Cuttlebug and Inking Tutorial Part 1

We are well onto our way to Christmas day and I could not be anymore excited! I just adore this time of year! This year being so exciting for me because my family is complete as this is my baby's first Christmas!

Part of my holiday happiness can be explained by being a part of this wonderful blog and its community of friends! So...

Happy Holidays!

I hope you like this 3 part tutorial!

Leah

We all love our Cricut machine but where would we be without our Cuttlebug? I thought it would be fun to show you some ideas to use with your embossing folders. In these tutorials you will find many different inking ideas to use with the same embossing folder...all to achieve totally different looks! I have mainly used Tim Holtz distress inks as well as metallic Color Box pigment brush pads (aka Cat Eyes).

I also want to add that I used the same hand made paper for each example.

Here is a picture of the Christmas ornament embossing folder which will be the main one used in all my examples. Along with Swiss Dots to show you a bit of Double Embossing.

Now one of the main things I have learned is that you can not Double Emboss with 2 busy folders...at least one needs to be a simple design with generous spacing between images.


This photo shows an example of embossing first with the ornament folder and then with swiss dots. See how the ornament embossing is almost like a background texture where the dots are more in the forefront?
This time I just reversed it. Embossing first with swiss dots and the with the ornament folder. I really like this look as it seems like the image was dusted with snow! Something I like you could do with most of the Christmas folders!



Now lets get to the inking!
This was embossing first with the ornament folder then swiss dots. I inked with Red Brick only (using my Tim Holtz inking tool, the one with foam not felt which is for alcohol inks). I pulled the color swirling off of the page onto the page to the inside of the paper. Then I re-inked and hit just the edges for more definition. This is where I played...I misted this with my mini mister. I thought I would have had water spots but all it did was blend the color, so in person this looks like watercolor! A mistake turning into something with all its own possibilities! Then I took it a little bit further and dusted it with yellow Pearl Ex powders. Unfortunetly you can not see it but the page as the most beautiful shimmer to it, something you can not achieve in any other way but with the Pearl Ex powders.


This was embossing in the opposite manner, swiss dots and then the ornament folder.
I inked outside to the inside of the page with Shabby Shutters (light lime green) and hit the edges with Peeled Paint (dark green). I then used both Gold and Copper Color Box inks to highlight some of the ornaments, I used paint brushes to do this. Dust the paint brush across the ink and then dust onto the paper. This only adds a bit of color so you just reapply until you have achieved the desired color.

I have more to show you so....scroll on down! LOL!