Tie Dye and Macrame

I survived the sixties!  I know, I know...that makes me old!  But I still remember what it was like to be young, and in love, and creating a life of my own.  I was kind of a pseudo-hippie back in the day.  That means I dressed like a hippie, acted a bit like a hippie, but didn't do any really crazy hippy things like drop out, live off the land or burn my bra like real hippies did.  I was much too task focused for that.  But I did enjoy crafting, and back then that included tie-dying everything in site and doing macrame.  While I couldn't find a photo anywhere of the beautiful So Saffron curtains I tie-dyed and made for my bedroom,  I did find a picture of my piece de resistance - a macrame wall hanging I made in the late seventies.  Here it is, adorning the wall of our first home as husband and wife:

To the right of it you can see one of the many plant hangers I also macrame'd.  Weren't we cool?  Notice the cinder blocks and board shelves! And the colourful carpet which goes so well with the upholstery on the sofa and chair.  And the plants!  Oh, my, did we love our plants!  Anyway, that macrame wall hanging was my pride and joy back then.  How times change!  Or do they?

I wanted to show you a card that I created for a nephew of mine for his birthday.  What do you think I did with the background panel?

It so reminds me of the tie-dying I used to do.  It's called the "Frosted Filter Technique"  and I will be showing you how to create it in my next video. (Coming soon!)  The colour palette is from the Pals Paper Arts challenge #144:

Love these warm fall colours!  The stamp set I used here is Serene Silhouettes, one I just purchased, and I love these images.  They are so versatile.  I'm hoping they're not too feminine for a young man who is a talented pianist. 

The "Frosted Filter" technique involves drops of reinkers in a pie plate, spritzed with water and soaked up in a coffee filter, scrunched and dried.  You'll see more detail when I post the video tutorial.  The card base is Early Espresso, and the Window Frame framelits are used to die-cut the More Mustard and Cajun Craze cardstock to back the Very Vanilla image panel.  It is popped up on Dimensionals after adding some metallic brads.  The banner at the bottom is from the Curly Cute set and, although it is hard to see in the photo, it is curved using a bone folder.

I wanted to leave a large part of the background panel open so you could see the designs of the reinkers on the filter.  You can never reproduce exactly the same design every time, which is the same as the results I got when I tie-dyed.  I set up the process, but the dyes worked differently each time.

I hope you have a chance to try out this technique.  A word of warning - use rubber gloves, because otherwise you will have very inky fingers!  Have fun with it.

Stamps:  Serene Silhouettes (w127332; c127324); Curly Cute (w117014; c1210510)
Paper:  Coffee Filter; Early Espresso (119686), More Mustard (100946), Cajun Craze (119684) and Very Vanilla (101650) card stock
Ink: Classic Ink Pad in Early Espresso (126974)
Accessories: Metallic Brads (119741)
Tools: Big Shot (113439); Window Frames framelits (129021), Paper Snips (103579)