Swirly Impressions

For her techique challenge at the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown, Andreja has chosen "Embossed Impressions".

When I tried this before, I wasn't particularly happy with the results I got, so I went back to the video Andreja suggested, and have made a card along very similar lines.

I used a Tim Holtz swirly die (another Christmas present), to create my corners. I cut my card to size first (one 6x6 and one 7x5 card). I gently inked the die with versamark, then ran through the die machine with the embossing mat. Learning from my previous attempt, I tweaked the plates so it wasn't such a deep emboss. This involved using sheets of cardboard to get the depth I wanted, but it worked!

I was looking through my embossing powders for ultra fine, as I thought that would work better, but only had white, clear and black. The first two wouldn't work for this technique (on white card) but I thought black might be an interesting look, so used that on one card. For the other I used regular powder in platinum (a pale gold that I love).

They turned out pretty well - the lines are a bit irregular but I don't think that matters.

Next I added my sentiments. As I hadn't planned at all, I didn't have much space between the swirls! So on the 6x6 card, I went for a small "Noel" from ClarityStamp. On the 7x5, I used a Merry Christmas, also Clarity, but had to shift the words relative to each other, by masking and cleaning in between stamping each word.

I embossed them both with the powder to match to swirls.

The next step was to water colour the embossed swirls. I used distress ink pads and reinkers, and a water pen. For the square card, I used barn door, pine needles, mowed lawn and bundled sage.

For the rectangle, I used dusty concord, blueprint ink, and peacock feathers.

This took a long time!!! But isn't it so pretty? Definitely worth it.

They were both a bit clean and crisp, so I splattered with the same inks.

I decided to mount these on another layer, with the same embossing powder applied round the edge. This meant cutting them down by 4mm to make space on the card blanks - and allowed for a bit of balancing where the sentiments sat.

And then just put them together.

 
This one is obviously very Christmassy colours. I think with the black it has quite a clean, crisp feel, and I love the pops of red.

But this is my definite favourite! The gold gives a bit of glamour, and I love the blues and purples in the swirls.




So, I think I can say that this is much more successful than my last play with this technique. If it's new to you, check out the video above, and my top tip is not to emboss too deeply.

To share your results, head to the 52CCT blog. This challenge is open until Friday 31st January.