Thursday, November 14, 2013

Smooch?

A number of you asked questions about Smooch. It's an iridescent, opaque ink/paint that you can use like watercolor paint. It comes in a bottle with an applicator that (for me, at least) works primarily for making dots.



To make my wreath cards on yesterday's post, I simply stamped ALL the berries in a light color of Memento Ink, which is waterproof. Then, I used the Smooch applicator to add one color randomly onto roughly a third of the berries. Then, I used a different color of Smooch on another third of the berries. So on each card, there are plain ink berries and two shades of iridescent berries. But there are no more berries than were on the stamp, which never had Smooch on it at all.

I hope that makes sense.

Tips for using Smooch

1. Always use waterproof ink with it. If you add it over, say, StampinUp's classic ink, the ink will run unattractively. Ask me how I know....

2. You can use the applicator in a variety of ways, but I find I don't have enough artistic talent to do anything other than add dots with it. Just be careful with the applicator. Press too hard and you might damage the tip.

3. It makes a GREAT watercolor wash for backgrounds...so sparkly and pretty! Just squeeze a bit onto a palette, use water and a brush to thin it, and apply to paper with the brush.

4. It can be used directly on stamps. I found the easiest way to apply it to the stamp is with a make-up sponge, but if you have ink pad blanks, you could use those for more even coverage. If you lightly spritz the wet stamp with water, you'll get an awesome watercolor effect.

If you've never played with Smooch, get yourself a few bottles and mess around. It really is quite fun!

10 comments:

  1. Thank you for this explanation...if I ever see some when I'm in the metro I guess that will be a fun purchase!

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  2. Thank you for the explanation. The bottles looked a bit like they might contain nail polish. :p Or maybe they don't - been a long time since I paid attention to nail polish.

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  3. Thanks for the tip about using waterproof ink. I've yet to try Smooch, but I've wanted to :)

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  4. i have a clear smooch & i often layer it over something else just to give it a sparkle. a classmate drew her shoes, for a class assignement and i guess the shoes has little hole punches. i lent her my smooch to fill in the holes, just to give the cute shoes a little sparkly punch

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  5. I just love all of your posts. I plan on using many of your ideas for the 2 dozen cards my stepdaughter and I are making for my Grandmother's Nursing Home folks. I have to say this reminds me, I always have trouble knowing which brands and kinds of inks are good for being waterproof or alcoholproof, and inevitably get them mixed up. Any good cheat sheet on that I could post on my desk? I have Distress Ink and PTI inks, and a couple Stampin up inks, oh and then there is Memento ink I just started getting, and I even have this Ranger Archival ink that says its waterproof but I made it run!

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  6. Thanks so much for the great tips for using Smooch. I've got a couple of bottles and need to use it more often.

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  7. So far I know that JoAnn's and Hobby Lobby do not sell Smooch...or at least I couldn't find any on the shelves!

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    1. Our Michael's and Hobby Lobby have small bottle sets hanging near the Stickles. Marco's Paper sells the larger bottles singly in the store in Centerville, OH, but I can't find it on their website.

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    2. You can order it through Amazon in lots of colors and multi-packs.

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  8. Ooooh I never realied you could watercolour with smooch - will look at my sad collection with new vigour :-)

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Thank you so much for taking time to comment!