Brighten Foliage Ink Removal

 I tried doing an ink removal technique with the May Betterpress Society plate, Brighten Foliage.

I began by ink blending three colours of Distress Oxide ink onto my cotton card panel, keeping the center area the lightest.

I used the plate with my Glimmer Hot Foil machine to add the leaf design in gold foil.

The foiling was gorgeous!  I used a wet paintbrush to 'paint' each leaf, essentially activating the oxidation process, by lightening the ink several shades.  I patted it with some papertowel to soak up any excess water.  While I liked the effect, next time I would skip this step, and just leave the pretty foiled leaves as is.

I die cut the word Beautiful (Pinkfresh Studio) in both pink and metallic gold, and stacked them together before attaching them to the center of my panel.  You can get a Betterpress Society subscription from The Papercrafter's Workshop.

Christmas Bouquet

 I took advantage of Alex Syberia's July sale to get the Christmas Bouquet die set.  So many possibilities with this one!

I used mainly Concord & 9th cardstock for this one, and added a little ink blending to most of the pieces.

I created a shaped card, so used the outline die to cut out my card base.  I added a glimmered sentiment - and may go back and add some gold paint spatters as well.  We'll see!

Rainbow Peonies

 Last one for a while!  These are the whole reason that I bought this press plate set.  This is the Lush Peony Bouquet from Alex Syberia Designs.  The amazing Mona Toth is on their design team, and did three of the most beautiful cards I've ever seen (you can see them here!).

I have copied her outright - so can't take any credit for these, but am beyond thrilled with my results.

The image was pressed using Betterpress Black ink onto regular white cardstock.  The plate comes with three coordinating stencils, which make it so easy to achieve a polished finished product.

The flowers are stenciled using only three inks, that all overlap to give the rainbow effect.  A pale aqua, yellow and pink.  The leaves are stenciled with two colours of green.

I used two different rectangular dies to cut out two of the images, and adhered them to a white card base with 3D foam adhesive.  The third card was left as a single layer panel, but give some black ink spatters.

I used three different sentiments that were hot foiled in gold on black cardstock, and added a few black gems.

Pink Peonies

 When I pulled out the Lush Peony Bouquet press plate a few days ago, I pressed and glimmered a bunch of images, so you're going to see a lot of these over the next while!

I hot foiled the plate with gold foil onto some pale pink cardstock, then used the coordinating stencils, and a mix of Distress and Pinkfresh Studio inks to colour it up.  These come together so quickly.  I used my Beam paint to splatter some gold over the florals.

I used a decorative rectangle die to cut it out, then added foam adhesive to attach it to my base.  The glimmered sentiment was also attached with foam dots.

Monochromatic Blues

My second project with the May Betterpress Society plate, Brighten Foliage is done in monochromatic shades of blue.

I had just recently purchase the new colours of Concord & 9th ink/cardstock, so I chose the Bluebell cardstock as my base, and pressed the leafy frame in Bluebell ink.  *The C9 cardstock is fairly thick, so I got some really great texture from the press!  Before I removed the frame plate, I placed the Hello plate on top of it to determine placement - then counted the grid squares on my Betterpress chase so that when I removed the frame plate, I counted and knew exactly where to place the Hello plate.

Hello was inked up in Capri ink.  I wanted a little more contrast around the edges of my panel, so used both shades of ink to blend softly around the outside.  I used both colours of cardstock to die cut a bunch of small flowers that I adhered around the hello, and added some silver gems to the centers.

You can get a Betterpress Society subscription from The Papercrafter's Workshop.

Lush Peonies!

The first of many projects to come using the lovely Lush Peony Bouquet press plate and stencils from Alex Syberia.

I glimmered it with Rose Gold foil on a textured peach cardstock, then used the coordinating stencils and inks from Pinkfresh Studio to colour in the image - so quick to get such amazing results!

I matted it on a coordinating green cardstock (the photos aren't amazing, the colours aren't quite this bright in real life), then added a foiled sentiment with 3D foam adhesive.

Painted Cosmos Backdrop

 The Cosmos Backdrop was probably the 2nd press plate that I owned, and it is still my favourite one.

I pressed with Betterpress Black ink onto Canson XL Watercolour Paper, then pulled out my Gansai Tambei paints.

I need to paint more to improve my skills!  But am still pretty happy with this one.  I used a rectangle die to cut out the middle, then matted it with a slightly larger piece of black cardstock that I adhered back down with some thin foam adhesive.  

The sentiment is from the One Word Greetings Dies by Kristina Werner.