Alcohol inks tutorial

I was asked by a number of ladies on my forum whether I would be willing to do a tutorial on how to use alcohol inks and get different effects with them. I am not sure that I am the best person to do this as there are many good tutorials on-line and I am only a novice with them, but I am happy to share my experiences so far. I have tried three main methods so far and wll try and describe them with photos below.

Materials needed: Glossy ppaer, alcohol inks (a range of colours), alcohol blending solution, mixatives (I have gold and silver), applicator and felt pads.

Method 1. Dropping inks onto glossy paper.

In this example I used butterscotch and terracotta inks, the blending solution and gold mixative.

First drop butterscotch ink directly onto the glossy paper in a random pattern Then drop terracotta ink around on the same area of paper Then add the blending solution -I tend to use quite a lot and then swoosh the paper around so that it covers the whole area. At this point the pattern could be used as a background once dry. In this case I experimented further and added spots of gold mixative followed by more blending solution To create the final effect I used a bit of cotton wool and swished the gold around to generate a swirly gold background. This has given quite an autumnal and oriental feel to the paper.

Method 2: Using the applicator to generate patterned backgrounds

In this case I used three different colours (bottle, meadow and butterscotch), the applicator and a felt and the blending solution.

Example A: This used small amounts of the inks dropped in a random pattern over the felt.

When applied to the glossy paper there were gaps in the pattern where the white showed through. I then added the blending solution to the same felt pad Then when applying this back over the pattern I didn't just stamp the pattern, I smeared it across over the top of the original pattern to generate this as a final pattern.

Example B: This used larger quantities of ink dropped in a random pattern over the felt.

Although on the felt there were gaps between the ink spots there was so much ink in these spots that when they were stamped onto glossy paper no white showed through. I then dropped the blender directly onto the glossy paper to generate the final pattern. An alternative is to add several drops of blender onto the felt pad and then restamp over the paper with that. Beware though, the blender dilutes the ink colours for a more muted tone.

Method 3. To generate a background for a landscape stamp

There are several different methods to do this, with the main one to drop your inks directly onto the glossy paper where you think your stamped image will end up trying to get the right colours for the sky, trees, grass, water etc. However, this isn't always easy and so for the stamped image I used for my father-in-laws birthday card I used the applicator.

Firstly onto the applicator I put drops of denim and stream where I knew the water was going to be and then added meadow and bottle for the grass around. I used large drops so that the inks all ran into each other as shown above.

Then for the grass on either side I used a fresh applicator with drops of bottle and meadow to continue the grass effect.

For the sky I used butterscotch and plum with a little terracotta and then when applying to the glossy paper I overlapped very slightly with the grass and the stream bits and smeared the pad sideways to give a sunset type of effect.

Finally I used black StazOn ink to ink up the landscape stamp from StampsAway and then stamped it into the relevant parts of the background to generate this final image ready for trimming and mounting onto a card.

I hope that you find this mini tutorial helpful, it is the first one I have done so please leave a comment to let me know what you think.
Love,
Caro
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Stinky Cold!

Poor Alex has a streaming cold and a very nasty cough and he is really suffering poor little chap. For the most part he is very good and is playing fairly well, but he needs more attention than normal (and who can blame him), wanting to be picked up and cuddled or read to a lot of the time. He also hates being ‘messed’ with i.e. having nappy/clothes changed etc when he is like this and screams the place down unless we can distract him. Sadly he can’t sleep or breast feed either because of his nose and his cough and so over the past few days we have had very little sleep and he hasn’t eaten properly. His three favourite things to do at the moment are to play in the bath (hence the rather cute ‘swimming’ photo), to have me read to him and to sit on my lap at my desk and draw. More recently I have stopped giving him pens to draw with as it takes so long to clean him up and have given him pastels instead (I don’t have any crayons at the moment), which he likes as he can draw with either end!
You would think that going back to work after a break would be a gentle easing back in…well not a bit of it. I have been up to my eyeballs in things and feel like I am barely keeping my head above water. Since coming back I have edited a thesis and completely re-worked my ideas for the next grant application. This one is the biggest I have ever written and will keep me fully occupied for the next month. However, as well as that I have numerous other things that I need to do including editing a and so I think stress is inevitably going to be present until after 8th Feb. Not the ideal start to the year.
On a different note I have made three New Years Resolutions and they are all to do with photographs and crafting. The first one is to tidy my craft space immediately after each session, the second one is to get and keep the family photograph albums up to date (including an album for our wedding photographs from 6.5 years ago!), and to do at least one scrapbook layout a week. I have got ahead on that one by completing two layouts in the past two days. This first one entitled ‘Sleepyhead’ is of Alex at about 6 weeks old having fallen asleep on my chest after feeding and the text reads ‘Mummy makes a comfy bed for a quick snooze’. The layout is based on Pencil Lines sketch #61 by Shimelle Laine, a scraper that I deeply admire so I hope I have done justice to her original sketch.
This second one entitled ‘Computer Whizz’ is from when Alex was about 4 weeks old and follows sketch #65 from Pencil Lines. The papers are all from the Junkitz Dad collection and really work well with the subject matter of the computers. The text reads 'Tim and Alex share Tim's love of computers'. It has been great to do some scrapbooking after so long and I am looking forward to doing more over the coming weeks. More soon,

