all in an inch

A fall foliage collage

2011-11-03T13:54:27-07:00

This is a great project for creating several cards with a variety of common theme stamps and an assortment of pigment inks.

All of the stamps used in this project are by Fred Mullet. If you haven't worked with his stamps before they are representations of the real thing because his signature stamps are from actual nature prints. And the wonderful Autumn Blessings calligraphy stamp is from Rubbermoon.

Create the foundation of the collage with squiggles and dots using a Krylon 18Kt. Gold Leaf pen. The gold will shimmer through all of the stamped layers.

Your goal is to create a stamped collage over an entire sheet of ivory card stock. It's up to you whether you stamp a full 8 1/2" X 11" or just a half sheet, but know the larger the paper, the more raw material you will have for cards.

Create each 'layer' by stamping each leaf randomly all over the sheet. Remember to change orientation of your stamp each time. This first layer uses the Lil Paper Birch stamp with Fig color pigment ink from Fresh Ink.

Next, the Lil Silver Birch with Honey.

(note: since pigment inks are very sticky and often slow to dry you may want to lightly heat set your work after each layer - this will prevent transfer of each ink onto the newest stamp)

The Flowering Ash Branch is stamped with Tuscan Olive.

As you continue to layer be sure and fill in the white spaces so you are getting good solid 'collage' coverage.

Lil Sweet Gum with Honey.

Finally stamp the Lil Maidenhair Fern with Pear.

Unless you began by stamping 'off' the edges you will want to cut a strip off the top getting rid of the white area at the very edge. Then, cut a 7/8" strip (above) from the top edge. Do you best to be precise because when you cut this strip into squares and paste them onto the Inchie Squares there will be a perfect 1/16" border around the edge of your photo squares.

Carefully trim the strip into 7/8" squares with a paper cutter. As you trim them out be sure to set them down in order and not mix them up. This will make it MUCH easier to match them up again as you are pasting them down on your card. For each card use 5 continuous squares, pasting them onto the black Inchie Squares. Set all 5 squares down on your card first before glueing. Arrange them exactly how you want them (use a centering ruler to position the middle one if desired) and then paste down one by one starting with the square in the middle.

(Hint: A set of 6 or 8 cards and envelopes wrapped in a ribbon makes a perfect hostess gift for Thanksgiving!)

News...and a thank you!

2011-09-29T16:08:36-07:00

We were VERY excited to learn that Inchie Arts products received a wonderful product review in the Fall issue of Paper Creations magazine!!

A warm and special thank you to the writer whose prose highlighted all of the special qualities of our Art Squares. The write up can be found on page 8 in The Marketplace section. We are pleased to say that as a result of the article we have been contacted by many papercrafters interested in purchasing the products. As a reminder, we have a list of stores and online retailers on the STORES page on our web site. And, if you are a store interested in carrying our products don't hesitate to send us an e-mail (lisa@inchiearts.com) and we will be happy to send you information about carrying Inchie Arts products.

Finally, a special thank you to all of you who have been having fun reviewing our past postings and leaving the nicest comments.

Stay tuned...we promise to get back in gear...and back to posting on a regular basis!

It's all about "Ash"!

2011-05-21T12:42:47-07:00

In February we did a posting about a class we were teaching, that created a unique pop up card. from photos from our local farmers market. The card stayed on display at Impress after the class and due to customer requests we are teaching it again.

Even more exciting is to see what others have done with the concept! A dear friend of ours, Vee, has a precocious and photogenic cat named Ash. She designed a version of the pop up with a collection of pictures, all about Ash. This pop up concept is an easy way to showcase and share a collage of images whether that be a trip, hobby, children or special pet.

We love to see what others are doing with our Art Squares or project ideas - send us your photos!

JudiKins and the Stamp Show

2011-05-12T13:42:57-07:00

We are VERY excited to be working with JudiKins in their booth this Sunday at the Puyallup Rubber Stamp & Paper Arts Festival. Not only do they have some incredible images to work with, but we are having way to much fun playing with all the MicaGloss colors and embossing powders.

One of the techniques we will be demonstrating utilizes the supplies in the top photo to stamp and emboss the leaves onto white Twinchie Squares and then hand mix colors to paint pearlized metallics in subtle shades of green. (click on the photo for a larger view) Rather than putting the finished pieces on a card they are popped out of a small black frame for an elegant art piece to set on a table or hang.

If you are in the neighborhood - be sure and stop by and say hi!

Zentangle style Twinchie Squares

2011-05-03T17:49:52-07:00

We are completely in love with the whole Zentangle^R phenomena created by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas. If you are not familiar with this style of drawing it has to do with purposeful pattern and line placement. (Visit their website at http://www.zentangle.com/ for more information!)

Twinchie Squares of any color provide the perfect surface for this type of detailed pen work and it is especially fun to tinker with different types of pens as you experiment with this drawing technique. Our local craft store (Ben Franklin Crafts & Frames Redmond) is having a promotion about this style of drawing and so we created a sample board for them to illustrate the variety that can be created using different types of pens on black and white Twinchie Squares.

Now you know why we took photos of each square....even though the poster is about 16" wide it's pretty hard to get a sense of it in a photo - suffice it to say it looks MUCH better in real life!!