Today, we will be doing something new…a new technique that one of our innovative design team members stumbled upon when doing another project. Got to LOVE those A-HA moments! LOL!

Design Team Member Heidi Blankenship will showing us how wax paper can turn your project into something beautiful…Wax Resist, Spellbindersâ„¢ style! Heidi introduced this technique on her blog a few days ago but didn’t want you all to miss this - it’s good! Sorry, ladies, you’ll have to bring out your irons for this one. I know mine is buried somewhere in the laundry room. But trust me, you won’t be disappointed in the results - do it for craft’s sake! LOL!

An encore presentation from Heidi:
I am so excited to be sharing a New Spellbindersâ„¢ Technique with you today! Before I get started I want to let you know how I came up with the idea for this technique. I don’t know if you have heard this before or not but sometimes when making a die cut the cardstock can really stick in the die template and if this happens Spellbindersâ„¢ recommends placing a piece of wax paper in between the die template and the cardstock and then your die cut will pop right out from the die template. If you haven’t heard this before it’s a great little tip!

I was making some pendant die cuts one day and I had several pieces of wax paper die cuts, they were so pretty I didn’t want to throw them away. Being a paper crafter you can’t ever throw anything away! *wink* I started trying to think of things I could do with the wax paper die cuts. Then I remembered doing a technique about 15 years ago where you crumple up wax paper and iron on top of cardstock creating a resist. Hmmm… That really had me thinking and wondering if I could do the same thing with wax paper die cuts and the answer is Yes!!

If you like to play with die cuts, the iron (only for crafty purposes-LOL!) and inks then this is a perfect tutorial for you! If you don’t like getting messy with the inks you can also do this technique on solid colored cardstock creating a watermark effect.

The New Technique is called “Wax Resist, Spellbindersâ„¢ Style!”

Here is the card I created using the Wax Resist.

Step 1: Start with a large piece of wax paper and fold in half and then in half again. (So it’s quartered) This is nice if you want to make multiples and have extra pieces to play around with this technique.

Cutting Sandwich (Stack from the bottom)
1. White Master Mat
2. Magnetic Spacer Plate
3. S4-210 Lattice Pendants (cut/ridge side UP)
4. Wax Paper
5. White Master Mat
6. Run through the Wizard machine.

Embossing Sandwich (Stack from the bottom)
1. White Master Mat
2. S4-210 Lattice Pendants (paper in place and the cut/ridge side up)
3. Tan Embossing Mat
4. White Master Mat
5. Run through the Wizard machine

Step 2: Cut/Emboss * You don’t have to emboss but it will show more of the detail in the resist.

Step 3: Before removing the wax paper, use a paper piercer, stylus, or even a toothpick will work to pop out the drop out pieces from the die cut.

Step 4: Remove the wax paper from the die template. Carefully separate the pieces. The reason you have to be very careful with this step is because any creases you might get in the wax paper with show up in the resist.

Step 5: Set the iron to the hottest temperature without having steam, lay wax paper die cut with the embossed side face down onto the cardstock, place paper towel on top and iron about 30-45 seconds being careful not to move the paper.
***You can use the paper of your choice to do the Wax Resist. On the card I created I used white glossy cardstock but it will also work on regular white cardstock. If you use regular white cardstock the colors of ink will be a little more intense because the paper has more fibers to absorb the ink. You can also use a solid colored cardstock for the Wax Resist and you will have a watermark effect.

I know it’s a little hard to see in the picture but after you are done ironing your cardstock should look like the one pictured above. You can see a light pattern from the wax paper.

Step 6:In this next step you will be applying ink to the cardstock. I like to use cotton balls to apply the ink. Ink up the cotton ball, in a circular motion rub off some of the ink on your scratch paper until it is a shade you like. Then apply the ink to the cardstock, remember to work in a circular motion, this will help for blending and smoothing out the ink. Use 2-3 colors of ink, layering them to add more depth. For my card I started with Ranger Distress Ink Broken China (Blue). When you are applying the ink leave some open space for the other colors.

Next I applied Ranger Distress Ink Vintage Photo. Heat setting the wax paper die cuts into the cardstock creates a resist and then when ink is applied the resist really pops! If you don’t have distress inks you can use other inks too.

In the picture above the Wax Resist, Spellbindersâ„¢ Style was done on glossy cardstock on the left and regular white cardstock on the right.

Here is another picture with a piece of solid color cardstock (sorry, it’s a little hard to get a good picture) so you can see the watermark effect.

Take another look at the finished card.