Love,

Caro

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Happy New Year

To everyone who reads this! I have had a very gentle day at home with the family today enjoying playing with Alex and with my new crafting goodies (alcohol inks and some stamps). The weather was pretty cold and miserable so despite the good intentions to go out somewhere for a lovely long walk I did a quick dash around the block with Alex and called it quits! Alex has been the greatest of fun today as Tim and I took it in turns to play with him andmake him giggle. He just loves his Christmas presents and was rolling around on the floor grabbing toys and playing with them, then moving onto something else. He has also done some proper forwards crawling today for the first time (a bit tentative) before reverting to his usual commando crawl and roll around.

Alex isn't really very well at the moment and wanted to sit on my lap and cuddle for some of the day so I decided that it would be nice to have a crafting session with him. He didn't always work out which way round the pens should be held and as much ink went onto him and me as the paper but it was great fun, as was the bath to get him clean again! I just love the look of concentration on his face in the first photo, and his creation is just lovely. I can't decide whether to cut it up and turn it into cards for his doting Grandparents or to frame it as it is!

I have also been crafting today...starting the New Year as I hope to go on by tidying up my desk after each session. It is my father-in-laws birthday on Friday so I turned my alcohol ink panel into the card shown above. I am really pleased with the way this turned out as it took me ages to decide how to mount the panel.

This second card is as a surprise for someone so I am not going to mention any names here in case she sees it. I have used the Oriental background stamp on brown corrigated card and then stamped a Chinese Dragon onto my alcohol ink background (butterscotch, plum, terracotta and gold) and mounted it on gold to place in the centre of the card. I am pleased with the way this has turned out.

The final card used a similar alcohol ink background (just butterscotch and plum this time) and the I stamped the Geisha girls onto gold paper and mounted it onto the alcohol ink background before mounting that onto the card with the Oriental background stamp. I then added the gold coloured ribbon and when I decide who this card is for a sentiment will be added below the image. I am really pleased with the way all these cards have turned out and I am really excited about all the possibilities that are now available with these inks. Let me know what you think about them. More soon,

Love,

Caro

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Alex's first Christmas!

Firstly, apologies for not posting about Christmas until now, New Years Eve! We have had an exciting week with various visits to relatives hence the lack of posting. Alex's first Christmas was really exciting...he didn't really understand what was going on, although by yesterday he had finally got the idea about unwrapping presents...well sort of!A Christmas photo of the three of us

Christmas day saw us having a family breakfast in our own home and then piling things into the car and driving across the city to my sister-in-law's (Fay's) house, where she and her fiance Rich hosted the celebrations for the whole family...8 adults and 3 children (aged 4, 18 months, and 8 months). Rich cooked a traditional Christmas dinner for the first time, and his Mum was so concerned about this that she provided enough cakes, pies, tarts etc to sink a battleship...we all went home armed with a tin of food! The dinner was great with everyone enjoying the chats, food, laughter and general silliness associated with family times. My home made crackers went down a treat and were a great success.

Granny and Grandpa Pete enjoy Christmas lunch
Everyone sharing Christmas dinner fun and silliness
Look Daddy, I have a hat and a cracker!
Alex and his cousin Tom (18 months) share a moment of reflection

Presents were opened after dinner, and Alex really didn't know what to make of it all. He sat there with one strip of wrapping paper torn off a present for ages just looking. In the end we unwrapped his presents for him and he had fun rolling on the floor and crawling round with the two dogs and watching his cousins playing. Christmas is so special with children around...they get so excited and have so much fun. They played with wrapping paper, bubbles, some of Alex's toys, jumping off the stairs, dancing to a musical toy as well as generally bouncing on the adults. All in all it was a great day and lovely to see the cousins all playing together, especially now that Alex is going forwards (commando crawling!).

It is hard work opening a present!
Wrapping paper provides endless fun for Tom

Tom, Alex and Sam played happily on the floor together
Cuddles with Granny!

Boxing day was a peaceful day at home as we exchanged our presents for each other and Alex. Alex loved his big plastic activity centre and I just loved Tim's present of an Alcohol ink set to play with, complete with applicator, spare pads, silver and gold mixatives, 9 inks and a blending solution. The rest of the day was spent experimenting with the inks (with a mixed degree of success) and watching Alex play with his new toys. Sadly Tim wasn't very well, but he still managed to have some fun with his computer and we enjoyed a Chinese meal and a movie in the evening.First attempt with Alcohol inks and gold mixative...this didn't work too well as the gold came off on the stamp rather than the ink stamping onto the gold

A successful background which also contains a subtle gold wash...I haven't tried stamping on this yet.An attempt at putting colours exactly where I needed them for a scenic stamp....I am quite pleased with how this worked.

