Hello!! Wanda here today combining embossing paste and embossing powder to get great texture and dimension. You can get a variety of looks from this depending on what color of paste you use and what kinds or colors of embossing powder you use. It can also be a great way to use up some of that old powder you have sitting around especially if you want to mix it up some by combining colors similar to what I did below.
I started with a piece of watercolor paper just to have a little more weight to the paper but you could use regular cardstock, colored or not. You can leave the paper as is or add color which I did with Distress Inks (spiced marmalade, mustard seed, fired brick).
Next is the paste. I'm using translucent paste through a Dylusions stencil. Place the stencil on your paper and apply the paste with a palette knife (or you could use an old credit card). Pull the stencil straight up, scrape off the excess paste and put it back in the jar. Wipe off your stencil and knife so the paste doesn't dry on it.
Add your embossing powder while the paste is still wet. Here I'm using Distress embossing powder (spiced marmalade, pine needles, and fired brick). Most of the colors of Distress EP have been discontinued, including these, but Suzanne has these 3 colors left (limited supply) if you want to get them while you can find them. I first added some pine needles by pinching some out of the container with my fingers and sprinkling it around on my paste. I tapped the paper moving the powder around and then dumped off the rest flicking the back of the paper. It was at this point that I noticed I hadn't got my Distress Ink completely dry. I wasn't worried about excess powder between the paste dots but if you don't want that, be sure you dry your ink thoroughly and you might want to use an anti-static bag. Next I did the same thing with the fired brick powder adding a bit more than I did of the pine needles. Lastly I poured spiced marmalade over the rest.
You can let this sit until the embossing paste is totally dry and then heat to melt the powder or you can heat it right away and the paste will bubble in some places, which I like and so I did. To me it just adds extra texture.
Next I repeated to add dots to the rest of my paper.
Here are a couple of close-ups of the embossing so you can see how all the dimension and the great texture that you get.
For the leaves on my card, I die cut them from a scrap of natural cardstock (I didn't need to cut the whole die), sprayed on some distress stains that I had placed in mister bottles, dried them, added some stamping (Tiles stamp set) with Archival Ink sepia, and inked the edges a little with Distress Ink.
The quote was stamped onto natural cardstock with Archival Ink jet black, torn out and layered on torn-edge scraps of red and green cardstock. I distressed the edges of the background, layered it to green cardstock and then the red folded card. I added a piece of some gold meshy stuff (I've had it a long time) and the leaves. Finally I decided to splatter some paint. I used Distress Paint tarnished brass and a water brush. I put some paint on my craft sheet, picked it up with the wet water brush and holding the water brush loosely in my hand tapped it against my finger. As the paint is flying off it becomes more watery and you get different shades of dots.
Quietfire stamp set -
Tiles
Watercolor paper
Natural Cardstock
Just to give you one example of another look, here is another start of a project (I'll finish and share it one of these days). I started with a small tag, added Distress Inks (vintage photo, dusty concord, broken china), used translucent paste through a
stencil and then clear embossing powder. It didn't take as long to get the embossing powder on so there was more of the paste that was still wet and I got even more bubbling in some areas. Fun!!!!!!!!!! Some of the areas bubbled enough that the paste turned a little white looking which I liked too.