Supplies:
Stamps: Taylored Expressions (Whimsical Wishes Branching Out); My Mind’s Eye (Laundry Line Flirty “Lil Girl”)
Paper: My Mind’s Eye (Laundry Line Natural “Encourage” Proud Print Paper); The Paper Company(White, Brown Cardstock); WorldWin (White Glossy)
Ink: Ranger (Distress Ink Vintage Photo, Broken China), Tsukineko (Memento Rich Cocoa Ink)
Spellbindersâ„¢: Wizardâ„¢, S4-210 Lattice Pendants, S4-235 Fancy Tags
Others: Scrapbook Adhesives by 3L (White 3D Foam Squares); Beacon Adhesives (3-in-1 Advanced Craft Glue); My Mind’s Eye (Laundry Line Sundress “Sweetness” Rub-ons); Wax Paper; Paper Towels; Iron; and Cotton Balls

I hope you enjoyed the tutorial. Give the New Technique - Wax Resist, Spellbindersâ„¢ Style - a try! I would love to hear what you think about the technique. If you do give it a try please leave a comment with a link to your project–I would love to see it!

After reading Heidi’s tutorial, I came up with these card fronts for hot chocolate pocket cards. I’m thinking of these for my boys’ teachers as holiday gifts (sticking in a gift card as well!).

I used S4-223 Create-A-Flake Two (the three largest sized die templates and their centers) as the background and S4-224 Snowflake Border Petite (the border that can cut/emboss a decorative edge) was used as a stenciled band on one of the cards. Then I embellished with the border’s snowflake cut outs and Hero Arts Pearls. Just love how it turned out! Makes you want to grab a hot cup of chocolate! Thanks, Heidi!

Hope you have a wonderful Saturday!
Thanks for stopping by… MargieH

Trick or Treat!  No tricks, just treats for you here!  The first treat is a double on the Tattered Angels Blog Hop!  Design Team Member Lisa Rapp and our very own Eli Harlan are both showcasing some Tattered Angels love today, be sure to visit both of their blogs.  And don’t forget to see what Tattered Angel’s Blog has in store too.

Now on to Halloween.  Halloween is for kids, and kids of all ages dress in costumes!  Super Heros, Princesses, Monsters, Celebrities, Politicians, Ninjas, Ghosts and just about anything else goes when it comes to Halloween.  Some people even wear costumes to work! This picture is the Spellbindersâ„¢ crew in Phoenix!  I’m sure they had a lot of fun, and plenty of candy too!

For today’s post I put together a cute Halloween mini book.  I had a sheet of vintage images waiting for the perfefct project, and this is it!  I didn’t take a lot of step shots, but you will see it is a pretty straight forward book.

I started with the largest of the S4-227 Pumpkins and cut 4 chipboard pumpkin shapes as bases for the pages.  In my Wizard™ I cut/embossed 8 more from patterned paper, Fancy Pants Trick or Treat Collection and an orange piece from Daydreams, these covered both sides of the chipboard.  I spritzed the pumpkin die cuts with Glimmer Mist by Tattered Angels, and when they were dry I sanded the edges.  I have several colors of Glimmer Mist and tried to match them with the colors of the papers.  Look at the results!

Ohhhhh, glimmery!

I cut a piece of Core’dinations Black Magic Cardstock with the S4-227 Pumpkins Nestabilities, to make pumpkin shaped frames by nesting the die templates.  See how I set them on my Magnetic Spacer Plate.  This gave me 2 frames and 3 full pumpkins.  I cut/embossed then sanded the black side to reveal the orange color underneath.

The rest of the book is just stacking, layering, inking, sanding and having fun.

The book includes a variety of Spellbinders™ die templates, including the following:
S4-227 Pumpkins; S7-014 Classic Lace Border Grand, S5-014 Deckled Mega Rectangles SM; S4-131 Classic Scalloped Rectangles SM; S4-235 Fancy Tags; S4-169 Small Labels; S4-200 Flower Bouquet; S4-161 Labels One; S4-190 Labels Four; S5-019 Labels Eight; S4-233 Labels Nine, S4-134 Classic Paisley.

Other supplies include: Fancy Pants, paper; Tattered Angels, Glimmer Mists; Crafty Secrets, Heartwarming Vintage images; Creative Impressions, Ribbons; Clearsnap, Colorbox Charcoal Fluid Chalk Ink; Copic, Atyou Spica Pitch Black; Cardstock; Alpha rub-ons; adhesives; hole punch; book ring.

Happy Halloween!
Beth

World Card Making Day is Saturday (tomorrow), October 3rd!! We’re having a little fun over on Facebook:

Post a card using Spellbinders Die Templates on Spellbindersâ„¢ Facebook page on World Card Making Day and be entered to win a Spellbinders Die Template. We will randomly draw a name from all the participants!

