IGGPPCamp Craft Challenges 2015 – Paper Marbling

Greetings, lovely Iggle Campers!! Gillyweed here, with six new craft challenges just for IGGPPCamp! Last year, I posted a new craftastic challenge every day, and this year, I’m doing it again! I decided to go with some simpler crafts this time around, with hopes that more lovely folks join us this year!

Today we’re doing some paper marbling with shaving cream!

What you’ll need:

1. Shaving cream
2. Food coloring
3. Paper, cards, or envelopes
4. Paper towels
5. A plastic or metal ruler (Or something with a straight edge to act as a squeegee)
6. Plastic spatula
7. Rectangular baking dish
8. Painters tape or washi tape (optional)

First, if you’re opting for tape, place your tape where you don’t want the marbling. I did this for only a couple of cards before I realized I didn’t mind the mess and liked the whole front of each card to be marbled. If you are taping down, make sure your tape isn’t too sticky and won’t rip the paper you’re placing it on.

Next, fill your baking dish with shaving cream! I must admit this part was fun for me, not sure why. Don’t overfill it though, because after a few dips, you’ll have to change out the shaving cream, and too much will be wasteful.

Now add your desired colors. I tried to do purple and bright green first. Don’t add too much color, 4-5 drops is probably a good amount! Then use your spatula to start the swirly marble designs. Try to keep to “slicing” through the foam, rather than using the flat side of the spatula and “spreading”. And don’t go too crazy on the swirly pattern. The more you mess with it, the trickier it gets and the more the colors blend.

Now take your paper/card/envelope, and firmly press it in to the shaving cream. Run a finger slowly back and forth, top to bottom, across the card to try and get as much of the shaving cream on to the surface as possible, but don’t push too hard.

Now pull it out! You can see in this image above that I didn’t press as firmly across the card as I probably should have.

Use your ruler or straight edge to squeegee off the majority of the shaving cream.

Then use a paper towel to wipe off the rest. And carefully remove that tape! Voila! Complete! Slice through your shaving cream a couple more times to re-marble the surface, and repeat! When the colors start blending too much with the shaving cream, it’s time to start anew. Unless that’s the look you want! Experiment with different colors! It can get addicting!

Here are some of my favorite pieces! (Notice none are purple and green… I guess I just didn’t like that mix! LOL) The bottom right purple card was done once the purple and red started blending too much with the shaving cream. You can see it came out more muddled than the others. The middle right purple card was done by adding more purple to the muddled shaving cream. It looked neat, but didn’t work as long as a fresh batch would – the purple seemed to mix faster in to the already purple shaving cream.

Extra notes:
– Depending on how much you do, you’ll need quite a few paper towels, so maybe head to the store and pick up the cheapest roll.
– Various other sites with this craft suggest a heavier quality paper – reason being thinner papers tend to warp. You can see the warping in my cards above. I don’t mind that though – I can always press them if I really wanted to!

I hope you’ve enjoyed today’s challenge and that you give it a try yourself! If you do, an achievement awaits!! Enter campersgetcrafty2 to get IGGPPCamp Challenge Achievement #2, and please don’t forget to share your pics via twitter and hashtags #IGGPPCamp and #IggleCC!