let's go surfin' now, everybody's learnin' how!

ok, technically, i don't know how to surf. and since i don't even swim terribly well, it's probably not something i'll be trying any time soon; but who can resist a beach boys lyric, eh?! meanwhile, the reason surfing came up at all is that this week's timely, olympic-inspired challenge at shopping our stash is to feature a sport, any sport at all. since i'm not sporty, myself, i knew that my choices were going to be dictated by whatever vintage illustrations i could find to incorporate. luckily i discovered this cool little blurb and pic in an early 1960's children's encyclopedia, and it paired really well with some older tropical themed papers from my stash:

hawaiian surfers and text from an old encyclopedia; patterned papers: a few different older echo park collections; cardstock surfboard diecut: ancient basic grey; kraft cardstock: recollections; embossed panel is a wax resist technique made with a cuttlebug/provocraft embossing folder and turquoise, cerulean and prussian blue colorburst, see below for details; ink: colorbox; adhesives: elmer's brand gluetape, 3m foam tape

since i was getting all tropical and watery, this seemed like a great time to try out a cool emboss/resist technique i saw on instagram. in this method, you use an embossing folder to apply the pattern to your paper, then a special clear wax resist crayon to coat the raised parts of the design, then you add the waterbased color medium of your choice... mine was colorburst, obviously... in shades of turquoise, cerulean and prussian blue. since i didn't have the special resist crayon thingie, i cast about for what i did have that might work. i came up with a white crayola crayon, a white gelato crayon, and in a totally random, "i think i saw this on the carol duval show when i was home sick one day in 1990" flashback moment, a plain white taper candle from ikea. one of these worked BRILLIANTLY, one sorta/kinda worked, and one didn't work at all. want to guess which was which?

it was the candle that worked brilliantly (never bet against carol duval, you guys!!!) the crayola that worked somewhat, and the gelato that did nothing whatsoever in this context. i should probably mention that i used inexpensive cold press watercolor paper on all three versions. 99% of the time when you see me using colorburst, it's on watercolor paper, which i buy at the big box store every time they have a bogo, which is every few months. i like strathmore best, though canson is also fine. you can use regular cardstock, if you are careful, and don't overdo the water. since i'm not naturally gentle, and since i like to have the option to add multiple coats and generally overwork the paper, i just start out with the watercolor paper to save time. btw, i never throw away the "rejects", i save them to use as diecuts, backgrounds, or art journal ingredients. there's really no such thing as a bad colorburst essperiment in my world, just ones i haven't found the right use for... yet! 

there are loads more olympic-gold-medal-level, sport-themed projects over at SOS to inspire you, why not check those out right now, darlings?! ♥