ArtUnwound

The latest class I took in the Altenew Educators Certification Program or AECP was Easy Die Cutting techniques, taught by Yana Smakula.

While I have some experience with die cutting, there were some creative ways Yana used her dies in the class that I had never tried before, like using your die to create a stencil and then using that stencil on your work. The card below was created using this technique. I used the Garden Trellis cover die to create the stencil and lightly stenciled with Teal Cave. The “bouquet” was created using the Fresh Flowers die set.

I matted the piece with a very narrow mat of blue and I happened to have the perfect colour of gems to add the final touch. The sentiment is a Spellbinders BetterPress plate called Mother’s and Father’s Day Sentiments.

For my second card, I followed Yana’s suggestions from the first lesson and heat embossed some flowers from the Celebrate Us set in white on vellum and then die cut them. This one has an embossed background using the wicker embossing folder from Altenew. I lightly inked the back side of the flowers to give them a pop of colour.

I mounted the card front on mirror gold cardstock to bring out the gold in the glimmered sentiment (Spellbinders). You have to glue carefully with vellum as it will show through so I put the glue under the embossing lines to make them less visible.

I really liked the lessons, and Yana is easy to understand. Once again, no matter how much you think you know, there is always something new to learn.

Do you have any interesting die cutting techniques you want to share?

Thanks for reading. I’ll see you next time, but I haven’t decided which class to take next so it will be a surprise!