DRESSED FOR A NIGHT OUT

Once again [and l will never apologise for re-visiting] l have dipped into the crafting box and used stamps from the Dylusions range of stamps designed by Dyan Reaveley. This time i have chosen  Curious Corrin and Right Up Your Street. These stamps can mix and match your never stuck to construct interesting imagery. These stamps along with almost all of Dyan Reaveleys back catalogue of designs are available at Thats Crafty On Line Store. Along with a wonderful collection of goodies for your crafting needs.
This project also has an idea for those things we use and then throw away.......

Materials Used...
White Neenah Stamping Paper ~ Scrap paper for Mask Stamping
Black Soot Ink Pad ~ Collection of Pro-Marker Pens ~ Thin Black Waterproof Pen ~ 8" Square Constructed Card Base.
Geli Plate ~ Selection of Crafters Workshop Templates ~ Selection of Eco Green Acrylic Paints ~ Heavy Weight Paper [approx 200gsm] ~ Brayer.
Buttons ~ Baby Wipes ~ Good Strong Clear Glue.
Scissors ~ Metal Knitting Needle ~ Heat Gun ~ Inkssentials Glossy Accents ~ A5 Gold Colour in Shade Paper.
Flower Shape Spellbinders Dies ~ Spellbinders Leaves Dies [don't worry if you don't you can cut out a cardboard shape and use that as a template].

Lets Make Something.......
Once again i have where possible taken a photo to help you see what im doing.
I have not taken photographs while i was using the Geli Plate. For details about this wonderful crafting tool i can recommend that you type in Geli Plate in y-Tube and just watch. YOU WILL WANT ONE!!. The days of not having a backing paper will soon be a thing of the past. You can also use your projects that have not worked but were going to be thrown away as a base to build upon. I hope to build up on my working knowledge of this wonderful tool and let you all know how l got on.  As you all know i'm Honest about what i use and i always will be. Like a lot of you funds are not always there to spend so we have to be careful in what we buy. That's why im always will to pass on information about products to my fellow crafters so that we are all in the 'Loop'

So i'm going to take up this project from having 'Printed' my backing paper and placed it onto my blank 8" square card base.......

First thing to do is take a sheet of cheap white paper and then stamp out an impression ready to be cut out and used as your mask for your built up image.

Using the cut out i started to look at what imagery l can use behind the fore ground image. i like to do this as it saves a lot of time later on when you may make an impression and then your forced to work with a 2nd choice.

I don't think  there are a lot of us that are perfect stampers. So i use the Friskars Stamping Block which helps me position while i am physically stamping right up to that moment where the stamp hits the paper. We don't always get them as a perfect registration like a printing press will do. If you look closely at the photo on your left and around the hair and the arms there is a white area where i have not got that perfect registration.

If you enlarge this photograph you will be able to see that with the aid of a Very Fine Nibbed Black Water Proof Pen i have been able to 'Fill in' the area's that i was not able to match up with the stamping. Please remember its not a work of art that your matching up so don't worry if you don't make 'That PERFECT' match. With practice this skill will become more and more easy for you to do.

 On projects where i am going to be using Pro-Markers i like to use Neenah card as it takes the alcohol ink very well and does not bleed. i also like to record what colours i have used just in-case i 'have missed a bit'. As you can see i used the mask i made to over stamp the buildings at the back. This gives the image something interesting and its not just a single object. Anything over-stamped a single image will make it a lot more interesting.

Glossy Accents on the boots and the collar on the dress finish off the colour construction of the stamped image.
Using a pr of sharp tipped scissors were used to cut out a border around the image. This time i left a larger border as i normally get as close as i can.

As the background paper was orange in colour i picked gold to back my image onto. I wanted a backing paper as this would help ground the image and it did not look as if it had been glued onto the card without any thought or planning. This was again cut out leaving approx. the same border as i had with the white card, i didn't get all worked up if the gap was not 100% perfectly matching.

Now then the next part of this project i like to think is my own idea as i have not come across it over the 3 years of crafting watching on y-Tube where if it was going to happen it would have. If this is not the case then i humbly apologise and my only defence is like i have mentioned never come across it.

Now then one of the waste products from using things like the Geli Plate is that you can use Baby Wipes to clean the plate ready for the next one. Like all crafters i hate to throw anything away in the fear i could have used it for this or that.

A selection of the Baby Wipes that had been used and then placed into a box to dry out. As you can see they collect the colours that are used. In a lot of cases the colour can be quite intense and also the depths of colour can vary even on this small square.

 Using a flower shaped metal die i cut out 9 sheets of baby wipe. 3 flowers and 3 baby wipes per flower. There was also thankfully a green sheet that could be cut into leaves. Now then if you don't have a flower shaped die or even a die cutting facility then just take some cardboard and draw a flower head. Keep it quite geometric and simple in shape. There are lots of images in Internetty land that you can use as a point of reference.

Take 3 of the flowers and crumple them together so that you have a 'Point' in the centre of all the flowers.

This will then give you something like this. As it has paint soaked up into the construction of the baby wipe it will be a little stiff in parts and will hold its shape quite well.

Using a metal pin or knitting needle [do NOT USE A PLASTIC KNITTING NEEDLE!] place it at the base so that when the next stage happens it will not blow away.




The next step was impossible for me to photograph as i was using a heat gun. This was on high setting and i was aiming the heat at the edges of the baby wipe. As this happens the B.W [Baby Wipe] will start to fold into its self. Its like what happens to plastic when you heat that it shrinks and starts to collapse into itself.

When i was happy with the shape and how much the B.W. had shrunk and formed a flower shape i opened it up and placed the metal knitting needle into the centre and once again using the heat gun l started to form a flower shape as you can see the shape has shrunk and become deformed and 'crumpled'.

This photo shows you how much after the heat treatment how much the surface area has shrunk. If you look closely you can see what i mentioned above on how different levels of colour can be transferred onto the B.W.

To make the leaves i placed them together and then using the metal rod right down the middle i took the heat gun and started to create leaf shapes.

The finished leaf shapes. Once again you can see how the different levels of colour have been transferred  This makes the leaves have a interesting look and something that would be quite hard to repeat using inks and paper.


Once again i have to stress that. USE A METAL NEEDLE! ~  DO NOT HOLD THE FLOWER SHAPE WHILE USING A HEAT GUN AS ITS VERY VERY HOT! ~ TAKE AS MUCH CARE AS POSSIBLE AS IT GETS HOT TO THE TOUCH!

All that's left to do is to construct our finished project. To secure the flowers onto the card i used a good strong clear glue and 3 complementary buttons were secured into the middle. The golden rule of odds came into play here that's the reason for making 3 flowers.

I hope that this might inspire you to not throw away those baby wipes when they are coloured as the ones i have used. I'm  not talking about the 'Muddy Brown Ones] but the brightly coloured ones. Any questions please send me a message and i will get back to you as soon as possible.

I apologise again if i'm claiming as mine something that has been around for years. Maybe its been done before but i cant say with hand on heart that i have ever seen it during my years of being a crafting y-Tube'er.

Remember PLEASE PLAY SAFE with your crafting.