All the lovely papers on this page were made using Distress Inkpads, Distress Ink refills, Ranger’s Non-Stick Craft Sheet, a spray mister filled with water, and assorted text pages torn from old books. here’s how it works:
Roll the craft sheet out on your work table. Mine is the 18×24 inch one, big enough to do large sheets of paper. Grab a Distress inkpad, and pat it randomly all over the sheet. With all but the palest colors, you’ll see the little squares of colored ink appear on the sheet. Don’t worry, the sheet is made of Teflon, so nothing sticks to it.
Now mist the sheet with water. I use a very find mister for this. A little water will make the ink start to bead a bit. A lot of water will make it runny enough to mix around, and will also make the ink more pastel.
Smoosh the paper onto the wet ink, and press.
Roll the paper off the craft sheet, and set aside to dry.
Here’s the result of using just a single color of ink, and not a lot of water:
Where’s the fun of just using one color, and not splashing around a bit? Let’s try something else…
Start with a clean craft sheet. Pat a color onto it. Then pat another color onto it, overlapping just a bit. It’s OK to leave some parts of the sheet all one color if you want. I usually do this from light color to dark, so I don’t get the surface of the lighter pads gunked up with other colors.
Now drip some ink from a reinker onto the sheet. This stuff is much more intense than the ink applied from the pad. A little goes a long way.
Now mist with water. A little water or a lot—it’s up to you. Remember, more water means fading the color down a bit.
I used more water on this sheet, and got the ink really runny. I could sort of slosh it back and forth on the sheet. A little sloshing makes ripples in the color. A lot blends everything into one color, which might not be such a good thing.
Now smoosh and press the paper onto the sheet.
Roll the paper back off the sheet, and set it aside to dry.
Since there’s plenty of wet ink left on the sheet, why not press a few more papers into it? I keep pressing papers onto wet spots until the craft sheet is almost dry. There’s no sense in wasting all that lovely ink, so have plenty of text paper ready.
Does your paper have too many white spots on it? No problem—just mist it with water while the ink is still wet, and let the ink bleed a bit.
Here’s the result of using two colors of inkpads, plus some drops from the reinkers:
Cleaning between colors is pretty simple—just wipe down with a paper towel, mist with water, and wipe again.
