My workshop projects

I suppose projects is not quite the word - but they are not cards either.

What we mainly did was to learn techniques using the materials that the retailer had brought along for us to try.  You will see that my 2 photos seem to show exactly the same techniques & you would not be wrong - you will find out why.

Mainly the techniques were showcasing some of their very own designed products.  I was right yesterday by the way it was called flitter glue - well actually Flitter Glu.  It is a great product & is used for stamping which then various products can be applied to the surface.  Yesterday we used Pan Pastels, Gilding flakes, mica powders & glitter - well they were the things that were demonstrated.

Here is the first one

The dark surround to the work is the cloth that I laid the work on to photograph it.  Although there is also a layer of black card that the background sheet is layered onto.  So basically - black card, decorated white card, black card, reindeer image on white card.  You can just see at the corners the fancy swirls that were stamped using the Flitter Glu & then covered with Gilding flakes.  Oh my! can that be messy.  I did buy a "starter kit" which consisted of a small tub of gilding flakes, Flitter Glu, spatula (to apply the Glu to the pad), scoochie, & Phat foam. 

What's a scoochie.  Well it looks like a black pan scourer - but it is not hard & rough, & you use it to take off the flakes to take them back to a smooth polished finish.  Phat foam?  That's the blending pads you use with distress inks basically & it was used to create an "ink pad" for the Glu.

Here is the second project;

Now the layout of this should have been very much like the first one - but I had a problem.  We used the Flitter Glu with a rather large ornate stamp & the technique is to ink the stamp pop it onto your card & lift up almost straight away.  Just as I was doing this the lady who had shown us what to do stopped to talk to us & I forgot to lift the stamp off.  That is how good the Glu is - it stuck & in removing the stamp the surface of the card came away too.  She gave me another piece of card & I started again.  Same thing happened & I then realised that when the Glu on the pad starts to dry a bit it sticks quicker.  So I didn't ask for another piece of card I took the piece of card we were given earlier with the aperture in it for making the sun & trimmed it as evenly as I could.  Went back to my colouring with Pan Pastels & stamped the small images at the corner.  Those are created by stamping with the Glu & then brushing Pan Pastels on the top.  This is the technique I really like. I didn't use the flakes again & I didn't try out the mica powders or glitter.

The flower was from a set we were given & was stamped onto a piece of card that we coloured randomly with Pan Pastels. I then layered up the black & white card & placed the flower over the aperture.

As you can see I didn't place the layers down very evenly - but I have to admit I was beginning to get rather tired by then - it was close to the end of the day.

A little word of warning.  do you have one of those lovely kraft mats that has the treated back so that it doesn't move around on your desk when, for example, colouring card with distress inks.  Well don't use the gilding flakes near it.  Despite being stuck to the table surface the flakes got underneath the mat & as it can be a bit static it was very difficult to remove them.  So at the moment I have a very fancy kraft mat, the lady sat opposite me was trying to completely cover a piece of card with flakes & got really messy except for the bits that went under my mat.  

So - that was my day yesterday,

Hope you have had a good weekend & that you have done lots of wonderful things.

More tomorrow - 'bye for now.