Birthday Card - Watercolor Galaxy Space Themed

 

Once again, another space themed card. This time I'm using a galaxy background created using watercolors with space themed embellishments. I needed a birthday card for a gift to my nephew so used a happy birthday sentiment with 'Whoa' in front to give it a bit of an 'out of this world' feel!

As per my recent trend, I made a process video of how I put this card together and a link to it is below or you can click here.

First step is to create the galaxy background. I was playing around with some watercolor paints I recently got and decided to make a galaxy. It's made by brushing shades of yellow, green, blue hues near the centre the piece then surrounding it with a dark purple hue then very dark blue (almost black) was painted around the outer edge. I then let the piece dry overnight before using a paintbrush to flick white acrylic paint flecks all over the piece for stars - I added a little water at times to help dilute the paint and make it easier to flick the white specks of paint everywhere. Again I let that dry overnight before adding my sentiment strip and space themed embellishments.

So, once the watercolor galaxy background piece was dry, I arranged the space themed die cuts I found and had hanging around in my stash on top of the galaxy background. I had already coloured these using alcohol makers (a review of the markers I used can be found here) so they were ready to use.

I also decided that I wanted to make a birthday card for my nephew who I was going to give a gift to soon. I found some stamps in my stash to create the sentiment "Whoa. Happy Birthday" The 'whoa' part is to give the sentiment a bit of an 'out of this world, kind of feel to match the space theme I was going for.

As I wanted to heat emboss the sentiment I place the black cardstock sentiment strip in my stamping platform then used it to stamp the sentiment 3 or 4 times with clear embossing ink. I then sprinkle white embossing powder over the sticky ink sentiment and tap off the excess. I do this over non-stick baking paper so I can easily recollect the excess powder for use next time. 

I then use my heat gun to heat set the embossing powder. I decided I wanted the rocket die cut to cover the end of the sentiment strip so it looked like the sentiment strip ends at the rocket so I trimmed off a bit off the end of the sentiment strip.

I stick the sentiment strip down using double sided tape over the nebula part of the galaxy background. Using foam tape behind the rocket die cut, I stick it down over the right hand side edge of the sentiment strip ensuring the end is covered by the rocket.

Standard double-sided tape is used to adhere down the rest of the space themed die cut elements.

Last thing to do is to adhere the card front to a card base. For this I decided a black cardbase would suit the space theme and used double-sided tape to adhere the card front to the card base, ensuring that there is an even border of black around the card front before pressing it down.

And its all done!

Happy Crafting!

Mel Crafting.

Touchfive Alcohol Markers Review

Touchfive Alcohol Markers

Sorry for taking a while to post another blog, I have been distracted with other things and lost a bit of motivation but now I'm back and happy to finally post a review on the Touchfive alcohol markers I bought off Aliexpress for about US$18 last year. For the video review head over to my youtube channel "Mel Crafting" or just click here or view the link below.

First impressions are OK. I bought a 60 piece set and the Aliexpress seller threw in a couple of cheap pens. The listing said a colorless blender would be included but I didn't get one so I was quite disappointed with that.

Some of the tips were poking out and needed pushing back in so consistency of assembly of the markers isn't great. However, they did come in handy zip-up Pouch to hold the makers and it fitted a few extra markers I bought to complement the set so that was a bonus; again though the material of the bag is quite thin and does have a cheap kind of a feel to it.

Touchnew 60 set zip pouch

The markers have a bullet tip and a chisel tip for each color. The caps feel very secure when you take them off and they give a nice click when you put them back on so I felt their was little chance of them drying out due to a loose cap. Holding them and drawing/coloring them was comfortable in my hand, I would have preferred a round barrel rather than the square profile but I didn't get a sense of any control issues.

Touchfive bullet tip

Touchfive chisel tip

I swatched both the bullet tip and the chisel tip ends, noting down both the number and name printed on the cap of the markers. All the markers were juicy when using the bullet tip. I found marker 99 "Bronze" had a dried out chisel tip whilst marker 69 "Prussian Blue" had feathering issues with its chisel tip.

