Backgrounds: Making My Own

This week the challenge on Simon Says Stamp and Show is Backgrounds. There are lots of different techniques that can be used to background and the design team showcases several of them. You know that I am a stamper at heart so I set out to make a variety of backgrounds using some of the imagines I thought would make the most interesting backgrounds.

 The first tag was stamped with Tim's wood grain stamp- wood grain is super hot in home decor right now.  I stamped it using Embossing Distress Ink and clear embossing powered.  After I melted the embossing powder I went over the tag with several colors of brown Distress Ink.

 The flowers were left over from Tim's Tattered Florals challenge.  I hot glued them in place.  The belt was made using Grunge Paper, Distress Ink and an Idea-ology Buckle.

 My second tag was made using Tim's Damask stamp on the top 2/3 and a script stamp on the bottom 1/3.  I embossed it exactly as above and then colored it with Broken China Distress Ink.  Again more flowers from the Tattered Florals challenge were hot glued in place.

Finally the red tag was made using a harlequin stamp, Distress Embossing Ink and Black Soot Distress Embossing Powder.  

I have to be honest- I have trouble with the Distress Embossing Powder.   It is hard to know when it is heated enough and once it is heated you let it cool and then rub off the inert crystals.  This ends up giving a very distressed look.  My Black Soot rubbed off way more than I wanted but it still looks cool. I added a Grunge Paper, glittered Eiffel Tower and Idea-ology pieces.  

Finally…Great news for me.  My article Making Your Own Foam Stamps is now available in the May/June Cloth Paper Scissors issue.  It is my take on jazzing up foam stamps made using die cut foam.  

This post was linked to the following Linky Parties

Simon Says Stamp and Show

thirty handmade days

Bloom Designs

VMG206

I Gotta Try That

Laters Baby….