Soak up the Sun

Today I am up on the Paper Issues blog with a Working with Water Colors post. 

I used the Sun and Fun free cut file and turned it into a stitching cut file. 

The water colors are the focal point of the sun center and the background, 

as well as a way to add a vintage look to the title word strips.

Here are a few close ups of the layout: If you have never turned cut lines into stitching marks for your needle, check out my cut file stitching tutorial post here to show you more!

The foam adhesive keeps the layers separated and casts slight shadows to create depth above the water color background.  Water colors are also a focal point of the center of the sun cut file. I love how my children's beach sunset photo worked so well with this sunny cut file and water color splash background.

Adding watercolors is easy by using the packaging technique. Here's how it looked under the cut file and photo. It is important to layer the colors and dry the area in between the layers. I use a hair dryer to dry the paper quickly and this minimizes paper warping.

Here's another background showing the packaging watercolor process.  I cut a scrap of plastic packaging and add water color to it. It naturally beads up/pools on the plastic.  Press it onto the paper where you'd like the color layered.

When it is sufficient, I stop and dry the area with a heat device such as a heat gun or hair dryer.

On this example, next I moved onto a golden yellow stripe. You can see slight variations of yellow and gold I layered in varying places before drying it.

I added the light blue-green color after setting the yellow stripe. You can see the small scrap of plastic used for this.

Here's the final tutorial picture of this now dried watercolor packaging technique! Pretty cool look to build a layout design on!

I am excited to see your water color magic! 

 Post your projects on Paper Issues July challenge album 

and have a chance to win gift cards this month.

As always there's a SALE at Paper Issues!  

Grab all of your favorite swag bag kits, 

Christmas in July kit, or collecion favorites for 20% off!

Code to save: Stacie

Cut It Up April: Be You

Hello!  Today I am on the Paper Issues blog  along with some Paper Issues teammates, and we are showing you several ways to use the new free cut file: Be You.  I transformed the ampersand into a stitching cut file and this post is all about walking you through the super simple steps!

I wanted to supersize the Be You ampersand and do some hand stitching--I am pretty happy with the results!  Here's the how to on getting perfect needle circle holes to stitch...

1. Once you have your cut file the size you want on your mat, select the text (A) icon.

2.  Select Times New Roman font.

3.  Set the font size to 36.0

4.  Increase the character spacing to 200% if you want longer length stitches as I used in the ampersand.

5.  Start typing periods in the text box.  (if any of the settings reverted back to default, highlight the periods in the text box at this point and select the above settings).

6.  Move the green circle toggle button in the text box so that it snaps onto the cut file line of the ampersand or cut file you are using.  This will adhere the periods over the cut line.  Continue typing periods until the entire shape is covered with the periods (stitching holes).

 7.  After the shape is covered with stitching holes, click on the mat near the shape to select the shape, this will remove the green text box.
8.  Go to the Silhouette cut settings and select NO CUT.  This will instruct your machine to only cut the stitching holes and not the original cut file outline.
9.  If you'd like the original cut file for the inside of the stitching area, reload your mat and cut the shape again with whatever patterned paper you'd like by cutting with the normal cut settings.
Here's what the perfectly round stitching holes look like:

Here's with the stitching completed with several colors of thread/floss and the Pink Paislee Oh My Heart paper number 8 inside with a bit of mixed media.  Have I mentioned how gorgeous this paper is??!!  I love that it looks like it was painted and there's no mess involved!

Close ups of the final project with added ephemera from Oh My Heart and Fancy Free.  A few puffy stickers and enamel dots for added dimension! The Oh My Heart  6x6 paper pad works so well for layering under the photo.

One last picture to show the popped up parts of the florals, photo, and title.

Thanks so much for taking a look at the process I use to transform a cut file into a stitching file by using the Cameo to punch the holes for me.  

I hope you'll try one of the PI free files this month and tag Paper Issues or me so I can check out your awesome projects!  

If you use this tutorial to help you convert a cut file, let me know!  I can't wait to see what cool ideas you have!

You have until May 2nd to post your Cut It Up entries into the Facebook Friends and Fans April Challenge folder.  Winners of the monthly gift cards will be announced May 3rd.

As always, if you are a fan of the products I've used here, go to Paper Issues online store to save 20% off with code: Stacie