Getting Inky with Clean & Simple Workshop

Here I am at the end of my Altenew Educator Certification journey that began March 2024. I kept seeing so many posts with Altenew Certified Educator by the creator’s names and out of curiosity I had to know more about what this was. I discovered Altenew’s Educator Certification Program (AECP). This seemed like a great opportunity to learn new things, renew old ideas & techniques, and to force me to create, sometimes outside of my comfort zone.

The past year went by so quickly to get to this final project to complete level 3 of the program. And I look forward to seeing where I go from here. The level 3 final project requires you to plan and teach an in-person or a live “virtual” workshop. I somehow managed to find myself trying to figure out how to teach a combination of both types of workshops…go big or go home…right?! Thanks to the help of my husband and our son, I somehow managed to pull it off and make it work for both arenas.

My planning started over a month ago when I was given the go ahead from Erum after I completed all 3 levels of AECP which involves completing 25 Altenew Academy courses and 2 final projects. Twenty (20) of which they are assigned and five (5) that you choose.
Planning started with designing 2 projects that could be completed within a 2-hour time frame. Once I decided on and created my 2 cards, I then had to write up a plan, supply list, and instructions. These needed to be approved by Erum before I could proceed. While waiting for her approval, using Canva I designed an invitation to share in the AECP and Altenew Fan Facebook Groups.

After receiving the go ahead, over the next several weeks I emailed the supply list, instructions, and Zoom link to all of the participants. In the meantime, my husband and our son made sure I had everything set up and working on the technical side. To make it possible to teach both virtual and in-person we had to setup a television and run Zoom on my husband’s laptop for the in-person attendees to be able to see what I was doing while still being able to share my desktop to the online group. 
 
A couple of things I learned:

1.  Make sure the you have a stable surface and a sturdy tripod to hold your cameras.

2.  One thing I did learn on the technical side; if you are using different devices; is to have the front facing camera and your device that shows everyone in the same area. Because of the set up we used my laptop was off to the side of where my front facing camera was and so even though I was looking at the participants when they were speaking it appeared that I was looking off somewhere else.

3.  READ your written plan and instruction while you are teaching the technique or project. Thinking I had it down left me reversing a couple of my steps and while it still worked it could have been confusing for new crafters.

4.  Practice teaching your projects even if that means roping a relative in to learn to make the projects. My husband was a huge help in being my guinea pig student and was also able to help the in-person participants.

Joe (my husband)

5.  Have your supplies organized and close at hand to make the time flow easily without interruptions.

6.  Just enjoy the time and the process.

Card #1

This first card focused on using ink sprays, splatter, ink blending and stencils to create depth and dimension to our background panels. This is the getting inky part of the card. We then embossed a stamped image over top of the background and added a simple sentiment strip across the front for a clean and simple style card.

My card uses the retired Altenew Color Block Triangle Stencil and Paint-A-Flower: Sweet Pea stamp set. There are so many great stencils that could be used for this technique. It just needs to have larger openings in the design.

Card #2

The second card featured ink smooshing and splatters over a heat embossed background image to again create an inky, grungy style background while keeping the layout of the card clean and simple with a simple strip sentiment and some sequins. Again, focusing on getting depth and dimension to the background.

For this card I used Altenew Shine Like a Diamond background stamp and Altenew One-Go Solid Sentiment Press Plate.

Sample Cards

The sample cards were created during a practice run or from "throwaway" panels that were made while trying to come up with my card design for this workshop. I forced myself to turn them into cards even though I may not have liked the panel so that I could share with the participants that not all of your panels turn out as you expect but don't toss them out find a way to bring some life to them.

It was a pleasure to craft with all of my workshop attendees! I thank you each for volunteering your time to attend my workshop and I hope everyone got a little something from it. All of the cards my participants create are just fantastic!! I could not have asked for better.

Workshop Participants

Walter Zemrock

Ishani S
Quillish

Jasmine (in person)

Mackenzie (in person)

Angelique Vuur

Xiomara Rivera

Rebekah Howell

Jerralyn Rose

Kimberly Whitten

Thank you to Altenew for this opportunity to find another avenue to share my creativity. And I hope to continue to move forward with what I have learned in each of the classes as well as what I learned in the process of planning and executing my final project.