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Pool noodles are for more than just fun in the pool. They’re great for making necklaces with gel prints! The necklace will be glued, sealed with a glossy finish, waterproof, and hardened all thanks to transparent Universal Medium by Powertex. On top of one supply doing all that, it’s also very forgiving. That’s important for an imperfect person like me.

If you’re new to Universal Medium it’s water based and environmentally friendly and sticks to just about anything other than plastic. That’s why my counter is covered in a piece of a plastic drop cloth in the video.

When choosing your paper there are two important things to keep in mind.

  1. While experimenting around, I found that a slightly heavier paper, a light weight cardstock or heavier, works best. Thinner papers can do it, but I don’t have the patience for them.
  2. I’ve found prints with a variety of colors in them, bold or subtle, make the best necklaces. The gel print I’m using in the video was created using a technique from one of the bonus lessons inside the workshop, Gel Printing with PanPastels.

Creating the base

Slice off a piece of pool noodle. Mine are about 1/4″ thick, but no need for precision, this is very forgiving. Make it as thin or wide as you want.

The utility knife I’m using to cut was not meant to be used this way. So why did I use it? It was what I had nearby. So I’m doing it gently.

The blade is made up of sections that are scored so you when the tip is dull, you can break it off and have a fresh, sharp edge. But I needed a long blade to cut smoothly through so I extended the blade fully. This means it’s weaker and prone to snapping if I use too much force. Good thing it’s a pool noodle because very little force is needed to slice through it.

Cut your gel print into skinny triangles. It takes about a fourth of sheet of paper to make one necklace.

To adhere the paper to the pool noodle slice, coat the paper fully in transparent Universal Medium. Then wrap the triangular pieces around the pool noodle until it’s covered.

Universal Medium is a harder that will also seal the paper and give it a glossy finish.

***Universal Medium comes in colors as well as transparent. If you want to see the paper, then be sure to use the translucent Universal Medium. ***

Drying Times

Once the pool noodle is completely covered, set it on a plastic surface to dry. I have a piece of plastic drop cloth from the hardware store protecting my counter so I just set it on there to dry overnight.

BUT I DIDN’T ALWAYS WAIT OVERNIGHT…so this happened to another one I made. The top was dry to the touch so I pulled it off the plastic. But the bottom wasn’t dry yet, so bits of the paper tore. If I’d waited overnight this wouldn’t have happened.

It’s an easy fix! I can just add another layer of triangular papers covered in transparent Universal Medium over it. This is also handy if there are ever any papers you don’t love the positioning of or if some of the pool noodle is still visible. And yes, I’ve done both of those.

Curing vs. Drying

As the Universal Medium dries, you can pick it up or add more layers to it. But it will take a couple of weeks for it to fully harden or cure. So for these necklaces, that means they can have the cord on it, worn and enjoyed before they fully harden. After a day, they’ll feel a bit squishy on the inside from the pool noodle but after a few weeks, they will be completely hard.

Here’s the paper that was used to make the OOPS necklace above.

Use any kind of cord, rope, yarn, string, you like to finish off your necklace. Or turn it into whatever else calls to you!

I’m just getting to know Universal Medium and there are so many possibilities. If you’d like to stay in the know when I’ve got a new video out, get signed up for my newsletter. Not only do you get weekly creative encouragement but there’s also a free download in there too!

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How can you create a metallic look on an image transfer? By using mirrored cardstock as the base. The look it creates reminds me of foil wallpaper from years ago.

If you’d like to play around with the collage image I used in the video, you can get it below. Want to see a more in depth video of the InkAid image transfer process? I’ve got a step-by-step, everything you need to know to get started video for you.

Making an InkAid Image Transfer

  1. Printing your image onto the Transfer Film using an inkjet printer with pigment inks. Wondering how know if your printer will work with this? I’ve got a getting started video for you here.
  2. Add a juicy layer of Transferiez solution to the mirror cardstock.
  3. Place the image you printed on the Transfer Film printed side down on the mirror cardstock.
  4. Brayer it down to remove any air bubbles.

Then comes the hard part. Wait 2 MINUTES. Yes, I know, waiting is hard, but when you wait the 2 minutes, it allows the coating on the Transfer Film and the Transferiez solution to do their magic.

The last step is to slowly and gently lift the Transfer Film.