Hey there scrapbooking fans! Here’s one for you today. I just had to share these pics of my family enjoying a Fall day in the park. I love the feeling of movement in them. Design-wise, I tried to include a variety of shapes to keep things interesting: ovals, lines, circles…These ideas can be applied to any card or layout.

I started by printing my photos at home and cutting them using the Oval Nestabilities®. The first attempt yielded an oval that was too big. As you can see below, the top and bottom edges of the photos’ white frame show… now, we can’t have that!!!

Not to worry…

The brilliant thing about Nestabilities® is that you can increase or decrease the size by just an eighth of an inch increment, providing a great deal of flexibility when designing.

So (now stick with me here), I began with S4-138 Petite Ovals, Large #6. (When counting die numbers, start with the smallest die template and count out to the largest.) This happens to be the largest in the set. If I went to #5 in the set, I would have a 1/4″ decrease. I thought that would crop too much of the photo. So I chose the largest in the coordinating set, S4-140 Petite Ovals, Small #5 which was 1/8″ smaller. It gave me the  perfect size.

And guess what? Since I wanted a 1/8″ mat around the photo, I used the first die template I used, S4-138 Petite Ovals Small, #6, to cut pink cardstock. Boy, these Nestabilities® sure are handy!!

If you want to try your hand at this layout or use it for inspiration for another project, you’ll need the following supplies: W-001 Wizardâ„¢, S4-138 Petite Ovals Large, S4-140 Petite Ovals Small, S7-017 On the Vine Borderabilities® Grand, S4-235 Fancy Tags from Spellbindersâ„¢

along with Chatterbox Fabulous bird rub-on, green patterned ribbon, epoxy sticker; The Paper Company Chocolate Brown, Sable papers; Cosmo Cricket Girl Friday patterned paper; Core’dinations pink cardstock; Creative Impression pink ribbon; SCRAPBOOK ADHESIVE by 3L, 3-D squares, Photo Tape; brown ruched paper, white opaque pen, sewing machine and thread

Now go out and PLAY!! Eli

We’ve had almost a whole month of awesome posts on Impressabilitiesâ„¢ and I thought it would be fun to remind you of a few techniques you might have learned this month, teach you a new one and use it all on a card…with Partial Impressabilitiesâ„¢, Impressabilitiesâ„¢ Letterpress, Chalk over Ink and using one of our most popular Limited Edition die templates…all in one card. Sound like too much?

Naaaaah, we like to put it all together.

So, just to remind you, Beth put together this tutorial on how to use Impressabilitiesâ„¢ as a Letterpress and Margie put one together last Saturday on how to use a Partial Impressabilitiesâ„¢. So I used both those techniques but also want to share with you a technique that Stacey Caron created. It is simply called “Chalk over Ink”. It’s not too challenging but gives a great “wow” effect. Let’s check it all out, step-by-step.

Gather your supplies: Wizardâ„¢, S4-227 Pumpkins Nestabilities®, I2-1001 Impressabilitiesâ„¢ Paisley, S4-235 Fancy Tags, The Robin’s Nest Halloween Swirl patterned paper, Cosmo Cricket “Girl Friday” patterned paper, Clearsnap ColorBox cat eye inks in Chianti and Picante, Taylored Expressions sentiment stamp, Creative Impressions ribbons, 3L SCRAPBOOK ADHESIVES–Black 3-D Adhesive Squares and Photo Tape, Decorating chalks, Hole punch, Green staples, Stapler

Next you might want to go review the techniques in the links above. You’ll need to cut one of your Impressabilities templates and letterpress some paper using a slow-drying pigment ink. I started by using green ink as in this example but tried orange and used it for the final card.

Then just color away with your decorating chalks. I like to use my bare finger to rub color over the inks and around on the smooth cardstock. You’ll notice the ink seems to grab onto the chalk, intensifying the color. I used several colors–red, orange, green and yellow–on this to get the desired effect.

Next, cut the letterpressed paper using the largest Pumpkins Nestabilitiesâ„¢ so that the letterpress image shows right where you want it. I do not emboss over letterpress as it tends to flatten the image.

The rest is up to you…After creating the Letterpressed pumpkin, trim a background mat to 5-1/4  by 5-1/4″ and add it to the card base (11×5-1/2″) folded in half. Punch a hole in the stem of the pumpkin, thread the ribbons through it and staple to secure. Stamp a sentiment onto paper and cut/emboss it with S4-235 Fancy Tags. Adhere the pumpkin by placing a double layer of 3-D adhesive squares down the middle. Add 3-D squares to the sentiment tag and add to the card: VOILA a lovely, fall friendship card, using several techniques.

