Gift Tags – Hit and Miss
I post my successes but I also don’t mind posting my semi-failures and first try results with techniques. So here it goes.
I’m getting ready for my first ever craft fair so I’m pretty excited and nervous at the same time.
I had an idea to make sets of christmas gift tags to sell. I originally thought i’d just stamp some christmas phrases on each one but I had an inkling to try out for the first time ever (gasp!) embossing powder and my heat gun. The results are mixed and I think I figured out why. So my findings may help someone else out there.
To be honest, unless I’m being to hard on myself…they look better in these photos than in person. I know embossing has been around FOREVER, but I wasn’t sure I ever wanted to deal with the mess. However, after finding some inexpensive embossing powder (yard sales and on sale) and a heat gun (7 bucks at a yard sale!) I figured it was fates hand forcing me to give it a try. I find myself definetly becoming addicted to the results. It’s really pretty when done well.
I think my main issue with the ‘gloppy’ look, is my embossing powder is too thick. It isn’t the fine kind. Also for more intricate stamps, the fine I think works better.
You’ll notice this if you compare the ‘Warm Holiday Wishes’ in the fine white glitter emboss below vs. the first picture where the ‘warm wishes’ is in gold. The white, although sloppy with some stray powder it’s much easier to read than the gold.
In the photo above, you can see the noel is very gloppy. That I’m assuming is because the gold is just so thick it may work on less intricate stamps. Then in the lower left, I tried a deboss effect. I think though I needed to put more coats on to get the deboss effect. I only used 2 coats. Then stamped in blue the word peace.
Also, afraid of burning my work mat, I used my ironing board.
Here is a tip on cutting the strings for gift tags:
Take a piece of chipboard that is maybe 3 or 4 inches tall and start winding what your using for the string, around it like so.
Then hold your threads at the top, take some scissors, and snip through just the bottom threads to cut them in half.
As you can see, I now have even pieces of gold string to use for the gift tags.
I used kraft paper for these below, but the variations of dark brown, is me taking a small dauber and rubbing some Tim Holtz Distress Ink Walnut Stain over the gold emboss, and edges. This made the gold stand out I think and helped the look a bit.
I’m still not sold on these and I don’t want to put anything up for sale that I’m not 100% happy with so I think I’ll put these away and move onto another item planned, then come back with a fresh pair of eyes and see if I think differently about them.
Any suggestions are appreciated.