Polished Stone!

Oooooooo...pretty shiny things!!   Some days I think I am part bird because anything that shines or glitters seems to get my attention!  Much like this card that I made for my brother on his birthday....I don't know about you but ...being a girl and all...I really struggle sometimes to come up with masculine cards that are not too "girly" !  I seem to use the Lovely as A Tree stamp set a lot when I need a "boy" card....it's pretty safe!  To make this one I used the polished stone technique ...I know it's nothing new but it's so darn pretty!  (and shiny!) There are many different ways to do this technique .... there's probably as many versions as there are letters in the alphabet!   

This is my favorite way:

1) Cut yourself a small piece of white felt... about 2" by 2" is good enough.  Fold it in half and grab the the sides with the open ends with a bulldog clip.  The clip makes a good handle to hang on to and helps keep your fingers clean!  I find that I get a lot less fuzzies stuck in the ink when I use felt instead of a cotton ball.  Have the fold of the felt stick out from the clip like this:

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2)  Dip the piece of felt into some rubbing alcohol. It should be wet but not dripping! 

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3) Then take some classic dye ink refills at least two colors, and place a couple of drops of each on the felt.  In this sample, I used hunter green and black.  Then take a metallic refill and place two or three drops of ink amongst the classic ink on the felt.  When you are using the metallic ink, LESS is MORE!  Don't over do it with the metallic ink because it tends to not want to dry otherwise.  Yes... you will notice that this picture shows pink in it and the card above has no pink!  Sorry about that....even the so called "experts"  ahem...make mistakes!  I tossed the card with the pink...pretend it's not there :)

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4)  Now the fun part.....pounce the piece of felt all over your glossy card stock covering the entire piece with the inky mess....As the alcohol dries, it will swirl and mix the colors and looks like stone!

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5) Set the wet paper aside and allow it to dry naturally. 

In this picture the colors are mixing nicely (just keep swirling, just keep swirling!)  The paper will tend to curl a bit while it's drying...don't worry, it will flatten out.

When it is dry, you'll need to seal the colors in with an acrylic matte spray.  Two or three very light coats are better than one heavy coat....

6) You can then stamp whatever you want over top of the background you just created using stazon.  I stamped the oak tree from Lovely as a Tree, mounted it on black card stock and then layered that on creamy caramel and added some brads. At least I think it's an oak...we don't have these in Alberta!

Set this piece aside until step 9.

7) The word "Brother" is from the Everyday Flexible Phrases set, I stamped it on a scrap piece of creamy caramel. I then folded my Real Red card base in half and stamped the front with the Canvas background stamp using black ink to cover the top 2/3 of the card front.

8) I stuck a 1/2" strip of black card stock on the card front over the transition between the canvas stamped background and the clear area.

9) Then I finished it off by adding the Happy Birthday greeting from the Sincere Salutations stamp set, mounted my completed layered polished stone piece from step 6 and I'm done!

One last thing....If anyone has some tips on how I can space my pictures correctly without adding these dumb little dots on the left side of the window, I'd be glad to hear it!!!