More from Create a Scene Cottage

More from the Create a scene cottage set of stamps. This time we've used a selection of stamps to create a scene - start with the greenhouse in the middle. Then stamp the flower pots in the foreground. then the wheelbarrow on the left and fill in with the flowers. I've coloured with the promarkers. I only have a couple of greens, so use a yellow to add highlights to your green areas. A good colour for your green house is a pale blue - like pastel blue - just a few dashes here and there in the panes of glass is enough to give it some life and depth. More from this set of stamps later this week! Happy crafting

Jane

A new name.. how exciting!

Well finally it's done. It's been talked about long enough and I've finally got into action and changed the company name! Jane Aldridge Handmade Cards originated when I started doing wedding stationery and handmade cards. Over the years my business has changed to card crafting supplies and now diversifying out further to include other crafts such as scrapbooking, jewellery and I'm sure more new trends will come along that I'll want to include too!... so the old name just didn't seem right any more... so from here onwards we are known as...

Aldridge Crafts

We've a new web URL of www.aldridgecrafts.co.uk and a new email aldridgecrafts@googlemail.com, but don't worry - we see no need to get rid of our old links that many of you have bookmarked - so there's no hurry to change your links. Our old email address will remain active too.

And best of all - we are celebrating with a sale - 10% off everything for the Bank Holiday weekend! With some new stock to tempt you to! Wild Rose Studio stamps, CDs and papers, Marianne Design creatables gorgeous die cutting stencils and new embossing folders from Crafts Too!
enjoy your weekend!
Jane

Distressed Cottage

Here is the second Cottage card as promised.

This time I've kept it ever so simple. Stamp your cottage with Distress Ink Black Soot. Then take a waterbrush or a paintbrush and a little water and drag your colour. Try to make it quite rough on the roof in the line of the angle of the roof as it adds to the effect of the thatch. Then just look at where you have shadows to make those areas a little darker but basically if you just drag a little colour here and there, you'll still have a fab result - you don't need to be an artist! Try to keep your touch quite light - you'll have a much better finished picture if you have light areas and dark areas. Try this technique with all different colours of distress ink - brown works really well - but any colour will look effective and sometimes it can make for a different style card if you use something unusual like red or purple. Whatever colour you choose - you can keep your background simple so that it accents the simplicity of the stamped design - so either stick with a neutral colour like black, perhaps a gold or silver depending on your colour scheme or if you've used a colour ink, match it in. Don't forget if you haven't got a coloured cardstock to match your ink colour - just cut your mount to the correct size and then use your ink pad either with cut & dry foam or just directly with your inkpad to paper for darker colours. You only need to ink around the outside as you'll be covering up the middle!
Here are a few handy links if you want to get started with getting some of these supplies...
Click here for Distress Inks
Click here for Create-a-scene stamps
Click here for Cut & Dry Foam
Click here for Waterbrushes
Happy Crafting!
Jane

Country Cottage

I've been playing with my Create-a-scene Cottage Stamps. This lovely cottage is such a lovely stamp. For this card I stamped my cottage in Memento Tuxedo Black, then coloured it using my Promarkers. It's quite a large stamp so it's best made into an A5 card. I mounted the cottage onto a card that is shimmery gold/brown and cut it slightly longer than my cottage so I could tie a piece of cream ribbon around the end piece. It needed something behind it so I cut a piece of black card, ran it through the cuttlebug with an embossing folder and highlighted the design with a Brilliance Galaxy Gold ink pad. A final touch of a few peel-off dots just for a little detail was all it then needed! I'll post another one later this week - same stamp - but a different style of card.
Off to Wymondham tomorrow for a craft fair... it was nice to have an excuse to make up some cards today!
happy crafting
Jane

it's been a while....

I know.. I've been a bad blogger.... I've been laid low with a nasty bug and just haven't had time to blog... so I'm going to try and catch up! Had a fab day with the Attleborough crafting group yesterday doing projects with them - and I got to craft on their fab projects too!.. A lovely group of ladies and we had quite a giggle!

Today's card has been made using the Woodware Wine Buff set. This is a nice set to create a card for men - so would be ideal for Father's day cards. However, after making a few masculine cards with these stamps - I thought I would do one with a more feminine feel as I'm sure there are one or two ladies out their who appreciate a good bottle of wine!! :-) So for this one I stamped and coloured the image in with Promarkers and then used my nestabilities to create this lovely frame. I thought a lilac theme would be nice - so I embossed my panel with the paisley embossing folder and then added a little inky highlight to the raised sections. Finally a piece of gingham ribbon just added the finishing touch!

Did you know you can buy 2m of ribbon for just 50p from the website? We've lots already listed on there - but have some new colours in stock that we'll be putting up soon too! Ideal for that little extra something on your card!

It's a busy week this week - Diss club on Monday then Harleston club on Wednesday... better get making some ATCs to swap!

happy crafting

Jane

Bank Holiday Sale - Joanna Sheen Stamps

Just a quick one to let you know we are having a Bank Holiday Sale. Get your Messy Rabbit and Lofty the Giraffe stamps at just £4.50 each this weekend. Savings on other Joanna Sheen stamps too.
Happy Crafting
Jane