 Mary at Espresso Press Design. Thank you for stopping by. I hope you're having a great day and getting ready for Christmas. I'm a little behind but I'll get there I'm sure. So today we're going to do abstract letter journal cards using paint and tape and magazines and I'll get to that in a second. But first, hi and thank you for your kind comments, reviews and purchases to Robin, Jennifer, Veronica, Kelly, Catherine and Linda and Beth thinking of you. I hope your daughter is found a place and I hope you are feeling less tired, although I understand the feeling. So a quick little overview here and I'll show you some Christmas cards I've been making. No new products this week but I think by the end of the week I might have it create with me. So if you've seen them before you know that they're free for watching the video and then it will be on my Etsy shop with a video tutorial. So I tried the dryer sheet glitter technique. I thought about repurposing some very old Christmas cards I have and it didn't work. I got glitter everywhere and I actually had to seal the glitter in the dryer sheet so I was really excited about trying that but I don't know how they got the glitter to stick to the dryer sheet. I don't know how they did it but I had glitter everywhere and I can't stand that so I sealed the glitter. I'm not sure if you're going to see any glitter on there or not but that's the dryer sheet glitter technique did not work for me. I've been doing some Christmas cards and my biggest problem is my limited number of stamps and time. I am not doing a homemade Christmas card for everyone on my list this year. Last year it just drove me crazy. So I found some tags and some ribbon and I'm still on this same paper pack which I can't believe it's been three years and I'm still not through it. So they're just for the most part they're going to be simple and I'll do a few ornate ones for the ants and the older people on my list and that'll be the end of it and the rest will just be store-bought cards. So this technique I've been playing around with this washi and I can't wait to show you what I found by accident. So I made these abstract journal cards and then I made a vintagey one with an index card for people who insist on vintage. Just try to find classical letter styles, font style fonts, classical fonts and you'll probably be able to pull it off. But for these two I didn't care. I wanted color. I didn't want whole words in some instances. I just used peeled off a letter and then wait until I show you this. I by accident got the text only to pull off onto tape and it was an accident and I'll show you how to do that first. And then I use that technique. It doesn't work every single time. You have to get the paper, the right moisture, but I'm just going to show you what I did and then I made these little tiny polaroids and went around the edges with that technique. This was a soup label. As you can see there's magazine texts, more magazine texts. This one it pulled off the paper. This one it just pulled off the text. What does that say? I think it says hooves. This one pulled off the text and I just made these little retro pulled off the text. Little retro, I have this retro paper so I just made these little retro polaroids with some scrap cutoffs. So what you'll need. Today I'm going to kill two birds with one stone. I remind you of some other common items to use for journal cards. So today I pulled out all of my paint chips. Everybody has them probably. They come in all sizes, different shapes. Some have a window. Like can you imagine doing something with that for a specimen? I have another one here somewhere. So that's what we're going to be using for our base or what I'm going to be using like this. I don't know which ones they still make of these but you can color coordinate these to your journals. Put your design on the back which is what we'll be doing and then your color side you can write on as a journal card. So I'm sure everyone has them. People use them for tags already but I have an entire bag of them. Another source is a lot of times in the paint store you'll see these brochures and they're nice and thick and they also have some very nice photos that you can use for journal cards. So far we've went through old photos, typographic stripes I suppose I could use that one. Typographic stripes, unwanted photos and vintage paper, wrapping paper. I'm just choosing out a few here. Wrapping paper, book pages, graphic for neutral journal cards and today is washi tape, abstracts. So that's what you'll need. You'll need your base. You'll need some magazines. You'll need either some white acrylic paint and I'm using matte or some gesso. A plate, a stiff brush. I'm using a toothbrush because we don't want to cover up the letters. We just want it to look scratched like old paint. So that's how I achieve that. And then some tape and some glue. Glue stick. So I'm going to be thumbing through here. If I have time I'll do a vintage one but I think I'm going to just start with the basics. So let me choose. I'm probably going to choose a square one just so it's easier. And I'm just going to be thumbing through here hoping I can find some text with it's not black and white. If not I'm going to be going to another magazine because I don't want black and white only. I want color. If I remember correctly this book didn't have a lot of color texts. Although it had a lot of interesting images like something like that dog. And this is where you can get your ads, your ad letters because we're not necessarily trying to get words. Or for the, I mean this one I had questions. But for the most part you can't read any. That has three. For the most part you really can't read any words. So that was the goal. So just bear with me. Well that would be cool but those are probably too big. Okay I guess I can find some here to get started. I guess get some paint out here. So this was all I did because I'll do the paint and I'll give it a minute to dry while I do the rest. And then I just began scratching over the letters. See that. Pour it out. Set it aside to dry. That might be too thick actually. Some of this paper is thin. Some is thick. More red. I guess I'll give it a try. 23. Then in some instances I instead of going horizontally I went vertically and just took the entire letter. Just went through my magazine until I could get enough colors and styles to cover a card. See this has a lot of cool cool text but mostly in black and white. So I might be going to another magazine just so I can get some color. Yeah I think I will like that pink. As you can tell this I've already been spraying this book big enough. And I'm not looking for tiny texts. The bold and graphic. Let's get some red. These ones I might be going vertical. Get three with that gold. That's cool. That's a variety. Get that. Stores but a lot of graphics. See if we have enough to cover this card. I think we do. So I'm going back to the first one which should be dry. I'm going to flip those over. Oh I should have got that green. I'm going to get that green. Okay and we're just going to