Ellen Hutson’s 11th Anniversary Hop, Day 5 (+GIVEAWAYS and a SALE!)

It’s a BUSY day on the blog!  For ongoing crafty sales and discounts plus my personal Thanksgiving giveaway click here!  For the Tag You’re It Challenge, click here! And for the Purple Onion Designs Surprise Blog Hop and giveaway scroll down or click here!  

Good morning!  I am SO excited to help Ellen Hutson celebrate their 11th anniversary today!  All week long designers have been celebrating Ellen Hutson‘s anniversary by sharing creations featuring their favorite Essentials by Ellen products and today I’m sharing a card using the GORGEOUS Mondo Hydrangea (my all-time favorite Essentials by Ellen stamp set)!

This past summer I had the honor of guest-designing on the Ellen Hutson blog and I shared a set of cards using alcohol inks.  I thought it’d be appropriate to use alcohol inks again for today’s card! 😉 I started by stamping the Mondo Hydrangea on yupo paper with versamark and heat-embossed it with gold embossing powder.  When you emboss on yupo it’s very easy to warp the paper…a few tricks: first I also adhere the yupo paper to a 110lb card base with a good amount of ATG adhesive so that it helps to support the flimsier yupo paper, and second, I make sure the heat gun is SUPER hot and I keep it moving constantly over the yupo paper.  It takes a little longer to emboss since I’m not allowing the gun to stay in one area for very long but it helps make sure the paper won’t warp.  Once I stamped the flowers it was time to play with my alcohol inks!

I’ll have to make a video of this process soon because it’s quite fun but kinda hard to explain!  So I uncapped alcohol inks in Flamingo, Watermelon, Shell Pink, Poppyfield, Wild Plum, and Gold Mixative and placed them on my craft mat.  Then I placed a layer of paper towels on my craft mat to catch any stray drops of alcohol ink.  I started applying color to the petals by carefully dropping alcohol ink into the embossed petals one at a time.  Then  tilted the yupo paper around to move the ink across the petal.  Sometimes I’d mix colors and sometimes I’d add a little mixative.  This created a very interesting look and a really pretty blended hydrangea flower!  And just that touch of gold mixative really shimmers and catches the light as you tilt the card.  As long as you tilt carefully the ink will not run outside of the embossed lines.  And even if it does (and you’ll see in the photo below that mine does) it still looks really pretty!

Next I applied drops of shell pink, wild plum, and flamingo alcohol ink to a felt blending pad and wrapped the edges of the pad around my finger (so that it was a much smaller surface).  Then I lightly applied the alcohol ink to the background around the flowers.  I let my finger trace ripples across the yupo with the felt pad to get a textured look.  I feel like the imperfect nature of the alcohol inks is perfect for a background allowing the Mondo Hydrangea to really shine!  After the inks totally dried I trimmed the yupo paper down to 4″ by 5.25″ and adhered it to a white card base.  Finally I die-cut the Many Thanks die two times from white cardstock and once from gold cardstock.  I adhered them together with multi-medium matte to create a thick embellishment-like sentiment and adhered it to the card.  And that’s it!

PSST!  Don’t forget to shop Ellen Hutson’s Anniversary Sale!  20% off almost every item in the shop!  Head here to shop early for the best selection!!

To celebrate, Ellen Hutson is giving away two $100 gift codes to use at their shop to two lucky, randomly selected winners! To enter, leave comments at each hop stop on each hop day throughout the week!  Ellen Hutson is also giving away two $50 gift codes to use at the shop to two lucky, randomly selected winners. Remember to comment, comment, comment!  Winners will be selected randomly from posts throughout the week and will be announced on the Classroom blog on Monday, November 27th (so enter until 11:59pm PST on Sunday).  I’ve included the hop list for today below.  Happy hopping!

• Jessica Frost-Ballas —> You are here!
• Heather Campbell
• Emily Leiphart
• Sharon Harnist
• Francine Vuilleme
• LauraJane Head

If you’ve gotten all the way to the end of my super long post, thanks so much for visiting and enjoy the hop!  If this is your first time at my blog I hope you’ll consider subscribing via the sidebar on the right or visiting me on Youtube or Instagram!  Have a fabulous crafty weekend, friends! 🙂

Interested in the products I used?  To make them easy for you to find, I have listed them below. (Affiliate disclosure can be found here). Your purchases through my links help keep my blog running with no additional cost to you and I thank you so much for the support!!

Essentials by Ellen Clear Stamps,… [ ELH ] Essentials by Ellen Designer Dies,… [ ELH ] Ranger Tim Holtz Alcohol Ink, Flamingo [ ELH ] Ranger Tim Holtz Adirondack Alcohol… [ ELH ] Ranger Tim Holtz Adirondack Alcohol… [ ELH ] Ranger Tim Holtz Adirondack Alcohol… [ ELH ] Ranger Tim Holtz Adirondack Alcohol… [ ELH ] Ranger Metallic Mixative, Gold [ ELH ] Ranger Alcohol Ink Applicator… [ ELH ] Ranger Tim Holtz Alcohol Ink Yupo, White [ ELH ] Pebbles Jen Hadfield Homemade, 12×12… [ ELH ] Neenah Cardstock, Neenah Heavyweight,… [ ELH ] Inkadinkado Embossing Magic Bag [ ELH ] VersaMark Ink Pad [ ELH ] Hero Arts Embossing Powder, Gold [ ELH ] Hero Arts Embossing Gun (Wagner) [ ELH ] ATG Kit, Advanced Tape Glider [ ELH ]