Altenew Level Two Submission - In the Mood for Color

 Today’s card making extravaganza has been a TOTAL exercise in patience!  You know the jokes about how many people it takes to screw in a lightbulb, etc.?  Well, today it’s how many cards does a student need to make before getting ANYWHERE close to the idea in her head!  I won’t even begin to tell you how many 5.5x4.25 pieces of ink blended panels are now littering my desk, but it’s considerable!  Well, that’s how it goes some days!

The card(s) that I’ve been attempting to make are for the Level 2 “In the Mood for Color” course taught by Stephanie Klauck.  It is a great class and made me realize that I have been focusing on coloring my die cuts and my stamped images, but generally not considering an overall background color.  AND I have not really considered the mood that my cards might evoke - I’ve only concentrated on what makes “ME” happy when I look at cards.  So…even though I am still using colors that I like, I think that they might have more universal appeal due to the feelings associated with the colors used.

The first step was selecting my colors.  I knew that I wanted to do some color blending, and that those blends would be my focal colors.  It is fall here where I live, and the mountains have been putting on quite a show of golds and yellows.  And while those colors do not always bring to mind fall of the year, they do denote a brightness, a lightness of spirit, and a contagious feeling of happiness.  So I selected three colors from my Distress Oxides - Mustard Seed, Dried Marigold, and Spiced Marmalade, focusing mainly on Mustard Seed and Dried Marigold.  I also selected Milled Lavender and Wild Honey for sentiments and edgings.

The next thing that I needed to do was to pick a stamp set.  Just this morning, I watched a video by Erum Tasneem, where she created beautiful cards using one stamp and two colors.  Initially I thought to emulate that, but changed my mind after sorting through my stamps.  When I spotted the Precious Peony stamp and die set, a completely new idea struck, although I did use one aspect of Erum’s video - using the back of the sticky mat to stamp a background design onto one card.  It was a great tip and one I plan on using frequently!

So…I won’t bore you with all the ink blending accidents and stamping accidents that I had today.  But I DO have a couple of “Pro Tips” for you that I hope bring a smile to your face!

Pro Tip 1:  when using Dylusions Dyamond Dust, Lindy’s Magical Powders, or Dreamweaver Stencil Powders, remove your card panel from your sticky mat FIRST!!  If you don’t, you might end up with powder on your ink blenders for your next card!  Learn from what I continuously do wrong!  (It’s ok to belly laugh here if necessary.)

Pro Tip 2:  don’t press down on your stamp wheel lid before you get it completely in place!  If you WANT blurred images to emboss, go ahead and press away.  But if you want crisp images, well, again - learn from what I do wrong! 

After many attempts, I ended up with two cards that were not disasters.  And if you have read to the end of this tale of trials and tribulations, many, many thanks!  Here is my day’s work for Altenew!

The first three pictures, all of the same card, use white embossing powder to highlight the stamped images, allowing the ink blended background to shine through the embossing.

The second card, which is shown in the next three images, used Dylusions Dyamond Dust to showcase the stamped image, again allowing the background color to come through.