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White Card Stock Comparison

May 16, 2011 by 30 Comments

Reported by Taylor Usry

There are so many options out there for white card stock! With the popularity of both clean and simple (CAS) cards, as well as detailed images that can be colored with markers or any other coloring medium, choosing the right white for your project can get tricky. Today I’m going to show you how different techniques work on several popular white card stocks – Neenah Solar White, Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select, Stampin Up!’Stampin’ Ups Whisper White, Bazzill’s Prismatics Textured White, Mohawk‘s Color Copy 98 Bright White, and Georgia Pacific‘s White card stock.

Here is a quick overview of each card stock:

  • Neenah Solar White: 80# weight, acid-free, ultra-smooth finish; widely available in packs of 25, or by the ream, online
  • Papertrey Ink’s Stamper’s Select: 110# weight; only available in packs of 40 sheets through their website
  • Stampin’ Up’s Whisper White: 80# weight; only available in packs of 40 sheets through a demonstrator
  • Bazzill’s Prismatics Textured White: 70# weight, textured on one side and smooth on the other; available online
  • Mohawk’s Color Copy 98 Bright White: 100# weight, acid-free; available by the ream or large pack online
  • Georgia Pacific’s White: 110# weight; available in large packs online and in retail stores such as WalMart, Staples, etc

The Neenah, Mohawk, and Stampin’ Up card stocks have the smoothest, glossy-type finish. Papertrey ink is also incredibly smooth, but it isn’t quite as glossy. Bazzill’s Prismatics has one textured side (in a mottled, orange peel finish) and one flat side (but not smooth and glossy to the touch). Georgia Pacific’s card stock is just flat. In terms of weight, although Stampin’ Up’s card stock is 80#, it feels much flimsier than Neenah’s. And while the Georgia Pacific is purported to be 110#, it feels flimsy as well. I don’t particularly advocate using either the Stampin’ Up or the Georgia Pacific as a card base. All of the others are quite sturdy and thick.  

All of the card stocks work well when used with a paper punch (here, a Martha Stewart one). I did notice that the Georgia Pacific card stock did not punch as cleanly as the others did. Some edges needed filing or smoothing several times, both when using an edge punch and a standard shaped punch.

Next I cut each image out using a different Spellbinder’s Nestabilites die, and left the card stock plain inside each one to do some sponging using Tim Holtz ink.. The smooth finish on the Neenah, Mohawk, and Papertrey Ink card stock provided the best surface for the blended sponging effect. Stampin’ Up’s card stock also has a smooth surface, but I don’t think the ink blended as well. I like the way the sponging turned out on the textured card stock by Bazzill as well, but again it is not a smooth finish. It still blends well, though. The Georgia Pacific does an okay job – but just okay. I found that the ink didn’t want to blend as easily as with the others, so the changes in colors were more noticeable. As you can see, the Neenah card stock took the ink really well; it is the darkest of all. I sponged each piece exactly the same, to demonstrate the variations of the inks once they’d been applied.

On these I partially colored a variety of Stampendous images with Copics. All images were stamped in Memento Tuxedo Black ink and had fifteen minutes of drying time, but were not heat-set. Stampin’ Up’s Whisper White is not at all suitable for coloring with Copics – it doesn’t blend. Georgia Pacific’s card stock is mediocre – it blends alright, but occasionally you can see streaks, and the lines between colors can be harsh. Papertrey Ink, Mohawk (which is not pictured above, but you will see it in a minute – stick with me!) and Neenah’s card stocks have an excellent surface for Copic coloring, and all blend beautifully. The Bazzill Prismatics also colors gorgeously, but I noticed a bit more bleeding (that could be due to not heat-setting my ink, but I didn’t do that on purpose).  In my opinion, the Papertrey Ink is such a heavy weight that is sucks up lots of Copic ink, which then necessitates quicker refills.

