Cards made with Hot Picks Products {by Katy Norgate}

 Hi everyone, Katy Norgate here with you; so nice to be back again.

This year on the blog, we have free rein to do a deep dive into a PaperArtsy product range of our choosing. For this post I have been exploring PaperArtsy's own Hot Picks designs. 

Today I'm looking forward to sharing with you the cards i've made and my process. Here is a closer look at the finished cards

 

Making cards is my go-to creative activity. Once on the production line I can create a batch of them, using the same style and products, but varying the colours. My last blog post used very neutral colours, so it was lovely to be back using some of Tracy Scott's pastel shades. While I didn't  experiment with colour charts this time, you can see some of the variations made by slight blending of colour on the page. 

I have enjoyed creating layers and dimension. 

The Hot Picks range has so many designs to choose from, it took me some time to decide which sets I was keen to play with, as i loved so many!. I finally opted for these floral designs above HP1505 and HP1602 I like the range of mark making stamps to complement the main featured flowers. 

I worked on PaperArtsy smoothy card stock (SCA4) since it copes so well with all types of wet media, and since I wasn't exactly sure what I might throw at it! I used the PaperArtsy grunge paste (GP190) for added texture. 

I have incorporated elements of these mini stamps MN28 and MN114 from the PaperArtsy collection, for additional mark making and textural elements.

I always prefer to use some stencils when making the background elements. I have used PS456 and PS457 from their release back in March this year, and are available from PaperArtsy Stockists, in addition to these minis from earlier collections PM024 and PM025

Here  are the colours I chose from the Tracy Scott range of Fresco Finish chalk acrylics Sunshine (FF223), Shutters (FF207), Aqua Duck Egg (FF199) and Flamingo (FF226) I used my trusty brayer (PABRAY1) to apply the paint. 

Add to this mix some bits and bobs of old medical gauze and cotton thread, inks and embossing powders, that is about everything I have used

Sticking to 2 of the 4 colours at a time, I brayered paint onto a craft mat then gently applied it to the smoothy cardstock, which I had first cut to size, for the card blanks i was using. Rolling back and forth until I has happy with the coverage. You can see this simple process in the photos below. I repeated this on several pieces until the paint was used up.

Not wanting to waste any leftover paint i applied paint through stencils PS456 and PS45 using a sponge. You can see below how these colours made a lovely orange too.

I had a go at using all 4 colours together with a much larger brayer, with mixed results. What do you think? I might use them to stamp some of the flower heads or butterflies on, rather than as a background.

Here is a selection of backgrounds with different  2 colour combos. I tried the flamingo and shutters together but it was not my favourite so didn't include them.

Next I stamped out the images with versafine ink, again onto smoothy card stock and heat embossed with black or white embossing powder. I also stamped and embossed the butterflies onto Dura-Lar matte film.

I added some embossing to some of the background pieces using the stencils. If you apply the embossing ink, using a sponge, through the stencil it works well.

So now to bring the elements together to finish my cards. Firstly I used some of the mark making stamps in the set PS1602 using archival black ink and analogous distress inks.

I used the same distress inks to colour some of the cut out images, and started to build the elements with the gauze and thread.

I added grunge paste through the smaller stencil PM025 onto some of the backgrounds.

Below I have stamped the floral image directly onto the background, and used the cut out embossed piece to superimpose over it, but slightly off set. 

More mark making with the addition of MN28 and MN114.

Here's another card in progress, using one of the stencilled backgrounds. I've painted the poppy using my watercolour paints. 

More stamped elements using an unmounted stamp from the PaperArtsy ink and dog range  Frames Plate 4 (FR4)

I distressed the edges of this background.

And here is another colour combo, maybe my favourite, Aqua duck egg  and sunshine, along with grunge paste elements and mark making with inks

There are so many possibilities with this collection of stamps. For this one I have stamped and heat embossed the poppy head onto a spare background, cut it out and then superimposed it onto another background with the same un-embossed stamped image.

So here you have several cards made using the same techniques described above, with these very versatile stamp sets, fresco finish paints and some texture elements. So many possibilities, it was a very absorbing and enjoyable crafting session. I hope you will give them a go yourself.

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