Distressing fun

Crafty Individuals Stamps with  Leaves Mask onto Glossy card

I've been having a play with my Distress Stains.  These are the distress inks in a liquid form.  They come in a handy bottle with a sponge tip to apply direct to cardstock.  These five samples have all been created using combinations of just three colours - Wild Honey, Broken China and Forest Moss.  I've combined them with stamps from Crafty Individuals and Inkadinkado - all stamped with Archival Black ink and highlighted with white gel and black fineliner accents.  I''ve used masks from 'that special touch of' to add extra pattern. 
 

Crafty Individuals Stamp (3 birds # 7463) & Leaves Mask onto matt card

They are all created with the same technique.  You can work onto glossy card (Our A6 packs are now online #4320 25 sheets for £3.00 is ideal).  You can also work onto matt white cardstock - and as you can see from the samples it will give you completely different effects depending upon what you use.

Start by taking a blank piece of cardstock.  Work onto a messy mat or non-stick heat mat (a surface you can wipe clean).  Pick up your distress stain colour of choice and either wipe across the cardstock or dot and dab for more intense colours. 

Inkadinkado Stamps Dogs Life Inchies (#4364) on glossy card

 Add additional colours in the same way, going over the top of some of your previous colour.  Try to work with the lightest colour through to the darkest to minimise contaminating the sponge pad - but don't worry if some colour does transfer - just work it onto some scrap paper and because the colour comes through the sponge pad the original colour will come through.  Two to three colours give an ideal vibrancy without being too much variation in colour.  Place your mask over the top and again dot and dab over with your various colours to get a few elements of the pattern to show.

Crafty Individuals Stamps - butterflies & cottages and circles mask onto matt card

 At this stage - have confidence and don't panic.  You may think it looks like a mess!!  Leave it to dry - you want it to be completely dry before you start stamping.  Select your stamps and arrange at different angles using Archival Black ink.  Add little accents with small stamps, border stamps or lines of words to break up the images.
Finally take your white and black pens and start to add some highlights.  You'll see I've added various white highlights - really handy to lift the design if your background is a little dark and you are losing the definition of the image you have stamped.  If you have a big empty gap in between stamps, then squiggles just done by hand in black or white - or a few parallel lines also works well.  It's one of those techniques designed to just play and experiment and see what appears!

Crafty Individuals Elegant Lady (#3813) with Andy Skinner Word Up (#7880) onto glossy card

Hope you have fun giving it a try - and I'd love to see what you create!
happy crafting
Jane

Shopping Guide - 
the # references refer to the item codes on our website for items in stock at the time of writing!  Just put the number in the search box in the top left corner of our website to find the items! 
Shop here for Distress Stains at just £5.30 each.
Shop here for Masks
Shop here for Crafty Individuals

Valentines.. in a hurry!

Seeing the beautiful creations on other fantastic blogs puts my effort to shame... but my excuse is time!.... I just didn't manage to fit in time to make my hubby's valentine's card this weekend - he usually walks the dog on his own Sunday leaving me home alone to be able to make his card... but as our plans changed I didn't have time on my own to make it!  So... revised plan for a quick and easy card I could make before he gets home of work today (said it was a hurry!).  I decided on a little fold-over card that I'd made before with other motifs.  I had a cuttlebug heart die and cut out two hearts out of a nice red shimmery cardstock I had handy.  I then embossed one with a papermania folder rubbed over the top with Versamark and heat embossed it with gold embossing powder.  I then used my Woodware Easy Stitching stamps to stamp a border with Versafine Satin Red.  Finally a Valentine's Day greeting from Woodware Tiny Phrases stamps was stamped in Black onyx Versafine.  I then mounted the two hearts at the top and Voila!... Valentines in a hurry!!  It goes to prove a carefully planned idea can be executed quickly if needed!

Enjoy your valentine's evening

Jane

A Snow White Card for a Snowy Day

Thanks to Karen for inspiration as seen on her blog...http://kslcreative.blogspot.com/2012/01/welcome.html
After seeing her beautiful all white sample I couldn't wait to give it a try myself.  So I rummaged through my die collection and selected some of my favourite Marianne Designs Dies and got cutting.  I firstly cut out a whole selection of different shapes - swirls, flowers, butterflies etc.  I also cut some borders with Martha Stewart punches too.  Then I cut a rectangular panel to the size to fit my card and ran it through with an embossing folder.  I then played around with the shapes I had cut out until I was happy with the design.   I stuck the large panels down with double sided tape and used my favourite Cosmic Shimmer PVA clear glue to stick down the fiddly pieces - love this glue for fine detail die cuts - always does the job!
My final addition was to add some highlights with Aurora Crystal Cosmic Shimmer glitter added to Quickie glue.  Just loved the finished result.  Go on - give it a try yourself.  It doesn't matter if you don't have the same dies - just have a play around with whatever dies & punches you have and see what you come up with - would love to see what you create so please share back with a comment with a link!
enjoy!
Jane

Cute Oriental Lady

This simple design of card has been made with a woodware peel-off sticker.  Our cute oriental lady has been coloured using Cosmic Shimmer Drawing Inks.  These inks have fabulous vibrant colours that you can apply with the very fine brush fitted in the lid.  She had such vibrant colours I thought she would work best on a simple matching colour background and a little trim of polka dot ribbon.
happy crafting!
Jane

A colourful card today to brighten us up on this damp day!  This card has been created using alcohol inks onto glossy card.  Blotches of bright colours in a random pattern.  I've then stamped using the Andy Skinner Antiques set using black Archival ink.  Highlights next - black patterns using a letraset fine marker and white & silver highlights using gel pens - it just helps to define the image over the darker areas of colour.  Then to finish - a few swirls cut out of black card with a Marianne Designs die and a simple colour mount.  Very effective and vibrant!
enjoy!
Jane

Pretty Blue Flowers

I was so pleased with the photographs I took whilst I was in Cornwall last October and I was determined to use them in my crafting.  This lovely shade of blue (I think it is a Phlox) caught my eye and I put it together with a pretty blue flower paper I had amongst my stash (origins unknown I'm afraid!).  It needed a bit of a highlight so I thought the polka dot would go nicely.  I was really pleased with the result!

happy crafting
Jane

Lovely Butterflies

I've finally had some time to get creative - so there will be a few new cards appearing on the blog.  This one is a simple design using Crafty Individuals Butterfly motifs and background papers.

Such a lovely paper it didn't need a lot of detail.  We've got lots of Crafty Individual papers in stock - click here to have a browse!

happy crafting
Jane