Welcome to another blog hop from The Stamp Review Crew. This week we’re featuring the very popular Watercolor Wings stamp set. Along with many other stampers, this set was one of my ‘must have’ sets from the moment I saw it. You’ll find a lot of inspiration on today’s blog hop but I’d be very surprised if there is a similar post to mine out there. That’s right, I’m taking you beyond the usual comfort zone of papercraft so hang on to your hat!
Many crafty types dabble in more than one hobby and I am no exception. Several years ago I took a few months’ course in cake decorating and ever since, I’ve created the odd special occasion cake. This week I’ve been making a wedding cake for my sister-in-law’s sister, or my husband’s brother’s wife’s sister for those who want the detail. I’ll be blogging pics of the cake in a day or two so check back to see or sign up to my blog if you don’t want to miss it. It got me thinking about using stamps for more than their intended purpose.
I had the idea to use Watercolour Wings to stamp on fondant icing. I thought the butterflies would particularly lend themselves to cupcake decorations. So once the cake was done and dusted, I decided to give my idea a go.
After a bit of trial and error with regards to how dry the icing should be, I achieved some pretty butterflies.
Step 1. Roll out your fondant until it is quite thin. Bear in mind that the thinner you go, the more elegant they will look but the more fragile they will be.
Step 2. Let the fondant dry until it is quite firm.
Step 3. Choose your desired food dye colours. You’ll want to dilute the base colour with water as there are three layers to the Watercolour Wings butterflies. Paint your stamp with a paintbrush and diluted food dye and stamp. Next use a little more intense colour for the second layer and then the undiluted colour for the top layer of stamps.
Note: In our house we only use Hopper Natural Colours. There’s no way I let nasty lab chemical colours near the mouths of my babes. This is my passionate (can you tell?) personal preference but you can use any food dye.
Step 4. Let your fondant dry out a little again.
Step 5. Grab your Bold Butterfly framelits and cut out your fondant butterfly with your Big Shot. Yep indeedy, you can use your Big Shot to cut icing! You could protect your icing with wax paper but I just used the framelit by itself and it worked fine.
Step 6. If your fondant is still pliable, you can fold up the wings to the desired shape and leave it to dry thoroughly on some foam (or anything that will keep it in the desired shape whilst it dries out).
Here’s my first attempt. Not bad. Love pink!
I decided I wanted to try mixing up the colours a bit. Fortunately food dye is just like regular ink. You can mix and match and create new colours all you like. I decided to mix some pink and yellow for a peach colour for my next base. Then I added a layer of pink around the edges and finally dark yellow spots and centre on the top.
It went well… until I broke off a wing 😦 Not to worry I thought. Originally my plan was to use buttercream icing and just stick the wings into the soft icing but I changed my mind. Inspired by the butterfly body in the stamp set, I molded my own little body out of some black fondant I used on the wedding cake. I also remembered that I had some black stamen somewhere around so they came in handy for the antennae. Perfect. I love when accidents turn out to be happy accidents.
I love how this little guy turned out even better than the first one.
I hope I’ve inspired the creator in you to have a go at stamping on fondant. You should be able to get fondant in the baking aisle of your local grocery store. If not, a specialised cake decorating supplies store will have it by the truck load.
Now hop along to the amazing Heidi Baks. She has more inspiration for you!
If you need to backtrack, click here to visit the fabulous Nancy Smith, or click here to return to The Stamp Review Crew home for a full list of participants.
EDIT: When photopolymer stamps were first released, Stampin’ Up! stated that they were made from FDA approved, food grade material. I’ve since seen some information that questions this statement so until I can find a definitive answer, it’s probably best to treat your butterfly as purely decoration and remove before eating.
Jess x
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