I hope you're enjoying a little Christmas in July! If you haven't had a chance to visit the Paper Artists Online forum, please come over and take a look at our little group. We enjoy all types of paper crafting and are quite enthusiastic about sharing our art with each other. There are always a variety of swaps, challenges and round robin projects going on.
This will be my final tutorial, and I decided I needed to share something pretty with you. This is another type of resist technique with stunning results using ink. Scenic stamping was really what got me interested in rubber stamping and this is a very simple scenic type card.

You will need a bright white matte finish cardstock with little to no 'tooth'. I am using Georgia Pacific brand 110# white cardstock. You can find it at Wal-Mart, it very inexpensive and makes a great stamping surface. Find your favorite Christmas tree stamp and Christmas saying. I honestly don't own a single Christmas tree stamp, but am using this stamp from Stampscapes. It has become a personal challenge to myself to use this same stamp in different ways each year for my Christmas cards.

Thanks for stopping by...and if I don't get a chance to see you again, may you have a very Merry Christmas!

It's a Cyber-Crop weekend at Paper Artists Online. The theme is Christmas in July. I was asked to provide short tutorials for a few Christmas cards, so I thought I might as well post them here also.

We're going to use a Technique Junkie technique called 'Faux Designer Paper' to create these cards.


For the background we're using kraft paper. Your stashed paper bags are the great economizer in this technique.  So get out your paper and some pigment ink with a little sparkle. I'm using Brilliance Ink Pearlescent Beige. Choose a stamp for your background. Randomly stamp this image all over your paper, remembering to turn the stamp in different directions. At this point, we're just laying ink down.

A reader had asked that I further explain this technique. I'm unable to provide step-by-step visuals, but will explain as well as possible. I recommend that you start with 2 or 3 different pieces of brown colored card stock. Bleach reacts different on each type of paper. Be sure to protect your surfaces and clothing. Grab a cotton ball and plain old bleach. Dip the cotton ball in the bleach and pounce it around on the paper. If you have a heat gun. apply heat which will make the color change quicker. Again, dip in bleach and pounce in areas that you have not bleached yet and in some of the areas that you have already bleached. Continue to do this until you have a freckling on the paper. If enough bleach is used, the brown will probably turn to orange in some areas. At this point stop. Dry the paper. Then take a pigment ink pad...camouflage colors and color some of the areas. You can use a clean cotton ball, sponge, or use the corner of an ink pad. Blend some of this ink in a circular motion. I used a little forest green, brown and a ocher ink color. Dry the ink. Now take a fine line black ink pen and separate out some of the colors. If you take a close look at my previous post and the example, you will see what I mean. You can also do this on gray, navy, black or any dark colored card stock.