Gel Plate
Welcome to Highlight Monday. I am so glad that you are spending this time with me in my craft room. I also hope you have had a great weekend. My weekend was very restful. I know we lost an hour with Daylight Saving Time but you would not know it with all the sleep I got. How do you feel about Daylight Saving Times? I seem more confused by what time it is because it gets dark later. I am finding I am staying up long and sleeping in later, which when you think of it is not a bad idea.
I love doing backgrounds for my cards. My most loved technique to do backgrounds is with a Gel Plate. Today is what we are going to do make backgrounds with a Gel Plate. Gel Plate is a gel-like material that you apply ink, paint, stamps, and stencils to make the backgrounds. One of the things I like about the Gel Plate is no two backgrounds come out alike. Gel Plates come in different shapes. The shape I love to use the most is the small circle Gel Plate. Some people make their Gel Plate, I on the other hand brought mine when they were on sale. Here are Gel Plates that I have:
Let’s grab a cup of coffee and let’s make backgrounds using my Gel Plate.
Crafting Steps
The materials you can use with the Gel Press are unlimited. You can use bottle caps, string, bubble wrap. tools that are made for the gel plate, stamps, and stencils just to name a few. Anything can be used as long it does not scratch or puncture the gel plate. The materials we will be using today are:
Stamps
Bubble wrap
Tools made for the gel plate
Bottlecap
Stencils.
Copying Paper
Card Stock
Brayers (small and large)
Inks
Paints
Gel Plates
Scape piece of paper
Water
Rag
Set up the workspace:
- Get all your materials out that you will be using.
- Get the Gel Plate out and next to it have a scrap piece of paper.
- Have a bowl of water and a rag on your workspace.
- Have the brayers next to Gel Plate.
Gel Plate tips:
- When spreading the ink or paint make sure you take a brayer and go with an upward sweep motion.
- Always allow your layers to dry before applying another layer.
- Make sure you use the water to clean up the brayer, stencils, and stamps.
- For an easy clean up put a little Oil Soap in the water.
- Using inks makes a softer background than paints.
- Leaving a little ink or paint on the Gel Plate between backgrounds will give it a little character.
Who is ready to try to make some backgrounds? I know I am!
Background number one:
This background is with inks and stencils. First I applied blue ink on the bottom of the Gel Plate, overlapping blue with purple ink, and then with overlap purple with red ink. Then I applied a stencil onto the inks. While it is still wet lay a piece of copying paper on the Gel Plate and remove the ink off the Gel Plate. This is how it turned out:
The second background is using paints. The heavy body paints work best but you have to have to let the paints dry between layers. I started white paint let it dry before applying yellow paint and put a floral stamp. Then put a piece of card stock to the gel plate to pull off the print. This is how it turned out:
These are some examples but I want you to take these materials and Gel Press and let your imagination and create your backgrounds. Try some new materials, inks, and paints. You will be surprised at the background you will create.
Word of the Day
The word of today is No. My three-year-old granddaughter was asked what part of the N or the O she said the N? In my life I have had a problem saying no. I have put myself into situations that I could have avoided if I just could say No! The reason I can not say no to people have a lot to do with my people-pleasing mindset. The more that I learning about how God feels about people-pleasing makes I can say no when it is right. People-pleasing can be a sin in itself. Can you both be true to yourself and a people pleaser? I am more trying to be true to myself and I am encouraging everyone to be true to themselves. Saying no to things that you feel not right for you is being true to yourself. Let’s all look into a mirror and we are going to practice saying No. How did it feel? Every morning before we start our day the rest of this week we are going to practice saying no in the mirror.
Be safe and find time to craft and create.
passiontobeme
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