Bubble Background
 

I tried (unsuccessfully) to do the bubble background technique yesterday - the one where you use dish soap, water, re-inker and a straw. Can someone tell me what I might be doing wrong? How much water, soap and reinker do you use? Do you actually lay the cardstock into the water after you blow bubbles, or do you just hold the cardstock up to touch the tops of the bubbles? I held the cardstock to the tops of the bubbles and it just didn't seem to leave any color on the cardstock. Help!

TIA,
Vanessa

In my previous life I was a preschool teacher. I used to do this with my kids all the time. You need to make sure you use alot of reinker. If you are choosing a color that is too light this may cause a problem too. Since the color is not as dark when the bubbles pop you can use a darker blue to get light blue. Blow the bubbles until they are about to overflow. More bubbles is better. Lay the paper on the bubbles. Hope this helps.

Steffani

I have also tried the bubble technique without getting any color on the cardstock. I was using glossy cardstock just like the instructions I have say. I thought I used plenty of re-inker and plenty of dish soap. I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong either. Does anyone out there have a "recipe" for how much dish soap to how much water? Thanks! :)

Hi there. I'm becoming the bubble background guru for my upline group (even though I have only done it once) so I'll let you know what worked for me.

You're starting out with the right "ingredients": glossy cardstock (regular will absorb too much water and curl up), dish soap and re-inker.

You don't need a lot of soap or reinker (although it will seem like you're using a lot of re-inker.) The tricker is to put the ink in AFTER you have blown some bubbles, so it sort of sits on top of the bubbles. (The color does seem to slide down between the bubbles, some colors more than others.) Blow some bubbles, put some ink on, then blow more bubbles while you hold your card stock slightly above the bowl and move it around, letting the bubbles pop on the card - kind of like a ceiling and the bubble rise up to touch it. (Yes, you will look silly doing this.)

You need to keep adding drops of ink. No matter how much ink is in the bottom of the bowl, that won't color the card stock (even if it looks like the bubbles are tinted with color). The ink has to be on TOP of (or within) the bubbles. Move the card around until you get the amount of color you want.

If you want to add a second color, I would do a second application instead of adding two colors to the bubbles, but I suppose you could try it. Also, if you're doing a lot of these (like for a swap), change out the dish soap after a while. The bubbles seemed to get "tired" and weren't as effective.

Nothing worse than tired bubbles! :lol:

HTH,
Julie

Email if you have any more questions!

Bubble Background
 

This technique sounds interesting. Does anyone have a card in the gallery that has this effect? I would like to see what all the fuss is about :D