Where to Find Images

Photos you’ve taken are a great place to look for images to transfer. Many museums, like the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. have online collections that are available for you to use.

Another place is Sparks of Art-spiration. Each week, I send a new free Spark for you to download in my newsletter. You can get signed up here and right now you’ll get the the collage of Sparks I used in the video sent to your email.

Ways to Use Them

Use the full image to create a quick and personal card to send to a friend. Oh the possibilities of using these for a wedding announcement or a holiday card!

Another option is to cut them up into various shapes to add a metallic touch to a collage or other mixed media play. In a photo, it’s hard to capture how noticeable the metallic pieces are, but in the video at the start of this post you can see it much better.

Now you know how to turn any image into a reflective one in about 2 minutes!

Here are the supplies used. Some of these links may be affiliate links which means I may get a small percentage and it doesn’t cost you anything extra! And you get a really good feeling knowing that you are helping keep the free tutorials coming!

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There’s a new Powerwax that’s slightly different from the previous Powerwax and I was curious how different it was. That’s what led to making collage papers with stencils and Powerwax. Mixing Powerwax with paint allowed me to do things that I couldn’t do with just paint.

Powerwax is water based. How a wax is water based is hard for me to wrap my brain around, but it does mean that it’s water clean up!

This is a very very forgiving process. There’s no measuring or exact ration needed when mixing Powerwax with acrylic paint. Just some and some. If you mix it together and want more color in it, simply mix in more paint.

To create the collage papers, put a piece of tissue paper on TOP of a stencil. Use some repositionable tape such as painters tape or washi tape, to hold the tissue paper in place. This is the Squares Layer Me stencil from StencilGirlProucts.

Then squeegee on the Powerwax and paint mixture. I used a very fancy tool to do this, an old hotel key card.

Since Powerwax is a wax, once it’s dry you can carve into it, like I did with the letter i below. That collage paper was created with the Feelings and Emotions Alphabet stencil from StencilGirl Products.

Could I just do this with paint? Nope. Paint only is very juicy and if only using paint, you have to scrape away or remove any areas while it’s wet. That means the tissue paper is fragile and will tear very easily. With Powerwax, there’s no time pressure. After it’s dry, anytime in the future it can be carved into. So a month or a year from now, I can scratch any pattern, line, or mark into the collage papers. Oh the freedom!

Another thing I noticed is that I can do very small details or have sharper lines when carving into the Powerwax and paint compared to just doing it in wet paint only.

But there’s more you can do with Powerwax.

Powerwax can be used to highlight texture or fill in cracks. I grabbed a piece of colorful cardboard and played around as I used up the leftover red Powerwax. Leave a thick layer on and it’s very opaque (the top red line), wipe most of it off and you get a translucent look (bottom left).

To make it even easier to tear in a specific shape, like the circles here, I brushed water in a circle on the BACK of the tissue paper. Why the back? Since the front has a thin layer of wax on it, it repels the water somewhat. But the back of the tissue paper will quickly absorb the water to create an easy way to tear little circles.

Along with using little pieces of the collage papers, bit pieces work too! The black Speckles and Spots were glued down as an early layer on this play.

The differences I noticed between the old Powerwax and the new Powerwax:

  • The old version was juicier, wetter and the new is a bit firmer. They look different in the jar but when mixed with paint, they are both creamy. A perk of the firmer new formula is that it will be less likely to run under stencils the way it did for me when I did the words on the page below.
  • The new formula takes a bit longer to dry. How fast it dries depends on how thick of a layer you’ve put on there, how humid or arid your climate is, etc. This does mean ample open work time, which has its benefits.
  • The old formula had a bit of a glossy finish to it. The new is much more matte and I didn’t realize how much I liked that until I tried it.
  • There is more of a smell to the new formula. I only notice it when I take the lid off the jar, and there is no smell on the Powerwax once it’s dry.

Below is the video where I explored what the old Powerwax could do in an art journal. What I did with the old Powerwax, I can do with the new Powerwax (and in some ways, the new is better!)

I’ll be playing more with Powerwax in the future and if you want to be in the know, then get signed up for my weekly newsletter.

Here are the supplies used. Some of these links may be affiliate links which means I may get a small percentage and it doesn’t cost you anything extra! And you get a really good feeling knowing that you are helping keep the free tutorials coming!

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