I enjoyed my Clean and Simple 3 online card class so much that I am going back and doing the first two C&S classes at my leisure (thanks, JM!). Gradient stamping was a technique shown by Jennifer McGuire in C&S 2. I like the ombre effect as that trend has been seen pretty much everywhere the past couple of years. I decided to put my pinks to work as I set out to create this background for A Blog Named Hero's 'Build a Background' Challenge. I didn't seem to get as much variation in my ink colors as I thought I would and I will say that this card coupled with my swatch book has me thinking that either Stampin' Up! inks are practically identical to one another in some cases OR I am not really cleaning my stamps well enough in between colors. Of course there were some instances on this card where I didn't clean the stamp in between inks intentionally so that my colors could transition gradually but still...am really surprised at how similar some of the inks are to one another. I feel that the photograph makes the card look more red than pink, but my eyes are also getting old so it may look this red in person :-)
Product notes: Also used a retired SU! ink called Regal Rose. Would use Stampin' Up!'s Ultrasmooth White next time since I ended up using the stamped piece as a layered panel--originally I thought I would have a white base which is why I used the Neenah.