Touchfive 60 Marker Set Swatching

Marker 69 Prussian Blue Chisel Tip Feathering

Marker 99 Bronze Dry Chisel Tip

Moving onto some alcohol marker blending. I tried out sets of three in colors that I would commonly blend together when I make my cards. What I found was that some markers were easier to blend than others; so that missing colorless blender would have come in handy...

Testing out the Blending

I'm mostly happy with the color range for what I use them for (cardmaking/coloring), but I would have liked more in the purple range because, well, purple is my favourite color. The set has a great range of reds, blues, greens and brown/yellows with quite a few greys so really only limited by your imagination.

Overall, I recommend this 60 marker set of Touchfive alcohol markers as a first set for someone looking to try alcohol markers out but who also does not mind having a limited purple color range and can live with imperfect blending.

Thanks for visiting my blog!

Happy crafting!

Mel Crafting.

Birthday Card - Starry Space Shaker Card

Starry Space Shaker Card

This card was another inspired by the stars and moons background I made earlier. Click here to go to the blog post on how I made that background or watch the following video:

I wanted to make a shaker card so I grabbed my Sizzix big shot and cut a rectangular window out of a white card front.

Before I get too far ahead of myself (and if you prefer) - here's a link to the process video for this shaker card:

So I cut the window at an angle to give it a bit of interest.

I found this sentiment strip from a moon stamp set I bought off Aliexpress that said "You're out of this world" that I wanted to use. I decided to stamp and heat emboss that sentiment above the shaker window using black embossing powder.

'Moon' Stamp Set

Sentiment Stamp Positioning and Angled Window

Heat Embossed Sentiment

 Using an old presentation report cover, I cut out a clear plastic widow big enough to cover the window and stuck it down using double-sided tape.

I grabbed my stars and moons background to check the look before placing foam tape all around the shaker window.

Foam Tape

The foam tape lifts the card front higher above the background so that the shaker elements have somewhere to move around in. I made sure the foam tape was placed as close as possible to the window to prevent the loss of my shaker elements.

I then removed the backing paper on all of the foam tape and filled the window with a sprinkling of glass beads (which I was using as my shaker element). You can use anything as your shaker element, I just decided to use these beads as I found them in my stash and I had no other plans for them.

Filling Window with Beads

Now I grab my stars and moons background, stick it down on top of the foam tape placing it over those beads to enclose them in the window. I then use scrap cardstock to cover up the remaining exposed sticky foam tape and to make sure the back of the card front is all level.

Placing Background Over Window

Covering the Exposed Foam Tape with Cardstock

Shaker Window!!!

 
Time to make my 'Happy Birthday' Sentiment strip. I grap a strip of black cardstock and a 'Happy Birthday' sentiment stamp from Simon Says Stamp Greetings Mix 1 stamp set.

Simon Says Stamp Greetings Mix 1 Stamp Set

 I place the card strip into my We R Memory Keepers Precision Press Stamping Platform and proceed to stamp the sentiment onto the strip using clear embossing ink. Then I heat emboss it using silver embossing powder and a heat tool.

Placing Card Strip and Stamp into Stamping Platform

Clear Embossing Ink

Stamped and Silver Heat Embossed Sentiment

After deciding I want this sentiment strip to sit across the bottom right hand corner of the card. I bring in my stamped and die cut space themed images which I've already colored using alcohol markers and arrange them on top of the card front.

Arranging Sentiment Strip and Space Images

Then I adhere everything down using double-sided tape and trim off any excess using scissors.

The last step is to adhere the entire card front to a black piece of cardstock using double-sided tape to finish the card. This card doesn't have a standard opening card base so it is intended that your card message is written on the back - I would use a white or silver gel pen in this case because I have used black cardstock as my final backing.

Many thanks for visiting my blog, if you'd like to see another card where I use the same background click here to see my starry window space themed card or click below for the process video:

Happy crafting!

Mel Crafting