When something old is new again

Have you ever gone back to a stamping technique that you haven't done in a while and say "wow - that was fun".?

Its no secret that I LOVE to color. And I have quite a few different ways to color in images. But I also have a (cough...cough...) few ink pads.

I wanted to play with this Salutations set by Penny Black. I love the greetings and the fonts they chose - that was the main reason I added it to the store. But the set has a bunch of images too and I wanted to see what I could do with them. They are solid images - no coloring! Oh My!

So I pulled out my trusty Versamagic ink pads to see what I could do. I forgot how much I love these pads! I love the colors, the soft chalk finish and how clean they stamp. In fact - I want you to try them too.

So right now, all of the VersaMagic Dew Drops in the Paper Garden Projects store are on sale for 20% off. Try a couple and see if you don't love them too - Check them out by clicking HERE.

So whats with the grid thingy?

Well, I wanted to create a repeating pattern background. I'm too LAZY to measure out spacing - so I let my computer do the work for me.

I printed this grid with Microsoft Word. You just open a document and create a table. Then select all the cells in the table and then adjust the column width and row height to whatever you want your grid to be. Mine had a column width of half inch and a column height of a half inch. So when I print, I have a grid of perfect half inch squares (make sure you have the cell borders set to print - or you'll just get a blank page!)

I stuck my grid on my light box and laid my cardstock on top. I had a perfect grid to guide my stamping without having to measure or mark anything.

One thing that helps is to have a block with alignment marks, like the block with the diamond stamp in the picture. Then you can just center your image and line the marks up with the grid lines. You can stamp everything even very quickly.

The block in the picture is one of my favorites because the lines are etched, not painted and I like the way the shape feels in my hand. You can see them HERE.


So here are the cards I made with my little background. All of the images are from the Salutations set.

For the butterfly card, I knew I wanted to doodle a flight path so I bent my "Miss You" sentiment into a curve a little when I adhered it to my block - something I really like about clear stamps. I added a Dew Droplet and some stardust glitter pen to the butterfly wings.

I wanted bling on the Thank You card too, so I added self adhesive gems to the flower centers.

On both cards, I used a duster brush with the Aloe Vera Versamagic ink to color the image background. These inks work great with duster brushes or even direct to paper to color edges.

Hope my grid tip is helpful. And do try some Versamagic inks while they are on sale. They really are great.

Thanks so much for stopping by! Tomorrow is Garden Party Challenge day and so far only one entry for the $5 coupon for Odd Bird Planet merchandise.

Have a great night all!