Lastly, I stamped some solid images on each card stock (using acrylic stamps from Sweet ‘n Sassy Stamps and Tim Holtz ink), to see what kind of coverage I got. The only one I was underwhelmed with was the Georgia Pacific card stock. Bazzill’s Prismatics stamp better on the smooth side than the textured side; you can see the mottled look the textured side gives. The others all have a smooth finish and take ink very well. Drying time varies a bit with each card stock, but none took longer than five minutes. Again, the Neenah card stock had a darker color than all the other smooth card stocks.

On this sample, I colored that Stampendous image using Copics on the Mohawk card stock. The base and embossed layer are Papertrey Ink. All of the card stocks emboss equally as well. For me, the Papertrey Ink provides the strongest base. It is not flimsy at all, and you can add as many layers or heavy embellishments as you want.

I also ran a few sheets through my printer, to see how well they worked with digital images and papers. I have an HP inkjet printer. The Papertrey Ink card stock was too thick to consistently go through my printer – they had quite an argument. The Neenah, Mohawk, Georgia Pacific, Bazzill Prismatics, and Stampin’ Up all fed through just fine, and worked great for digi images. The smooth-finish card stocks (not the Georgia Pacific or Bazzill Prismatics) worked better for printing digital paper on (*tip: run it through twice, to create your own double-sided patterned paper!).

What card stock is your favorite for coloring on? Do you use it for rubber stamping, printing and coloring digital images, or scrapbooking? I’d love to hear your thoughts and suggestions!

Disclosure

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Vendor Spotlight & Giveaway!: WireLace and Alacarte Clasps (day 2 of 2)

May 10, 2011 by 75 Comments
Reported by Susan Reidy

I’m not usually a jewelry maker, but lookie what I made.

Ohh, ahh. It’s so pretty, sparkly and girly. I love it! And, it was pretty easy to make, even for this novice.

My beautiful results were all thanks to the WaterLily Necklace Kit by Alacarte Clasps. It had all the materials I needed to make the necklace, and super simple, easy-to-follow directions.

One of the stars of this necklace–the ingredient that gives it the airy, ethereal feel — is the WireLace. WireLace is ribbon woven with very fine wires of brass, copper and/or aluminum that is bonded with an enamel coating in a rainbow of colors.

A unique aspect of WireLace is its ability to expand to about three times its width. Here it is straight from the package all shiny and silky.

Now, I grabbed it on either side and pulled gently to make these awesome waves of ribbony goodness.

And if you don’t like how your waves look, you can smooth it back out and try again, and again. It’s also a tube, so you can gently open one end and put things inside, like beads. I had tons of fun stretching it out, making different shapes, and then smoothing it back out. It’s really addictive.

My example here is the 6 mm (about 1/4 inch before expanding), but it’s also available in 1 mm ( about 1/32 inch, which doesn’t expand); 2.5 mm (1/8 inch); 12 mm (1/2 inch); and 20 mm (7/8 inch). WireLace is available in 31 colors.


It’s nickel-free, which is good for people with allergies to nickel, it’s waterproof so you can use it in items that might get wet or need to be hand washed and it’s heat resistant (although some colors will change slightly when heated).

Don’t the delicate, airy appearance fool you. I stretched the you-know-what out of a small piece, as you can see below.

I was still able to smooth it back out into its original shape. It did fray slightly at the end, as you can see above, and some of the fibers started unraveling, but I did handle this piece quite a bit as I was testing it out. When my testing was done, the piece was still usable; I just snipped off the fraying end.

With all WireLace can do, it’s no wonder that it’s famous. It’s been featured twice by the Queen of Craft, Martha Stewart. During her March 2 Crafts Hour, Martha and Kristin St. Clair showed how to make this awesome mesh ombre necklace, putting the tube properties of WireLace to good use.

On Martha’s Eggcellent Easter Special, this Egg Garland with WireLace was featured.

You can buy WireLace by the yard, in 10-yard spools or in complete kits for making lots of awesome jewelry pieces. I decided to start my actual WireLace crafting (I did do lots of playing first) with the WaterLily kit.

