LTC Shrinky Dinks

I am participating in aMAZEing adventure frog's "Inspired by Shrinky Dinks" LTC swap.  My original idea was to make a cool sky and grass on my Gelli Plate, carve up a butterfly/ladybug/dragonfly/etc, shrink it and attach it to the outdoor scene.  I even made the sky & grass and changed my mind.

In 2014 I was in a Christmas postcard swap and I loved it.  But I was busy in 2015, didn't do it and kicked myself for it.  So I thought I would carve up this 4x6 postage stamp and I could use it later as my Christmas postcard.

I worked on the stamp on and off for 3 months.  I got a mini #1 gauge from Kerbert to use mainly on this stamp.  I let my daughter borrow it and she bent it.  I sent it back and had it remade/sharpened so I could continue to work on the stamp.  

But I had issues baking the large Shrinky Dink.  I started off in the toaster oven and they were coming out misshapen and not flat.  I decided to move to the regular oven and that helped.

I really wanted to do them on the white shrink material but had a headache with that too.  It takes a while for the Stazon to dry on the all shiny white.  Then once it is dry if you rub your marker against the Stazon it bleeds and can rub away completely.  The original kind is like a coloring book; you can color on your stamp lines with almost no problems.  Shockingly, my noxer husband volunteered to help color them.   I attached the Shrinky Dink to white cardstock with tape runner.

Greeting from Indiana LTC

Every oven is different but I ended up baking mine at 325 degrees, on parchment paper with a piece of cardstock on top.  Sometimes they wanted to stick to the cardstock but they turned out pretty good.

Things to think about when making Shrinky Dinks.
1.  Size-Smaller is easier when baking.  Also, do you really want to color 20 4x6 cards exactly the same?
2.   Material-You can color more colors on the original than the white.  I recommend using the white for things like snowflakes, candy canes, photos, etc.  When you just want the color of the ink and white.  

Thanksgiving LTC

Thanksgiving: Thank Full

This is my card for the "Thanksgiving" LTC tracker.  I love the simple Life is Good images so I looked for a Thanksgiving theme one.  I liked this one but thought that I would have to make it really big to get the detail and text to look nice.  Then I decided to make the stamp into a shrinky dink.  I probably should have made it bigger but I was worried about using too much carving material.

Shrinky Dinks

The start of this card is a lot like my Gesso one.  I cut my paper to be tag shaped.  Then I tore some old music paper and glued it to the card using Gesso and a knife.  I put the stencil on and put more Gesso on and let it dry.  I hadn't played around with alcohol inks in a while so I wanted to try that again.  I put the ink on the craft mat, sprayed it with a little water, and rubbed my card thru it.

Background before and after the inks

They started off really colorful but I quickly learned that alcohol ink doesn't take well to Gesso.  The color quickly faded.  I still thought they were pretty so I rolled with it.  To jazz it up a bit I sprayed the card with Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist gold spray.

Then came the leaf.  I looked around the craft store for a leaf punch but didn't see one big enough.  I thought about printing one off on card stock to make a template and cutting out my own.  But I ending up ordering some die cut leaves  from Etsy.  They came in 3 shapes and 5 colors.  I took a Distress Stain ink pad and a alcohol ink applicator and rubbed the ink onto the edge of the leaves.

Added ink to the leaves

I glued the whole think together with school glue which was probably a mistake.  Some of the color behind the shrinky dink bled and looked odd.  But it is too late now.  I think they turned out pretty good.