do our technique and I'll by the way for the second technique the lifting of text only. I have a 50% alcohol 50% water ratio in here. Okay so we're just going to do what we did before. Lightly spray and do you know that I've had my tape setting sitting here for two years. Never used it. And I went through almost an entire roll of tape which to me seems unbelievable. So again we wet and then it that dried already. That's how fast it dries with the alcohol and I'm not going to get that because it dried too fast. I guess I'll be going with a different letter. If you get it too wet the adhesive dissolves on the tape and if you get it too dry it doesn't work for me and I can't explain it so it's just you're just going to have to play around with it until you learn yourself. It's a feel, a feel kind of thing and I'm also probably going to get my lettering showing through here in some places. I don't mind that because in others it'll be covered and you can go every which way on here. It doesn't have to be straight up and down. You can go vertical, horizontal. I got this. This was inspired by an abstract letter painting. I'm only going to get a part of that but I'm going to keep it anyway and that's sticking anyway because I didn't pull up enough of the paper. Okay let me move on to the next. What did I have here? I'll cheer horizontal with this. I did pick up enough paper. I'm also using a new magazine here. Maybe I'll bring back my better homes. I'm sure oh that's another thing. More of this sewer. Real simple. That magazine does not work for this technique but I'm going to do that over because I can get more of that word. I hope I can get more of that word. Now I did that. Come on. I want to pull up some of the magazine. Not just. I need these to be slightly opaque so I'm going to pull up some of the paper too. Maybe it's my paint. It's not working so well. Apparently I should have used my better homes. I'm getting more of the second technique than the first and I want the first. I want paper. I want more opaque. So this is just this is just a lesson in different magazines. Two different things. Okay let's try this one. Much better. Okay guys this isn't what I want. It's coming out abstract anyway but maybe if I um maybe if I don't spray it. Let's see what happens. It actually worked for me this time. Okay yeah. Getting more of the paper. Good thing I chose a small card. Let's go. That's what I want. That's more what I want. So I guess it's just a matter of different magazines are different where they are as far as paper. Thickness. All of that kind of stuff. So I'm just going to use the tape because I know I want it full covered. This was more the original technique that I saw that I could not get to work for me. So I hope everyone's doing well. I haven't um I've just been working. I haven't had much time this week. Haven't really seen anything that interesting. I did see one thing that was really in. I really wanted to try that dryer sheet. I've made so few cards except for no cards. Much less cards than I usually make. So I've been having to look around for inspiration. So I'm going to trim trim all these edges once I get um once I get through here. There's my pink. This is this is so much fun and I've been finding so much stuff that um there you can see. You can begin to see how I accidentally um came up with technique number two. I've been having so much fun with this. I'm wondering why I ever bought any paper in my life or why I have any a room full of materials because I certainly have enough junk I could use for um material. Okay one more little thing on top there and I think we'll fill up this card and then I'll show you the second one. Now I'm getting more of the technique I don't want than it must be because well I know why it is but I'll get to that in a moment. Let me get this today half here. Let me get some more bread hopefully. Come on I want some paper. Don't want to transparent. Well this one certainly isn't as good as my first two, three, so looks similar enough I guess. And again I went through um letter there for the corner. I went through um went through the Sizzix afterward with these with the A probably not unless I spray you. Maybe it's because I'm not burnishing enough close enough and if you don't pick up a lot of paper there's enough tape on there to keep it sticking. So let me just where are we 36 already are you keeping me? I didn't know we had one sticking on the back. Oh well okay so that's basically what I did it still looks cool and I still see a little of that renaissance coming through from the back of the paint card but that doesn't bother me that just adds. So there's those ones abstracts close enough good enough and the abstracts around the vintage lady so let me try now this one probably won't work okay let me get my good housekeeping back I did this I did this in the country living the better homes the good housekeeping let me try this and I'm going to do this on white so that you can see so hold my beer and watch this okay I sprayed and then I got interrupted where did my cloth go I got interrupted like now and it began to dry so then I had to spray it again and what I think happened is the alcohol dissolved the ink and then I was able to lift the ink only and the paper fibers got weaker let me tell you see this look at that looks like a stamp now I had so much fun going through my um look at my table is covered with washi I had so much fun just going through and doing that is it cool or what now maybe someone has done this I don't know but um I'm counting on you guys to help me uh make them make this technique go viral because it is tons of fun let me see if I can find that M&M again that was awesome let's try that all greens okay I sprayed that's drying this for a time snake I sprayed they're pretty much got completely dry like 90 percent I sprayed again because I was trying the other technique put my tape on don't don't lose me don't lose me put my tape on gave it a little burnish and up came the letters only or the whatever only so there's the socket see that okay let me see what else we can get here probably be putting this really want that M&M's let me see I'm taking a little time because I lived that lived in that country putting in my photo so and I didn't try this with packing tape but I'm sure it might work okay again I sprayed it dried almost completely I sprayed again I'm sure the alcohol is dissolving the ink and to a degree probably weakening the fibers of the paper more that I lifted over three okay everyone 47 minutes I'm about gonna run out of tapes so not tape but time my link card so there you go sorry I didn't do a vintage one but coming through the magazines and all that is taking a lot of time so there you go abstract journal cards using your paint chips is a base and a back and your washi tape abstract letters okay thanks again everyone I'll see you next time bye I hope you had the patience to stay through this and please like share and subscribe I think this technique has been more fun than a barrel of muckies so have a great week I'll see you next time bye