New Toy Tuesday: The Crafter’s Workshop Templates

Christy Ink & Paper, New Toy Tuesday, Reviews 11 Comments

Templates. Some people call them stencils, but I guess that word conjures too many images of 80s kitchens with linoleum floors and colorfully “painted” flower borders. But whatever you call them, I like these things.

They’re 6×6 inches, which is really the perfect size for card-making, since you can position them either way and cover an entire background. As far as uses, you can use them as masks for sprays like Glimmer Mist or the Copic Airbrush System, you can trace the designs, or–of course–you can use them as stencils.

But here’s another really cool use for them:

 

That’s right, you can emboss with these. It took a little trial and error, but I finally figured out the perfect sandwich. From bottom to top: Multipurpose Platform open to Tab 1, Acrylic Cutting Pad, Stencil, the paper you’re embossing, 2 Spellbinders rubber embossing pads, and another Acrylic Cutting pad. (Usually the embossing pads replace the second cutting pad, but since the stencil is so thin, both are needed). It’s also important to note that if you do a lot of embossing you’ll warp the plastic, which makes it not ideal for stenciling. Once or twice through the Big Shot should be no big deal, but if you’re embossing 20 cards you may want to get a separate template to stencil with.

To make everything stay put, I used post-it notes to adhere the paper I was embossing to the stencil.

 

If you want to color your stencil after it’s embossed, don’t remove the post-its. Instead, flip it over on a sheet of scrap paper, and use more post-its to hold everything in place really well.

 

Then color away. I used Distress Inks with little finger dabbers from Tsukineko.

 

I love the finger dabbers for coloring small spaces like this, but the regular blending tool works fine as well.

How pretty is that? Perfect for a happy summer card:

Distress Inks used: Shabby Shutters, Bundled Sage, Tumbled Glass, Seedless Preserves, Victorian Velvet, and Festive Berries