Six Warm Hugs

I've been focussing on just one stamp set today - it's one that really stuck out to me as soon as we got them but I've not managed to ink up until last week and today I've inked it up another 5 times so have 6 different looks from it. The stamp is Warm Hugs from Altenew - a simple floral set with an inked background that's lots of fun to play with.

For the first look I replicated the look in the stamping guide, but that uses an outline stamp that is NOT included in the Warm Hugs set (confused? so was I at first but I figured it out now!) The outline is actually in an stamp that was released before Rose Blossom. As I don't have it and its out of stock at the moment, I replicated the outline and dotted colouring with a dark grey (very sharp!) pencil crayon.

Here I stamped the background with Kiddie Pool ink (my new favourite soft blue for backgrounds) and edged the stamp with Teal Cave to get a darker edge to the framed image.  I stamped the leaves and flower stems in shades of green and then used my dark grey pencil to trace the stems and shade the flowers.   The sentiment comes from Warm Hugs and was stamped in Galactic Storm.

If you aren't confident in tracing the fine lines, then my tip is to go with a dark background so the stems stand out.  I went full on black for drama!

I stamped the leaves in two shades of green again (using versafine clair inks this time) and then stamped the sentiments onto green card.  Really quick and easy - this one will be going out to thank the milkman for our extra deliveries tomorrow!

Next I wanted to see if I could stamp it on glitter so it had a happy feeling for a birthday card.  I tried the kiddie pool ink again but it was too soft so overstamped again using a teal cave but it didn't dry on the glitter - however I really like the effect I got when I patted off the ink that didn't dry - happy accidents!

I did learn my lesson though and knew I needed to try another ink for the leaves so I went with versafine clair in two shades of brown and again just used a sharp pencil in brown to draw in the outline.  My sentiments this time came from Mama Elephant's Birthday Messages set and I selected a few that would be the right lenght to form a border all the way around.  Once I spaced them out dry, I lined them up and stamped them in blue to match the background glitter.   It's one of my favourite ways to use a small sentiments - make borders or fill a background with them.

Next I went with a soft backgrond by stamping with a pink oxide ink and using a tissue to dabb off some ink on the edges so it fades out towards the edge of the frame.  I then stamped the leaves and flower bases in one shade of green and used a fine liner to give a bolder outline and some detail to the leaves.  I had some easter papers out from Easter cards so used that to make a patterned matt.  White heat embossed sentiment to match the flowers.

Next up is my favourite - this time, other than the yellow background and sentiment, I didn't do any more stamping.

I simply coloured the "white space" the yellow background left behind with Altenew markers in greens and lilacs.   I stamped with versafine clair in golden meadow and clair inks don't bleed when markers touch them so it's safe to do.  The sentiment comes from Altenew's Hello and Hugs.   More of the easter papers for a matt.

Finally I decided to have a play with embossing the whole image.  Using 3 metallics and then white puff for the cotton blooms which seemed appropriate!

I started with the gold background, added the leaves in copper and silver and then finished with the white puff.   The sentiment is embossed in gold on black card and is again from Altenew's Hello and Hugs

Hopefully you've managed to stick with me to the end of this long post, but I do like to show how some sets are more versatile that they might at first glance appear!

Hope you're all staying safe and enjoying your lockdown long weekend!

See you Sunday for more inspiration.

Tara