How to Make a Tulips and Daffodils Card with Spellbinders BetterPress (Step-by-Step Tutorial)

Hello there, Michelle Short here to share a step-by-step tutorial with you using the new Tulips and Daffodils Press + Foil Plate from Yana’s Tulips Collection. I chose to press the plate, but it works beautifully foiled too! There are lots of ways to colour the image, but for today’s project, I am using the Layered Tulips and Daffodils Stencils to colour the image using ink blending.

PRESSING THE IMAGE

1. Flip Platen of Betterpress Letterpress System over and place Porcelain BetterPress A7 Cotton Card Panel inside the registration marks. Hold in place with Best Ever Craft Tape in the corners.

2. Place Tulips and Daffodils Press + Foil Plate onto Chase (the Chase is magnetic so it will hold in place). Use the registration marks on the Chase to centre it.
3. Tap BetterPress Black Ink onto the plate and swivel the ink pad slightly to get a good coverage of ink.

TIP: Make sure to use a well-inked pad. You will get a better impression that way.

4. Flip Platten over and place onto platform (over the Chase). The magnets in the corners will hold it in place.

5. Run through Platinum Six Die Cutting Machine.

6. Lift Platten from platform to reveal pressed image.
7. Remove cardstock panel from Platen by carefully removing the tape.
8. Remove plate from Chase and clean.

TIP: I used two shims underneath the Chase, but you may need more or less depending on your machine. If you are getting too much ink in places where you do not want it, remove a shim. If you are not getting a solid impression, add a shim.

STENCILLING

1. Place first Layered Tulips and Daffodils stencil (they are numbered) on top of image panel and line up cut out pieces with image.
2. Hold in place with Best Ever Craft Tape.
3. Ink up Blending Brush with light peach ink and blend over exposed areas of the stencil. Start with brush on the stencil material first and then bring the brush onto the cardstock. This gives a soft blend.

4. Apply a slightly darker peach ink to the base of the daffodil centres, blending approximately halfway up.

5. Apply a darker peach ink at the base of the daffodil centres but do not go as far up the flower centre with this ink as the previous ink.

6. Remove stencil, being careful to peel back the tape lightly so not to rip the cardstock.

7. Place stencil 2 down and hold in place with Best Ever Craft Tape.
8. Mask off tulips at the top of the image with memo tape.
9. Apply the light peach and medium peach inks to the daffodil petals.
10. Apply a pink-toned peach to the base of the petals.

11. Remove memo tape covering tulips and place below them to cover up daffodils.
12. Apply light pink ink to the tulips using a new Blending Brush.

13. Apply darker pink ink to the base of the tulip petals.

14. Remove stencil.
15. Place stencil 3 down and hold in place with Best Ever Craft Tape.

16. Repeat the process as above to add ink blending to the remaining daffodil and tulip petals.
17. Remove stencil.

18. Place stencil 4 down and hold in place with Best Ever Craft Tape.
19. Add light green ink to the stems and leaves with a new Blending Brush.

20. Add darker green ink to the base of the stems and leaves.
21. Remove stencil.

22. Place stencil 5 down and hold in place with Best Ever Craft Tape.
23. Add ink blending to the stems and leaves as you did for the previous stencil using both light and dark green inks.

24. Remove stencil.

TIP: You can reuse Best Ever Craft Tape multiple times. If you get ink on it, you can simply wipe it off with a cloth.

CREATING THE CARD

1. Place largest die from Essential Arches Etched Dies over image (cut side down) and hold in place with Best Ever Craft Tape.

2. Run through Platinum Six Die Cutting Machine using the following sandwich (bottom to top):

• A Platform Base
• B Platform Top
• C Cutting Plate
• Cardstock with die on top
• C Cutting Plate

3. Pop image out from die. Set aside.
4. Die cut two more of the same arch die from Classic White ColorWheel Cardstock.

5. Using a scoring board and bone folder, score a line approximately ½” inch from top of arch on one of arched panels, to create a hinge.

6. Add adhesive to the hinge, making sure no adhesive goes under the scoring line.
7. Adhere the other arched panel on top. Pressing down where the adhesive is. This creates an arch-shaped card base.

8. Make sure that your card base stands up nicely.

9. Apply adhesive to the back of the image panel and adhere to the front of the card base.

TIP: The hinge method is an easy way to create shaped cards, however, you can die cut directly on top of a top-folded card base. Make sure to have the edge of the die extend the edge of the card so that it does not cut the fold of the card. This works well too, but it is sometimes difficult to cut all the way through two layers of cardstock depending on the shape of the die.

SENTIMENT

1. Place sentiments from Bouquet of Hugs Sentiments Press + Foil Plate & Die Set onto Chase of BetterPress Letterpress System.
2. Add ink to sentiments using BetterPress Black Ink.

TIP: I wasn’t sure what sentiment I wanted to use, so I pressed two. Keep extra sentiments in a pocket and keep for future projects.

3. Add Cotton Card Panel to the back of the Platen and hold in place with Best Ever Craft Tape.

4. Flip platen over and place onto platform.
5. Run through Platinum Six Die Cutting Machine.
6. Remove Platen from platform.
7. Remove sentiment panel from Platen.

8. Place dies over the sentiments and hold in place with Best Ever Craft Tape.
9. Run through Platinum Six Die Cutting Machine.

TIP: Holding dies down with low-tack tape, like Best Ever Craft Tape, prevents them from moving whilst being run through die cutting machine.

10. Remove sentiment from die.
11. Place foam squares on the back of the sentiment.

12. Remove backings from foam squares.
13. Adhere sentiment to card.

TIP: I like using tweezers to place elements down onto cards. That way I can hover it in place to check I like the placement before pressing it down.

EMBELLISH

1. Pick up Peach Blush Color Essentials Gems using pokey end of Tool ‘n One.
2. Place gems onto card.

I hope you have enjoyed seeing how to add colour to images using stencils. I used multiple shades of inks for my ink blending, but if you wanted to make it simpler, you could use just one shade for the daffodils, one for the tulips, and one for the stems and leaves. Experiment with colours too, the great thing about cardmaking is that you do not have to stick to traditional colours if you do not want to! Thank you so much for stopping by today. I hope you have a wonderful day!

Other Supplies

Scoring board, bone folder, memo tape, Altenew Peachy Glow Fresh Dye Ink, Altenew Golden Honeycomb Fresh Dye Ink, Altenew Amber Blaze Fresh Dye Ink, Altenew Blush Fresh Dye Ink, Altenew Baby Pink Fresh Dye Ink, Altenew Fuchsia Fresh Dye Ink, Altenew Firefly Fresh Dye Ink, Altenew Grass Field Fresh Dye Ink.