I will have to try the watermark ink in the future. that sounds interesting.

I was suspicious it was the paper too. I was wondering if it was a different brand of watercolor paper than I used the last time.

I ended up trying to use what I had on hand. I was trying to use cocoa bean brilliance with a darker brown embossing powder on white watercolor paper. I switched to the clear embossing powder that I forgot I had and suddenly it started working. I never would have thought that the weakest link was the powder. So strange. Anyway, these cards are starting to look pretty good considering my dull gouge and embossing difficulties. :)

Now, anyone have any ideas on borders? I want a frame sorta look to go over the picture. Is my only choice to hand cut something or does someone have a better suggestion? I don't have any die cutters, punches or anything.

BTW you guys rock. I never had anyone to chat with about my crazy crafty conundrums. It's nice that I can chat with people who have opinions.

for borders i always use 2 pieces of paper. the background piece (the one you want your border to be) cut to the standard size 2.5 x 3.5. then the front piece with your stamp image will be cut smaller depending on how big you want the border 2 x 3 or whatever. this makes a border without having to actually cut one out with exacto knife. hope this helps!

heres a pic of some of mine i did this with http://www.atlasquest.com/images/gallery/12/91/129131lg.jpg

Those are cool LTCs. I have done them that way before. I was kinda going for an oval picture frame sorta look so I may just cut my stamped image out as an oval. I was just curious if anyone had any method of cutting out openings that I hadn't thought of yet.