Stamping on Vellum

I love flowers and butterflies. The Spring and Summer Idea Books are great for this, because they always have lots of them. (But of course, it's a weakness...I have too many flower stamps...) This month in card class we made a butterfly stamped both on card stock AND vellum. We stamped on the vellum and then cut it out and attached it to the butterfly on the card stock. (We used Petal brads in class, but here I just attached the vellum with Liquid Glass, under the butterfly body.)

Of course, stamping on vellum can mean your ink will take forever to dry. I tried using a heat gun to speed up the drying process, but still it takes a while to dry. Unless you leave it for hours, you will probably smear your ink when cutting. This was a problem in card class last week.

The solution came to me after everyone left for the evening. Close To My Heart's Clear Detail Embossing Powder (Z821, $3.95). I love this stuff. In Embossing Powder-speak, "detail" means a finer grind, so the powder will look good even on those fine lines on your stamped image...it's less gritty; you know, like powdered sugar is compared to regular sugar. (But not that extreme of a difference.)

TIP: So to keep your stamped image on vellum from smearing, just stamp on the vellum and sprinkle Clear Detail Embossing Powder on it, tap off the excess, heat it with a heat gun, and then cut it out. It makes the image shiny, but if you don't want the shiny side up, use the back side of the image. It still looks nice. (um, unless you're stamping letters...)

EMBOSSING POWDER TIPS: You can stamp with dye-based inks (like Close To My Heart's) on card stock, but because the ink dries pretty fast, you can't usually use embossing powder with it. (Using pigment inks, like Color Box brand ink pads, or ones that specifically say they are good for embossing usually work better with embossing powder on card stock because they are super slow drying, even on card stock.) BUT, because the vellum makes the dye-based ink very slow drying, you have time to sprinkle and heat/melt your embossing powder. There is another advantage to using clear embossing powder - you now have 60 Close To My Heart colors to choose from for your project, since the embossing powder I am recommending is clear, your ink color will show through! LOVE IT!
(Note: There are lots of different types of embossing powders - most of them are opaque. Which is nice when you are embossing on dark paper.)

Supplies Used: Bella paper pack (X7114B, $12.95), Embrace Life stamp set (C1391, $18.95), 8 1/2" x 11" Vellum (1395, $6.95), Olive card stock (included in Bella paper pack), New England Ivy card stock (1282, $9.50 for 24 sheets), Colonial White card stock (1388, $9.50 for 24 sheets), Clear Detail Embossing Powder (Z821, $3.95), Liquid Glass (Z679, $6.95), Craft Heater (Z555, $29.95), Micro-Tip Scissors (LOVE 'EM!) (Z534, $9.95)
Colors Used: Pansy Purple stamp pad (Z2141, $5.25), Olive card stock (included in Bella Paper Pack, 1245, $9.50 for 24 sheets), Colonial White card stock (1388, $9.50 for 24 sheets), New England Ivy stamp pad (Z2135, $5.25). You could use the Vanilla Cream card stock which is included in the Bella paper pack

If you would like to learn to emboss, let me know, and we can schedule a get-together with you and your friends. Learning and creating is always fun! lisasargent@myctmh.com