Christmas cards to inspire Day 3: Distress Resist

Hello again my dears!!

How are you all today? I'm DYING of heat exhaustion here in Perth today.  We're not even out of Spring yet and it was 36 degrees Centigrade here today. (That's 96.8 F) I was quite a bit like the Wicked Witch of the West this afternoon when I went out the front to get the mail...I'M MELTIIIIIIIIIIIIING *wink* (but without the socks and green skin haha!)

So anyhoo--welcome to Day three of my Christmas Card Inspiration Week!  Let's get straight to the card--I'm pretty happy with this one :).

The techniques I used on this one are Heat embossing and a technique called "Resist".

Here's how I did it:

• I cut a piece of Bazzill Kraft Classic Cardstock down to 5 1/2" long by 3" high. 
• Then I took my Versamark watermark inkpad and applied it to my Hero Arts Wreath of Leaves Stamp (I LOOOOOVE this image!)
• I then stamped multiple times over the surface, going off the edge quite a bit on all of the images to give extra effect (I re-inked my stamp with Versamark each time).
• I shook some Mustard colored embossing powder over the whole image and blew off the excess then I heat set it with my heat tool.
• Taking my Ranger Inkssentials Blending tool, I then added a light layer of Peeled Paint Distress Ink and Walnut Stain Distress Ink to the cardstock, blending it in well.  

The embossing will resist the distress ink you put over the top. Just make sure you wipe over your embossed areas to remove any excess distress ink that might be there and to really make your embossing powder's color shine through. (this is the technique called "Resist). 

• I lightly distressed the edges of the cardstock with my scissors (or you could use a Tim Holtz tonic distressing tool) and added some Black Soot Distress Ink to the edges, to sharpen up the colors.
• Next I added some Red Hero Arts Ribbon, a little twine and a couple of buttons from my stash.
• Then I stamped the 'Merry Christmas' sentiment from the Hero Arts Merry Christmas Trees Clear stamp set and in Versamark and used red embossing powder on that before heat setting it.
• I attached my inked, embossed and 'ribboned' cardstock onto a folded card that I'd made out of kraft cardstock (which I cut to size and scored in half).
• On the inside of the card, I used the 'Best wishes for the season' sentiment from the same Hero Arts Merry Christmas Trees Clear Stamp set in Walnut Stain Distress Ink.

I'm starting to really utilise the insides of my cards now. I love adding a little something extra wherever I can.

Anyhoo, that's it! Super easy and it would really be easy to make multiples of these! I'd just stamp the Wreath image all over a bigger piece of cardstock and emboss it all, then cut it down to size! 

One more quick note--You can do the first few steps in the opposite order; the distress inks first and then add the embossing over the top.  This will only work when you are using colored embossing powder, but if you're using clear powder (so that the color of the cardstock underneath will show through), you must do the embossing first, then go over with your distress inks second.
(Because if the embossing powder is clear--and on top of distress inking- the distress inks will show through and you wont see your embossed image, it will just blend in with the distress inks colors.)

**A tip!!  If you do go the other way around (Distress ink first, then emboss over top), make sure the Distress Inks are completely dry before stamping the 'Versamarked' image (and most importantly, the embossing powder). If it's not dry, when you pour the embossing powder on, it will stick to the entire cardfront, not just the image you've stamped with the Versamark--very annoying...trust me *wink*

Have fun with this! It's a favourite technique of mine!

Talk to you tomorrow!

Linda xx