Stencils and Gelatos - STAMPlorations Blog Hop Day 2

After yesterday's white-on-white card was done I sighed, oohed and aaahed a little bit, and then immediately needed to shake that CAS off by getting messy. 

So, I had to pull out my gelatos, naturally!

Today marks day 2 of the STAMPlorations stencil hop. All of our design team will be sharing super-fandiddlytastic ways to use those plastic slabs effectively. 

There are TONS of fabulous prizes! Over 10 of them... which gives you some pretty good odds of winning something new for your crafty stash. 

And now, back to my card. As I said, I busted out the gelatos for this little number. Gelatos are a sort of like a watercolor crayon... They are waxy and you can scribble them directly onto the paper. I wrote a full tutorial on some ways to use gelatos >>here<< if you want some more information. 

If you haven't used Gelatos yet I'm going to give you some advice:

1) You will be addicted. You will be in love. You will feel feelings you've never felt before and then spend your entire craft allowance (and then some) to purchase as many of these fabulous waxy sticks as you can. So be prepared.

2) In the words of Nike, Just Do It. Seriously. You won't regret it! Probably. 

I started out by using the ARTplorations Shower of Flutters Stencil. This is actually a mask, not a stencil, which just means that it will leave the negative image instead of the positive image on the card.

I used some washi tape to stick down the mask so it wasn't going anywhere and then I used Old Paper Distress Inks and began sponging. I added a heavier layer of ink in the upper left corner and then gradually reduced the amount as I was going to the right to give it an ombre feel. 

When I was good and finished, I removed the mask and started scribbling on some gelatos to the white butterfly spaces. 

Please pardon my messy mat! Such is the life of a mixed media card maker - those things never come clean! I applied gelatos, but left a tiny bit of white space around the edges. After it was scribbled on, I used a baby wipe to wet down my fingers and gave them a good smudge, which helps to blend the colors and give it a smooth look. 

Then I used the butterfly stamps from the Trendy Butterflies set to stamp over some of the butterflies with white pigment ink. The Trendy Butterflies set is actually made to pair perfectly with this stencil - how neat is that?!?!

For my final step, I outlined some of the butterflies and added trailing white dots in the edges with Claudine Hellmuth's Studio mini applicator in white acrylic. Then I stamped a sentiment from the STAMPlorations Fond Expressions set.

All in all, I'm drooling over this one and I feel more like my normal self! 

I'm going to link it up with the following challenges:

Cupcake Inspirations - Bugs and Butterflies

Friday Mashup - Create a card with butterflies or use inspiration image

As for you crafty peeps - head on over to STAMPlorations! Check out what the rest of the team made! You'll find links to all our projects here.

Thanks for popping by! Follow my blog and leave me a comment and I will do my utmost to come peek in on you, too!