A Background Story

Welcome to my first ever blog tutorial. It takes a lot of planning, so cherish it - it might be the one and only!

I want to show you step by step how I created the background I used on my son's birthday invitations early last month. He was delighted with them, and many of the parents at school complimented me too. So here it is:

Step 1

I started with some cardstock in this aqua/spearmint green colour. It needs to be cardstock that is not too flimsy (nothing thinner than Bazzill).

Step 2

I stuck some torn pieces of old book to the cardstock using PVA glue. I don't normally like to use PVA because it has so much water in it, and buckling paper is a look I don't always want. For this background it was perfect.

Step 3

I embossed a grungey-looking number 8 with embossing powder that is similar in colour to the cardstock. You could also use clear embossing powder, but I wanted more of a "milky" look and not the gloss of clear EP.

Step 4

Now it starts getting messy (my favourite bit). Slap some white acrylic paint on with a credit card. Don't cover the whole sheet with it - it needs to look streaky.

Step 5

Fill in some of the gaps with aqua acrylic paint. You still want to see some of the plain cardstock underneath.

Step 6

Give the whole thing a wash with 'uszhh'. This is a Michael DeMeng thing - it's a watered down mixture of Golden Acrylics: Quinacridone Nickel Azo Gold and Mars black. It gives everything an old, worn, settled-in, been-here-a-long-time look. Here's a close up:

Step 7

With the edge of the credit card, add some lines with white acrylic paint.

Step 8

Using some watery white acrylic paint and an old toothbrush, spatter some white acrylic onto the page. Step 9

This is the step that hurts - time to cut it up to use. I used some white cardstock as the base of the invitation. I had printed the invitation details onto a transparency, so I cut the background to size and attached the transparency with a couple of grungey-looking staples. Just for fun, and because these are a boy's 8th birthday invitiations, I added a spider brad I bought from Queen and Co years ago.

Voila - my first tutorial. Please leave a comment and let me know what you think. Also promise me that if you make one of these backgrounds you'll show me a photo! I'd love to see that.