Sympathy Lilies Card

 A card I created with new to me goodies for a contest.

We were challenged to make a card

using items from the SaleABration catalog.

Granted, not everything on my card is current

but it is what I have to use .

I stamped one of the sentiment stamps a few times on the background

with versamark ink then heat embossed it with clear embossing powder.

The dark green banner is Always Artichoke card stock that I 

ran through a paper crimper numerous times to help break down

the paper fibers/layers. I then carefully pulled the top away from

the bottom, revealing the fibrous center.

A fun way to make a neat sort of handmade looking paper piece.

I used a blender pen to remove ink from the stamen

then colored it in with a marker before stamping.

 I will be quite honest here and say that I personally am not impressed

with the new distinktive line of photopolymer stamps.

I wonder if the newer foam type ink pads would work better

on them ? I have the old fabric topped style and they would

not ink well at all. All of my pads were reinked in December, 

so I thought maybe they were too wet. The ink pooled on the stamp.

I dug out a couple of older ones that had not been inked and were drier,

still a no go. They left the pattern of the fabric pad on them.

I tied rubbing them across the ink pad to remove the pattern

and all I got was swirly patterned images when stamped.

I also tried Colorbox pigment ink petal points 

as well as coloring directly on the stamp with markers.

Neither gave a good stamped image.

Perhaps it is just me and there is a learning curve,

but I made several attempts with different colors

and the purple ones above are the best result.

I may try Versamark with Stampin' Pastels next.

I brayered the green ink onto the leaves

and that seemed to give better coverage. 

I also don't like the dies I bought to go with this stamp set.

 It may not necessarily be the dies, but the nature of photopolymer

stamps in that they are flexible. They are being "distorted", 

flexing when applying them to the block

 that causes the dies not to line up with the stamped image. 

I've not been able to use the stem dies so far.

The paper snips have been getting a work out !

Thanks for looking, have a great day =) 



EDITED 4/7/2019
I've done some searching on the internet and see that indeed there are issues with getting good, crisp images with this distINKtive style stamp set. I've found a tip to smoosh the ink down into the pad before stamping so it isn't so wet. Good idea - if I had the foam type pads. I guess using a brayer will be my best option to ink up the stamps as that seems to be the only way to get a halfway decent image using my linen topped pads. 

Also came across a tip to align the stamps with the dies on the acrylic block before stamping so they will line up to die cut them out.