Here are all the goodies included in the kit, which retails for $69. It includes Swarovski crystals in teal, green and violet; Italian glass silver seedbeads, wire, turquoise WireLace, crimp beads, end caps and a teardrop shaped clasp. All I had to add was G-5 Hypo Cement, a two-part epoxy and needle nose pliers.

First off, I had to twist the ends of the WireLace into a point, and add some of the Hypo Cement. This makes it into a nice point to make threading the center beads easier. You can see the nice step-by-step directions, with full-color photos. Even if I didn’t fully understand a step, I just had to look at the photo, and it all made sense.

I had some trouble at first getting my beads through, but I just kept twisting the WireLace until the point was thin enough.

This is the first bead to go on, right to the center of the WireLace.


Next, you have to strong the wire through, being careful not to snag the WireLace on the way. This was a little tricky, but I found if I pulled down on the WireLace, there was plenty of room to sneak the wire through.

I added the rest of the beads for the center piece, and strung the wire through twice to make a circle.


I pulled on the wire to pull the beads into a circle and added the crimp beads to keep it in shape. It’s a tight squeeze; needle nose pliers are a must.

Here’s the center piece all finished, looking just like the directions!


Next, it was time to string on the violet crystals, every inch and a half.

After the crystals are all strung, separate the WireLace that is between each group of crystals. This was a fun step.

Then it was time to string the seedbeads. I’m not sure why I don’t have a photo of this step; maybe it’s because I was going cross eyed from stringing a bazillion teeny tiny beads. Ok, I exaggerate, but it was a lot of beads, and was probably the most time consuming part (but it wasn’t difficult). The beaded wire weaves in and out of the WireLace poofs. I love that look.

Once that’s done, I added the crimp beads to the ends and trimmed down the extra wire and WireLace.
I mixed up my two-part epoxy and filled up my end caps before adding them to each end.

I added the clasp and it was all done. Alacarte Clasps has all kinds of kits available for necklaces, bracelets and earrings.

I love how simple it was to follow these directions, and come up with such a professional looking necklace. The materials are a wonderful, top-of-the-line quality.


Since I thoroughly enjoyed my jewelry making experience, I wanted to see what I could on my own. I also wanted to incorporate it into my first love, papercrafting. I decided to make a free form flower. I made two sets of petals, twisting them in the middle, and then securing them with wire. I added some pearls to the middle, again with some wire.

Here are the leaves I added after the flower was assembled. I decided to wire a pin to the back.

Here it is all finished. I just shaped my flower from the WireLace, but you could also put a wire inside the WireLace, and shape it that way.

I took another piece of WireLace, stretched it out, and added some pearls to the inside, working them down the length with my fingers.

I thought it made a nice border for my Mother’s Day card, which also includes my flower pin. It’s a card and gift in one!

I enjoyed the WireLace shaping so much, I wanted to try making a butterfly. I made one poof, twisted it in the middle, and made another poof.

I made two of these.

And wired them to my butterfly’s body, which I also made from wire. I’m thinking this little guy will be perfect for some home decor, or a scrapbook page. I keep thinking of more custom embellishments I could make for all my papercrafting.

I really enjoyed working with this product. It’s unlike anything I’ve have ever used before. I can’t wait to make some more jewelry, and incorporate it into some scrapbooking.

Pros:
  • Unique product that can be stretched to three times its width, and then smoothed back into its original shape.
  • Tube-like shape, so can add beads inside the WireLace.
  • Super versatile. Great for jewelry making, papercrafting, polymer clay, even sewing projects.
  • Complete kits are available, with quality components and step-by-step, easy to follow instructions.

Cons

  • On the pricier side at about $5 per yard for the 6 mm size, and $50 and up for complete kits.
  • You’re going to love playing with it so much, you’re going to want lots and lots.

GIVEAWAY! 
Our friends at Wire Lace and Alacarte Clasps have given us a kit to give away. Just leave a comment answering the following question to be entered to win.

Have you tried WireLace? Which of their kits do you like the most?


One comment per person, per day (this is day 2 of 2), please. Winner will be selected on Saturday, May 14, 2011.

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