April 2021 – Folded with Care

The long-awaited date for my Final AECP Workshop came on March 28, 2021. I invited seven ladies to join me on Zoom to make cards and work with alcohol inks. The wonderful people came with very different places in their crafting background. My two longtime friends, Jo and Lori, got me into scrapbooks 15 years ago but have limited to no experience with cardmaking and didn’t know Altenew at all. Sande and Mandi joined the AECP the same time I did and Sande is now a Certified Educator. Followed just behind her, Bridget was certified as an Educator. Sharon has just finished her Level 1 and Jill is a friend from a different group that was kind enough to join in. I owe a huge THANK YOU to each of them for the time and effort they put in…and for going out of their comfort range.

We used Yupo paper, Acetate, and Holographic paper. Many of them said they had the supplies needed but I sent everyone a small “kit” that included samples of theses three types of substrates and a mini distress mister labeled as alcohol. By doing this they could fill it with 91% alcohol and not get it confused with water. They supplied the remaining items including the alcohol inks, blending solution, and any other regular crafting items they might want to use.

Some of the ladies were very experienced with card making but no one had a great deal of knowledge about alcohol inks so we started from scratch by creating the “papers” we would use in the cards we would make. I LOVE ALCOHOL INKS and still have so much to learn about them, too, but I know for sure, they are addicting!! We chose our colors and created a couple of backgrounds on Yupo paper. I showed how to make an alcohol ink flower (see below) for control of sometimes uncontrollable ink. I also showed how the blending solution reacts with the ink, and how the 91% alcohol reacts differently with the ink. From there, we switched to the holographic paper – so many variations of backgrounds to get depending on the holographic design in the paper. Lastly, we inked up some acetate, making various colored sheets to die cut and create an acetate card, giving a stained glass effect. I use the term “backgrounds” loosely here because some of these turned into backgrounds and some of them we used by die cutting images.

We started simply, with an overall background and adding large word dies.

CARD 1

My example on Yupo Paper

Class Gallery

CARD 2

My example of alcohol ink on holographic paper:

Class Gallery

CARD 3

My example of Alcohol ink on acetate:

Class Gallery

Everyone did a terrific job getting 2-3 cards done and finishing out a bit on their own. I love the diversity of all the cards, colors, styles. So nice to see how everyone put their own spin on the techniques.

Bonus CARDS done with die cutting yupo or holographic papers

This has been a wonderful journey to get to this final Altenew Educators Certification Program Workshop! I have found great new friends in the program, been encouraged by them and by Erum and Virginia along the way. I have realized that I’ve only scratched the surface of what I can do in cardmaking. There is so much more to do and so much more fun to have! And I look forward to sharing my handmade cards with others to pass on the joy!

Thank you all for a great program and a great day!

Hugs, Penny