Paper Seedlings: STAINED GLASS BIRTHDAY

Have you ever, by any chance, colored on vellum? The colors almost tremble, especially when you do the coloring on the front of the vellum as opposed to the reverse side. When coloring on the back side, the colors are often somewhat subdued because they are being viewed through the vellum.

My workspace in my Creation Station, as I've mentioned many times in the past, is a jumbled mess. Sometimes it's sort of fun sifting through the piles of detritus that have been put aside for future projects.

Recently I was doing just that and discovered a small stack of these vellum stained glass designs that have been retired from Stampin' Up! for awhile.

Being at loose ends at the time for a change, I decided to sit down and grab my Stampin' Blends to do some stained glass, well, faux stained glass. Ever so much fun!

To create the piece below, I used the following Stampin' Blends: Light Shaded Spruce, Dark Flirty Flamingo, Dark Mango Melody, Dark Call Me Clover, Dark Soft Seafoam, Dark Calypso Coral, Dark Lovely Lipstick, Dark Real Red and Light Magenta Madness. I realize that a handful of these colors are retired. But I don't really care. I will continue to use them until they are pried from my stiff dead hands,.

In order to make the stained glass portion as luminous as possible, I mounted it onto a square of white cardstock. I was very pleased with the bright look.

The cardstocks I used were black, white and Magenta Madness.

Usually I am not completely enamored with the brightess of the Magenta Madness, finding it an in-your-face color. But paired with the colors I used for the stained glass, then repeating it again with the mat and the words, I loved the balance it brought to the composition.

How about you? What have your experiences been with coloring on vellum? Have you used any other coloring medium besides the Stampin' Blends?

Another difficulty with vellum never fails to arise in any project. That of adhesive. Yuk. Have you found anything that works really well without needing to disguise the adhesive in some way? I am sure other readers would love to hear your words of wisdom on this topic.

In the past, I've used adhesives of all sorts specifically designed for use with vellum. None of which were satisfactory to me.

Please share your tricks!