Dripped Alcohol Ink Domino Pendants

If you've been following the blog, you know that I snagged an incomplete domino set over Christmas break and I've been putting them to good use. Today's project used a different technique than my last domino pendants (which used stamping). This time I brought out the canned air and dripped my alcohol ink on to create a marbled effect.

Unfortunately this tutorial needs to start with a little cautionary tale. I started these thinking they'd be a quick easy project, but they took longer than I expected, and I ran into some snags along the way. I began the way I do with all of my ink projects, I laid out the craft mat and selected my inks. I dripped the ink onto the dominos and used some canned air to blow the ink around, but I soon realized that the ink was pooling under the domino, and even with the canned air (spraying it all over), the ink was tacky and not drying quickly. So I ended up with lots of smeared ink and a craft mat that looked like a colorful crime scene. Frustrated, I let the dominoes dry overnight and came back to them after I had a mini-aha moment.

To stop the pooling under the dominoes, I tore a piece a paper towel in half and folded it up underneath the domino. Now if the ink drips over the sides, it gets absorbed instead of pooling. This worked pretty well, and I was able to keep layering the ink on the dominoes.

Another problem I had was that my canned air was spraying ink all over the place. That I fixed by using the lid of my alcohol ink tote as a shield. A piece of cardboard would work well too, but I was able to wipe all of the ink off the lid when I was done with a paper towel wetted in rubbing alcohol. I also ran into some problems with the canned air. I was using some cheap stuff from Big Lots and the cans kept getting over-cooled and spurting stuff (propellant I assume) out onto the domino. I mostly solved this problem by switching between two different cans and not pushing all the way down on the trigger to use as little air as possible.

After all of the big issues were solved, then it became fun again, and it was all about layering on the ink to make the best looking domino. When I was done covering one side, I would move on to another domino (you can see one in progress drying in the the photo of the lid shield above).

After the side was dry, I turned it onto the back to cover it. Then once I was fairly satisfied with the top and bottom of the domino, I worked on the sides (they already had a fair bit of ink on them from doing the fronts and backs). They usually just needed a drop or two, but they were a bit of a pain as the domino edges are rounded just a bit, and they were even less steady on the paper towels than on the craft mat. After I was done covering the dominoes, I then went back and added metallic inks to give them more dimension. After blowing them with the canned air, they were often a big blob of silver or gold, so I would have to layer a little color over top (starting to sense a pattern here, just keep layering until you like the way it looks).

After a couple of days and lots of trial and error, I finally really liked the way that they turned out.

So I snuck them into the garage to spray some sealer on them. Then I grabbed my glue-on bails and some cording and turned them into some cool necklaces. These were a bit of a pain, but I really loved the way they looked in the end.