Monday morning I noticed a wonderful Technique Challenge on SCS to use graduated or Ombre colors. There are so many ways to do this, that I've had fun considering the possibilities until I had time to play with some of them. While I still have some other ideas, these are the cards I did today:
- Not really having a plan other than to try out my ombre idea with embossing folders, I started by applying Island Indigo marker to recessed areas of the Chevron folder.
- At the top I just put a dot at each tip of the first row, a solid line in the second row, two solid lines in the third and so on until I had this:
- Then I cut a large piece of Whisper White card stock that was larger than the folder. You just want to have it ready.
- I sprayed the inked partion of the folder with 4-6 spritz of water from a recycled Stampin' Mist bottle. You could use more or less. There isn't a right or wrong here - just different!
- Then I carefully placed the card stock in the folder so that it was straight and ran it through the Big Shot. Using a piece that is plenty large helps you do this quickly. A larger piece of card stock also helps absorb any extra water.
- It doesn't look particularly great when it comes out but I set it aside to dry. At first I just set it on some extra acrylic plates. Sometimes I set a few dies on top of the pieces when they are partly dry and a little curled and let them straighten over night.
- I didn't do that today and I was able to straighten them easily by securing them well to either colored of Naturals card stock.
- I went to my unused punch and die cut drawer to find the pieces to finish it off. It ended up with a layout similar to the first card I ever did with Mixed Bunch.
I used multiple markers on the the second piece which eventually led to this card:
- I used So Saffron, Daffodil Delight, Pumpkin Pie, Tangerine Tango, and Cajun Craze markers in the rows, mixing them in every other row.
- After spritzing the folder with water I embossed a Very Vanilla piece of card stock.
- The partial circle is punched out with 2 1/2" circle punch.
- The larger butterfly is cut from So Saffron with the Beautiful Butterflies Bigz Die.
- The smaller butterfly is punched the the Elegant Butterfly punch. The ribbon is Very Vanilla seam binding.
Of course this is just one way you can do graduated colors.
