbers which were recently added to our sale section at a bargain price. As with the Claudine Hellmuth paints once these have sold out we will not be able to restock them.

Butterfly Doll

Hello!

When is an Art Doll not an Art Doll?..... um.... when it's a butterfly attached to a canvas on legs?!

My project today is a variation on a theme...yes it's a doll, but this one isn't a free standing piece by itself, it's an embellishment..

I'll show you how I made her...

The three main bits are made from clay. As I wanted holes through them, I poked a bit of wire through in the appropriate places! 

The clay then got painted and stamped a little...

The easiest way to get a detailed design on a curved surface is to use stamped tissue paper. I stamped everything, then made sure the ink was dry...

(I stamped two faces as I wasn't sure at this point which one I was going to use!)

The stamped images were then cut out and glued onto the clay using Mod Podge..

It's really useful having holes in the clay, as the wire can be pushed through again and rested on something whilst the Mod Podge dries!

Once the Mod Podge has dried, we can start to assemble the doll.

You'll need lots of craft wire for this! Cut two pieces, then thread both through the horizontal hole...

Make spirals at the ends of the wire (you can always fiddle about at the end and make these smaller or larger if you need to)

 Next, make a loop at one end of a long strand...

Thread on the large 'body'..

Thread on the 'head'

Tightly coil the remaining wire around and around the top of the head, both creating a design feature and securing the head and body of your doll...

I wrapped more wire around her neck...

Now, adding on the 'bead' at the bottom requires a bit of jewellery making technique... but really, just practice making loops and wrapping wire around things. We're not making jewellery, so it doesn't matter if it's not perfect!

Thread a bit of wire through the hole in the bead, and bend like so...

Make sure one 'tail' is a lot longer than the other at this point. Make a loop with the shorter tail, and join it onto the loop under the body...

Wrap both ends loads of times around the wire and the top of the bead. Messy is good!

Now for the wings! Stamp the Stampotique wings twice, once onto acetate, and once onto painted cardstock...

Cut out, bend the acetate then glue together....

Once the glue is dry, glue on the clay body...

Now the butterfly doll is finished, it can be attached to whatever you fancy!

I painted a canvas, stamped it with dots (Darkroom Door) and glued the doll to the front..

The doll gives a fabulous 3D look to your work..

I used painted spools as legs..

and added thick wire as a hanger. More thin craft wire was wrapped around to echo the wire elsewhere on the piece, and a cut out word added...

Phew...! Hope you like her!

Trish xxxx