WREATH STAMPING

 There are templates that you can purchase to create a wreath style of stamping on a card. I chose to make one as it's a simple process and there are lots of YouTube videos available showing how to create your own. Card fronts are much bigger than ATCs so it can be a little challenging to get your wreath to fit onto the rectangular shape of an atc but it can be done, as shown by my samples below. The good thing is the same size template will also work for cards a it's all about the placement of the stamp on the door of the stamp positioner as to how small your wreath can be. Wreath stamping does not have to be leaves or flowers as is usually used. My samples show that you can use whatever small-sized stamps that you choose to. Yes, I chose bats, skulls and spiders for some of mine. I hope you give it a try, it's such a great technique!

"Excuse me"
(The black border around the edge of this atc is
created using the Distress Oxide re-inker from
my Bleeding Borders class. The gold accent
colour around the edge and on the bat is Golden
Hour Solar Paste swiped onto black. Such a
great effect!)


"Fly away"
(You can see you don't need to colour in the
background of the atc at all with this
technique. There is enough going on
with the wreath stamping and a focal image.)


Here is a closer look at the sparkle on the bee.


"Be you, bravely"
(The bleeding lines around the edge of this atc
is created with the Pilot G-Tec C4 gel pens that
come in colours and can be activated with water.
I love the Banksy sticker that makes the focal
point in the wreath and the little bootprints
were from a Christmas stamp set that I never used any
other parts of, except the boot prints.)

"Shine brightly"
(This background is Supervision Layering 
Watercolour paints. It is one colour that granulates
and separates into blue and purple.)


Another close-up to see the sparkle of the WOW
glittery embossing powder on the dragonfly.

"An unfortunate ending"

"Life is good"
(Sometimes clean and simple just works.
I was pretty impressed by how small I got that
wreath on the skull's head!)

DRY EMBOSSED STENCILS

 Stencils are an easy way to add something extra to a background and it can be as complex or as simple as you like. But did you know you can use your stencils to get a dry embossed look to your plain cardstock? The cheaper, thicker type of stencil works particularly well for this technique and you can buy a rubber embossing mat that is specially made for this purpose. I have a couple of rubber embossing mats but one of them was old and brittle so I was going to purchase another one, however I found that the silicone pet feeding or training mat from Kmart here in Australia was a perfect substitute. In fact, it's slightly thicker than the embossing mat so it works well. Two caveats, never run your embossing sandwich through twice, that is backwards and forwards, as the rubber stretches and you'll end up with a double impression and secondly, don't force the sandwich through your machine. You may need to shim to get just the right combination of cutting pads, rubber/silicone mat, stencil, platform. If it goes through too easily, you won't get a good impression on your card. I used Bristol Smooth for the card as it is reasonably heavyweight and the blending of the Oxide Ink pads on this card works beautifully. 

"Keep moving forward"
(I used a Uni-Ball Signo DX 0.28 black gel
pen to draw around the edges of this stencil
after adding the colour to make the petals
stand out.)


"Plant Parenthood"
(A grey brush marker was used on two edges of
this stencil design to give a shadow effect.)

"Live gently"


"CTRL + Z"

"Free to fly"

"No rain"