A few folks asked me about the shimmery paper I made for my Rock'n'Roll Valentine LTC, so I did a little tutorial:

http://frykitty.com/2011/02/27/shimmer-paper-tutorial/

fk

Thanks for sharing! We need a little instruction sometimes. I also saw your little valentine book you made. Sweet! (Love all the birds you incorporated!)

bluebirdlover

Thanks for the tutorial. It's wonderful! Can you use felt to make year long reuseable ink pads? If not, what would work better?

Thanks for the lesson; I was wondering how you achieved such a pretty look as well. I loved your Valentine card.

Thanks a million! I will try it!

Corazon

Can you use felt to make year long reuseable ink pads? If not, what would work better?

Alcohol inks evaporate too quickly to make anything reusable. You'd have to re-apply the ink each time. I've never had much luck using them for stamping, either (which really confused me at first--it's ink, surely I can stamp with it?)

Can you use felt to make year long reuseable ink pads? If not, what would work better?

Frykitty is correct that the felt pads wouldn't make a good ink pad but Ranger does make a product that does. It still wouldn't work for alcohol inks, though.

It's called Cut-N-Dry stamp felt pad and it's part of the Inkssentials line. It comes as an 8X10 sheet that you can cut to size. For ink, I would think you would be able to use any ink refill but I only saw it demonstrated with Ranger Distress Ink. The refill bottles were dripped onto the felt pad and voila, a customized ink pad!
And like with so many products that I get excited about, I immediately bought what I needed and after I got it home, it still sits unused! I like to tell myself that I'm just waiting on the perfect project to come along...

Wyvern

And like with so many products that I get excited about, I immediately bought what I needed and after I got it home, it still sits unused! I like to tell myself that I'm just waiting on the perfect project to come along...

You sound like me. Today I discovered I had some Perfect Pens, perfect medium in pen form. I sure don't remember buying these but sure could have used them a while back. ha...have a drawer I stash stuff in and rarely go through it. Need to make me a list, I suppose, of what all is in there....same deal with a scoring board I bought recently, didn't think of it till yesterday and wondered if I had left it at the store, went snooping around my room and found it. ha. Organization is on my list of things to do.....

It's called Cut-N-Dry stamp felt pad and it's part of the Inkssentials line. It comes as an 8X10 sheet that you can cut to size.

Perfect! I'll give it a try. Thanks for letting me know. :D
Tri-Colored Paws

And like with so many products that I get excited about, I immediately bought what I needed and after I got it home, it still sits unused! I like to tell myself that I'm just waiting on the perfect project to come along..

A while ago I made a little valentine book:

http://frykitty.com/2011/02/13/valentine-book/

It got me digging into everything! I pulled out stuff I'd never used, like my Penscore Magic Stamp block. I grabbed old foam stamps I hadn't used in years. So much fun! And it reminded me of all the neat stuff I have to play with.

I love this frykitty! Thank you for sharing!

Camp Fire Lady
who's wheels are turning. Can you smell something burning?

Love the tutorial! The little booklet is awesome! Thanks for sharing and thinking of us. :D

Very cool. I had wondered how those inks worked. Thanks!

If it's the cost of the felt you are concerned about, you don't *have* to buy the ranger felt pads. They are just felt, after all. However, the regular polyester felt won't work. It has to be wool felt, which you can buy in bigger sheets and cut off however much you need. I found mine in a yarn/textile/fabric store.
Also, when you want to do (non-alcoholic) ink in a smudgy way, the felt doesn't work for that. You can either use the Inksentials product and cut off pieces when you need them, or use make up sponges. I like the make up sponges for the way they are wedges - easier to hold onto.

(non-alcoholic) ink in a smudgy way

Why does this sound contradictory?

(non-alcoholic) ink in a smudgy way

Why does this sound contradictory?

I took this to mean Distress techniques, which often involve smudging ink in various ways to create certain effects. :-)

Thanks. ;-) One more thing to learn...

well, frykitty's tutorial uses alcohol inks, from either Ranger or Jacquard. That is one technique, and uses a felt pad.
If you want to smudge on pigment ink, you can use a makeup sponge and sweep it onto the paper in a circular motion. It gives a different effect.
For more info., look for the Tim Holtz tutorials on his blog.