Playing with Techniques!

Last week I was in a technique-y mood so I pull out an old Suze Weinberg stamping technique book (The Art of Rubber Stamping) and thought I would (finally) give some of those techniques a try. I mean this book is the reason I bought a brayer and watercolor crayons!! That have been rarely used! This technique called faux suede and is done with Liquid Applique. Liquid Applique was originally designed for fabric but works on paper too! It comes in a needle nose bottle which you generally apply to your paper/fabric. Let it dry for a few hours and then heat it with your heat gun and it magically puffs up!! I sell it in the store from time to time mainly in white because it makes perfect snow.

I own white and brown not really enough colors to do the proper faux suede look so I improvised. First off I grabbed a piece of white Superstock cardstock (130lb) and brayered Weathered Wood Distress ink on a 5x5 square of the cardstock for a background. I then squeezed a puddle of brown Liquid Applique onto my Ranger Non Stick craft sheet and used a piece of foam to apply the Liquid Applique to an Impression Obsession large daisy then I stamped it randomly around on the brayered cardstock. I stamped the leaves (Hero Arts) with Peeled Paint Distress ink randomly around the flowers. I was tired of waiting for the Liquid Applique to dry by this point, all of 5 minutes I'm sure! So I just went ahead and heated the flowers with my heat gun and they puffed up to a suede like finish! Very cool!

I still thought the piece looked a bit naked so I pulled out my Tombow markers and used Marie Browning's Tombow flower techniques and added some little yellow flowers and some random swirls with my Tombow markers. I am so pleased with myself. I took Marie's class about a month ago under duress thinking that the drawing was not really my thing and I would never use the technique. I ended up LOVING the class and am now using the technique on my cards. I am very pleased with myself! :)

The middle of the large daisies needed a little pop so I finished them off with some dots of Ranger Liquid Pearls. Perfect!

I added a piece of vellum with a Hero Arts sentiment to the front of the card an mounted everything as shown. I am so happy with how this card turned out!!

Thanks to Sharron for the moral support and advice while I was making this card! :)