Eli

I’m a pile maker.  I pile stuff here, pile it there.  I have piles of paperwork and lists, and I know exactly what things are in which piles.  In my ongoing effort to reduce clutter in my home I decided to start using a system to keep my lists, time logs and other major and minor notes that control my existence.  I need a notebook.  A pretty one, that I can take with me or leave out on the counter, one that my kids won’t mistake as their homework.  While doing some back to school shopping (Yippee!) I grabbed a notebook for my own use.

I can’t let it sit there all yellow and boring!  I promised to show you how to use the Borderabilities® on projects longer than 5.5″.  Lets get to work!

I started with these dies, the S4-207 Kaleidoscope Pendant, S4-216 Kaleidoscope Borderabilities®, S4-185 Large Octagons, and S4-235 Fancy Tags. I used patterned paper, a brad and a chipboard letter courtesy of 7gypsies, black pigment ink from Clearsnap Colorbox, and clear decoupage finish adhesive.

To cut the Borderabilities® I started with a strip of patterned paper 12×2″.  Using regular household tape (that I stuck to my t-shirt to make it less tacky) I taped the S4-216 Kaleidoscope Borderabilities® with the cut edge facing the patterned side of the paper.  I made sure to line up the die template straight at the end and the long edge.

I placed the die template on the Magnetic Spacer Plate with the cut edge up, and cut/embossed in my Wizardâ„¢ Die Cutting and Embossing System.

The first half of the paper strip is done.  With an ink applicator, I applied Clearsnap Colorbox Black Pigment ink through the holes in the die template.

I carefully removed the tape.

I poked the paper bits out of the die before attaching it to the paper strip for the second round.

I lined up the die to the long edge of the paper as before, and made sure it was right on the spot where it stopped cutting on the first run.  The repeating design of the Borderabilites® allows you to continue the cutting pattern over and over.

I cut/embossed again in my Wizardâ„¢. When embossing, I only covered the paper that was in the die. If I placed the Tan Embossing Pad on the previously embossed areas, I could have flattened them out.

Then I inked through the die on this section. (Note to self: Do not look away at teenagers asking for money or rides to friends houses while inking.)  While directing concentration away from my project, I accidentally inked over the end of the die and onto the paper. In order to “cover” my mistake, I added additional ink over the top of the whole strip.

I cut/embossed the S4-185 Large Octagon, S4-207 Kaleidoscope Pendant and Center, and one of the S4-235 Fancy Tags.

I used a paintbrush to apply decoupage finish to the top of the notebook and the back and front of the paper. I carefully worked out air bubbles, and allowed it to dry. I added a brad to the Kaleidoscope Pendant and Octagon and adhered the set to the notebook, as well as the Fancy Tag with the matching chipboard letter. Allow more time to dry. To finish the edges I sanded the paper to fit and added one more layer of decoupage finish.

Oops, you can see where the glue isn’t all the way dry, silly me for picking a rainy day to work with decoupage!  What will you extend your borders on?

Happy Saturday!

Beth

First of all, many thanks to all those who participated in the contest entries, blog comments and excitement surrounding our CHA Blog Frenzy! BIG THANK YOU!!!

Our lucky winner has entered all 14 CHA Blog Frenzy contests to be eligible and has been drawn randomly. As a result, the winner will receive all 29 newly released Spellbinders products valued at over $550.00!

And the winner is (opening the envelope):

LAURA from Virginia, USA!!!

“OMG! OMG! OMG! I am literally shaking right now with excitement. I saw the email title and thought you were announcing the winner. It never dawned on me that I WAS the winner! (I had to read the email twice to make sure).

I have followed the day-to-day CHA announcements by your design team and can’t tell you how excited I am about the new release. The dies are amazing! I would also like to say that I am so impressed by your design team. I appreciate how much time and effort they put into their detailed step-by-step tutorials on how to use the new dies. Not only did they make me excited about the new products, but I feel as though I will be able to “hit the road running” with the new release.

I can’t tell you enough how much this prize means to me. I wish I could put into words what is going through my shaky, adrenaline-rushed body. Money is really tight right now, and I feel truly blessed to be given such a grandiose prize. It simply doesn’t feel real. Thank you, thank you, thank you from the bottom of the heart.”

S7-017 On The Vine Border Grand

S5-017 Snowflake Frame

S4-227 Pumpkins Nestabilities®

S7-015 Holiday Lights Border Grand

S7-016 Poinsettia Border Grand

And from the bottom of our hearts, we thank Laura and the other winners for participating! Again, congratulations!!

See any that you like? I have my list. Be sure to ask your favorite local retailer to order yours.