Thursday 27th December saw Alex and I driving down to Somerset to see my family. The original plan was for all three of us to go, but sadly Tim wasn't well enough to travel so Alex and I went on our own. It was a long way and after about three hours of travel Alex started to get fed up, but in general the journey wasn't too bad and we arrived at 3pm. We did an exchange of presents for the two babies (Alex and Daniel) in the afternoon and then I gave my home made presents to everyone and they all seemed to love them which was good. Alex loved his stacking rings from Gran (his Great-Gran), his book from my parents and his train set from his Uncle and Aunt! It was fun seeing Alex interacting with all the family and 'playing' with Daniel. My brother took a classic set of photos which shows Alex playing with a toy then Daniel reaching over and grabbing that toy and Alex looking bewildered!

Auntie Nel and cousin Daniel
Alex sharing giggles with Uncle Andrew

After the little ones had gone to bed we had our Christmas dinner (Roast beef with the full works followed by Christmas pud and mince-pies - very yummy!) and had a lovely chat with everyone. It was lovely to have all of my family there, including Gran and Great-Auntie Jean (known as Auntie), although it was a shame that Tim wasn't there.

Auntie Jean, Nel and Mother enjoying their Roast BeefAndy and Gran share a moment of chat
Dad, Auntie Jean and Nel round the dinner table

Friday (28th Dec) morning was hillarious as both babies were awake by 7am and were given to Grandma to play with in bed, while Grandpa tried to sleep beside them! I just love the various photos of that occasion. The aim was to go for a nice long walk during the day but the weather was revolting so we ended up inside sorting out some of the old toys and books from when Andy and I were little, doing a jigsaw and playing with the little ones.

Grandpa asleep in bed while Alex and Daniel play with Grandma
Sharing Grandma's lap
After breakfast and the over 80s share a moment with the under 1s!
Sharing a toy between two. Daniel definitely had the advantage as he can sit up and get two hands on the job!

Both evenings we were in Somerset we decided that Alex and Daniel could share a bath and that was the greatest of fun. Alex just loves to splash with his hands, his latest bath time trick and Daniel kept trying to grab Alex's feet causing much hilarity all round.

Alex playing on Mummy's bed before his bath
Splish, Splash what fun we are having in the bath together

Andy, Nel and Daniel left at 9am on Saturday leaving Alex and I to spend some quality time with my Mother, Father and Gran. As it was sunny we went out for a walk down the lanes trying out the new pushchair (our Christmas present from them!). We set off back to Sheffield after an early lunch. The journey was long (an accident on the M5 slowed things down) and loud as Alex had one snooze during the traffic jam, but refused to sleep later on when he was tired and just screamed for about 30 minutes until he finally fell asleep. It was lovely to get home and see Tim...Alex was so excited to see him!

Alex out for a walk with his Great-Gran

Yesterday I came down with a horrible stomach bug and felt pretty rotten for most of the day so really didn't do very much, except open a couple more presents with Alex who got very giggly over the wrapping paper. I also built Alex's garage (a Christmas present from Granny and Grandpa Pete) which he loves, and extracted the big red bus from the ridiculous amounts of packaging. The bus was a present from Andy and Nel and Alex really likes the various bricks to put in it as they rattle nicely.

Today I am still feeling under the weather and so have spent a gentle day playing with Alex and tidying my crafting things and my desk. Even the tray on my desk is more organised and I now have just three items left to sort before filing away properly. This means I can start the New Year as I hope to continue...with a crafting session tomorrow morning!

I hope you all enjoy celebrations tonight and Happy New Year for tomorrow. More soon,

Love,

Caro

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Christmas preparations

Well, Christmas is finally upon us. After a frantic couple of days wrapping presents, washing, cleaning and cooking we are ready for Christmas, just!! We went to our first Nativity service with Alex yesterday, at St Thomas Crookes, Sheffield and it was wonderful. It was an under fives nativity and he was a sheep with this very cute hat on. He was beautifully behaved in church either sitting on our laps or crawling on the floor, only being noisey when the carols were being sung as though he was trying to join in. He was absolutely fascinated by all the other children and everything that was going on, watching with wide eyes and big grins all round. It was so lovely to go back to church again after so long.

Today, Christmas Eve, felt really strange as for the first time since we got married we were not travelling away somewhere. It was nice to be at home, but it almost felt like any other day...which is not what I am used to. However, Alex and I went to the Carols Round the Crib service, which was wonderful. Alex was giggling away at all the other children running around and grinning every time we started singing, and again kept trying to join in. It was a shame that Tim didn't join us this time, but the service did help to make the day feel more like Christmas. This evening we are going to have a take-away and watch a movie before going over to Fay and Rich's for Christmas Day tomorrow.

Happy Christmas everyone!

Love and God Bless,

Caro

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