How to Make an Ink-sprayed Birthday Card

In the good old days when there were no computers, most of the day-to-day tasks were accomplished manually. We also used to make Greeting Cards by hand according to the occasion - whether it was Christmas or New Year or somebodies Birthday.

In this instructable, I will demonstrate how we used to make very attractive Birthday Cards with whatever resources available with us.

Step 1: What You Need

• A card of required size. You can recover a good card from packages when you buy new clothing
• Fountain pen inks of different colors. Here I have used Red, Green and Blue colored inks
• An old comb and an old tooth brush
• Some designs to cover the card. You can use leaves, flower petals, coins and many more things to design your card
• A "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" printout using a large sized fonts like Imprint. In earlier days, we used to draw the letters by hand.
• A Cutting Mat
• A Crafting Knife

Step 2: Cut and Remove Letters

• Place the printout with the letters "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" on the cutting mat
• Using the craft knife cut and remove every letter separately from the printout.

You can see the cut letters in the last picture here.

Step 3: Arrange the Design

• Place the card on an old news paper to prevent ink from spoiling the surrounding areas
• Arrange the flower petal, leaves, coins or whatever you wish over the card in any design you like
• Arrange the cutout letters also on the card along with other material
• Open the ink bottles and take small amount of ink in their respective lid

Step 4: Start Spraying

• Dip the old tooth brush lightly in red ink. Do not take more ink as the excess ink will splatter over the card
• Hold the comb close to the card and lightly brush the comb with the inked tooth brush
• You will find the ink sprayed in very small dots over the card. Spray it all over the card lightly

Step 5: Spray With Other Colors

• Now take blue ink and then green ink in the tooth brush and spray over the card using the comb
• Please dip the tooth brush very lightly in the ink.
• See the last picture above. I did a mistake here and dipped the brush deep into the ink which splattered and made a large spot on the card

Step 6: Allow the Card to Dry

• Once you are satisfied with spraying, keep the card without disturbance for the ink to dry
• You can pour the remaining inks in their respective bottles and close the lid.
• Do not keep the card under a fan or in area with air flow. Otherwise the designs placed on the card may be lifted up before drying and spoil the card
• Once the ink dries up, just tilt the card and the letters, coins and designs will slide out from the card

Step 7: Here Is the Finished Birthday Card

• You can see the finished Birthday Card in the picture above. If you wish, you can add the name of person and date also in the greeting card.
• The last picture shows the close up of the card where the ink sprays have formed a mosaic like pattern on the card.

Make your own Greeting Cards by hand and have fun...