Black Cat Scraps- Coffee Technique

Coffee staining can add a really nice color to white cardstock or black and white pattern paper adn can be done in different shades or applied with a brush to have it in detailed areas.

     If you don't drink coffee or have a coffee maker
If you don't own a coffee maker all you need to do is pick up a small bag of coffee beans, without a coffee maker it would be difficult to keep the grounds separated from the fluid. If you are using beans like I recommend all you need to do is crunch them up. Using 5 -10 beans I took scissors and cut them in half and then half again, then I took a spoon and pressed the back side to the pieces making the bean break up some more.  I then placed the chopped up pieces into the smallest sauce pan I had and put in about a quarter to a half cup of water. I boiled this up til the liquid got very dark and was a little thicker than normal brewed coffee. This way the coffee is more concentrated and easier to apply and have a richer color on your paper.

Why I recommend using coffee beans rather than normal brewed coffee:
In order to achieve a richer, ticker color, boiling the liquid down to a thicker consistency with the coffee beans still in the water will be more concentrated. The coffee beans will continue to add to the staining ability.

If trying brewed coffee from grounds and a filter, you may need to used a lot more coffee liquid into a sauce pan and boil longer to get the similar consistency and strength and using the chopped up beans.
Depending on how long you brew your coffee and how long you boil it and how concentrated it is will give you different shades

With this technique can be used on white laced ribbon, paper, cloth, and in some cases of stamping.

Be careful with your projects, Coffee can make the paper you are staining very brittle. It also adds an smell and a glossy sheen.

Black Cat Scraps-Happy Sweet Birthday

  To have this card make some sense you may want to watch the Coffee Technique video to see how I got to the point where this video starts.         

     This card was not originally intended for it's purpose until in the middle of making it I had visited my in-laws and had found out that my sister in-law was turning 16 on her up coming birthday. Once this card had a recipient in mind it made it much easier to finish it. It was a Happy Birthday to start off with so there wasn't much changing just adding.

           I used my favorite letter pack, K&I Memories Juicy Summer Letters. They have a very nice font, very different from what I normally find in letter stickers. Although, the letter stickers I used were in a variety of colors but not in the color range I needed, brown, tans. Good thing I had a few options, cover them in the right color paper, trace them onto paper I wanted and cut the letters out or color them with paint or ink. It was quite easy to go about using an ink pad because when the stickers are on cardstock they, of course, are raised up a bit and for me, made it easier to not waste ink that I would never use being on scrap paper. I was able to brush the StazOn Timber Brown over the letters and get little on the scratch cardstock. Since StazOn dries relatively quick I was able to pick up the letters, place them on the cardstock where I wanted and then go over the letters with a Versa Mark Pen so I could enhance my letters with clear embossing powder with GLITTER! It looks very sharp and bold.

Supplies used:

-Consumables-
Cardstock- Cream,white and craft (Recollections), Tan  (DCWV Neutrals-white core textured)
Stain Black Tea/Coffee
Ribbed cardboard
Letter stickers (K&I Memories-Juicy Summer)
Ribbon- Lace 5/8" (C&G), Brown 3/4" (Michales Stores), Cream 1/4" (Offray), Brown 1/8" (Offray)
Pattern Paper- white with black floral print (Me & My Big Ideas, Specialty Black and White Butterfly), Plaid inside card (DCWV 8x8 Sweet Stack)


-Part consumables-
Ink- StazOn Timber Brown, Versa Mark watermark, Color Box Chalk Fluid Cat's Eyes- Maroon through rose coral for small butterflies.
Embossing powder - (American Crafts-Clear with glitter)
Glue dots
Craft Glue- (Aleena's tacky glue)
watermark pen (Veras Mark
Glitter glue
Staples


-Tools-
Stamps - butterflies/flora pattern (Stampendous), Happy Birthday (Inkadinkado-Happy Days)
Acrylic blocks
Corner rounder (Fiskars)
Scissors
Paper trimmer (Fiskars)