Pure Bling! (and a blingin' tutorial)

Hi!

I wanted to show you these two cards I made for two special people last month. I wanted them to have "nothin' but bling!" I have been wanting to use this flourish from Barouque Motifs since this fine cosmo glitter came out....can you believe it took me this long to stamp it out? I absolutely love this flourish and the cosmo glitter...well, it speaks for itself! What can I say about that glitter? LOVE IT!

The card base is elegant eggplant. The flourish was stamped with versamark ink and then embossed with heat and stick powder. (I will explain this at the end of this post) While the heat and stick powder is still hot, pour on the glitter and set with the heat tool again. OMGosh!!! Aren't these gaw-jus?!??!??!?!!!

The sentiments were from sincere salutations. If I could only have one stamp set for card front sentiments (please..don't make me pick just one.....) this would be it...it is so versatile! I pierced the upper corner with my mat pack and piercer. The two ribbons that I used on the respective cards were white taffeta ribbon and 1/4 inch grosgrain in eggplant. Did you get a look at those envelopes??? Oh how I love to decorate the flap in the back!!!!

Want to see a close up of that sparkle??? Trust me...pictures don't capture their sparkle in it's entirety!

Here is your tutorial that I promised:

Now...onto the heat and stick powder. I have a lot of people ask me how to use this.

Here is how I use it with glitter:

1. swipe your card stock with the embossing buddy

2. ink and stamp your image (a solid image) with versamark ink.

3.pour heat and stick powder on the image and tap off the excess onto a powder pal

4. heat with the heat tool....IMPORTANT....just until it starts to get shiny. If you over heat it, it will lose it's sticky-ness (hence the name..heat and stick...lol!)

5.while it is still warm, pour your glitter over the image in another powder pal and tap off excess into powder pal.

6. heat with heat tool again, briefly to set the glitter.

7. pour remaining heat and stick powder and glitter into their respective containers.

Now...some questions I have been asked before:

1. can you just use a blow dryer...no...blow dryers don't come even close to how hot the heat tool gets.

2. do i have to use a solid image stamp? in theory, no but just remember that you will only get glitter where the stamp is.

3. why use heat and stick instead of a two way glue pen with the glitter? well...i use both a lot so here is when i use each:

heat and stick - when you want the entire stamped image to be glittered...the glitter will stick better to a big area

2 way glue pen - i use this when i want to accent an area with glitter

I hope that helps you with just two of the ways you can add bling to your projects.

I will try to get some stamping done today if my little one takes a nap...those are getting few are far between. If I get to something....you may get a double post today! :)