Altenew July Stamps, Dies, Inks, and More Release | Blog Hop + Giveaway ($300 in prizes!)

Hello everyone!  I'm so excited to be guest designing for Altenew's July stamp, die, stencil, ink and more release.  I won Altenew's monthly challenge in March and was asked to participate in the July release.  I would like to thank Altenew for this opportunity!  This is a photo heavy blog post so I hope you will stay to end.   You can find the entire new release right here.   So lets get to some of the details of the blog hop: 

To celebrate this release, Altenew is giving away a $100 gift certificate to 1 lucky winner and a $40 gift certificate to 5 winners! Please leave a comment on the Altenew Card Blog and/or each designer’s blog post on the blog hop list below by 07/12/2023 for a chance to win. Altenew will draw 6 random winners from the comments left on each stop of this blog hop and announce the winners on the Altenew Winners Page on 07/14/2023.

*The winners of the $100 gift certificate will be chosen from comments left on the Altenew blog. 

Affiliate links used within the body of this blog post where possible. Using my links allows me to earn a small commission. Thank you for your support.

You should have arrived from Rachel Alvarado's blog. If you didn't you can head to the Altenew card blog for the entire link list. For my first card I used the following new products: Sketched Florals stamps and dies and the Dotted Waves Debossing cover die.

I have a very small collection of Altenew Crisp Dye inks and all of them got used for many of the projects I'm sharing. Stay tuned, though, as I have projects to share that use the newest additions to Altenew's Fresh Ink line up. The florals in the Sketched Florals set are so whimsical and sweet. I used the following ink groupings for the flowers and leaves/stems: Red Cosmos, Green Meadows, Green Fields, Deep Blue Seas, Golden Sunset, and Red Sunset. The background was created using the Dotted Wave debossing plate. I first die cut my rectangle of white cardstock and then debossed it with the Dotted Wave plate. The panel was adhered to a light gray cardstock base and then I arranged the flowers and leaves. There is a die for the large "thanks" sentiment in the set so I used that sentiment along with a subsentiment for my card. I finished with clear sequins.

For this next card I used the new Shimmery Hummingbird bundle that includes the following: Hot foil plate, stencil and coordinating die.

I foiled the hummingbirds using matte silver foil and then used Sea Breeze ink and an Altenew mini blending brush to ink up the images. I tried to go heavier on the top of the birds and lighter on the bottom. Once I had the ink blending done to my liking I die cut the birds with the coordinating dies. For my background I used the Altenew Magnolia Ballerina 3D embossing folder and then added the same blue ink to the centers of the flowers. The sentiment is from the new Sincere Sentiments stamp set. The sentiment was stamped with watermark ink, covered with silver embossing powder, heat set and then die cut with one of the labels dies that is part of the Fragrant Flowers die set. I adhered the background to my card base and then arranged my hummingbirds and sentiment.

This next card uses the main die from the Fragrant Flowers die set along with the Versatile Greetings 2 die set.

Originally I made a card in a different color combo, but ended up not liking how things turned out. So I went back to the drawing board and created this card. I found a piece of light lilac patterned paper and die cut the Fragrant Flowers from that along with two additional pieces from cardstock. All the layered were adhered together and set aside to dry. I pulled out my Altenew metallic watercolors and watercolored the simple background with the amethyst paint. The sentiment was die cut from the same patterned paper as the floral die cut and the shadow layer from heavy weight vellum. I like how the vellum really blends into the background. I adhered the die cuts to my watercolored background and then added that to a white card base. Simple, but I'm very happy with the end result.

The next set of cards use the newly released Altenew Fresh Inks. They have released inks in the following groupings: Deco Garden, Green Fields and Golden Sunset. They also released a white pigment ink called Cloud White. For my first card (and my favorite of the group), I used inks from the Deco Garden set to do some watercoloring.

To start my card I used the 3D embossing folder from the Watercolor Flowers Craft Your Life kit to emboss the image on watercolor cardstock. I then used the following colors from the Deco Garden ink collection to color the flowers: Mid Yellow, Navy, Pool and Coral Red. I simply smooshed the colors onto a large acrylic block that I have and started painting. I used the Coral Red for the petals on the cluster of three flowers and Mid Yellow for the centers. I decided to use the Pool color for the larger leaves and stems. I then combined the Navy and Coral Red inks to create the purplish color for the rest of the flowers. The smaller leaves were colored by combining the Mid Yellow and Pool colors. After I had finished all the painting I decided to add a little of the Navy to the Pool leaves. I was a little worried as to how it would look, but I really like it! I finished the card with some fine splatters of white gouache and the two sentiments from Watercolor Flowers set that were stamped in the new Fresh Ink Jet Black and then die cut with the coordinating dies.

This card features the Golden Sunset and Field Greens inks. The Field Greens bundle includes Jet Black ink and I used that to stamp the images. I used the older Build a Flower Japanese Mum stamp and die set. I think this is my second time actually using this stamp set! Shame on me for not using it as it is beautiful! I stamped the images and die cut them with the matching dies. I used the new Dotted Wave Debossing background die to deboss a panel of light peach cardstock. I die cut the Fancy Hello from the same peach cardstock three times, layered them and then adhered the word to the panel. I wanted the floral image to take center stage so that is why I went with a tone on tone look for the background and primary sentiment. I arranged the flower and leaves on top and then added the "just saying" sentiment that I stamped using Snapdragon ink, the darkest ink in the Golden Sunset collection. The new Fresh Inks stamp beautifully the first time you stamp!

For my last card I used the new Cloud White pigment ink. I initially tried an embossing folder technique that Jennifer McGuire shared recently, but it really didn't work that well with the Altenew Sylvan Baroque 3D embossing folder. So I tried something else. I used burgundy cardstock to emboss the image and then swiped the pigment ink over the top. I did get some of the ink on the surrounding cardstock so I decided to trim out the embossed image. Altenew sent me a pair of their Fine Blade Scissors and I used those to trim out the image. I used the pigment ink to stamp the sentiment from the Watercolor Flowers stamp set, applied white embossing powder and then heat set it. I die cut it with thee matching die and added the Cloud White pigment ink to the edges. I adhered the sentiment and the floral image with thin foam squares and then added some color change gems to the center of the flowers.

That was a long post, but I hope you have stayed with me! Your next stop on the hop is Seeka and I know that you will be blown away by what she has to share.

Thanks for stopping by and don't forget to comment for a chance to win one of the fabulous prizes!