Hot Pinks and Orange #140

I seem to be in a bit of a pink and orange phase at the moment - whenever I dive into my box of Distress Inks, I seem to gravitate towards Spiced Marmalade and Picked Raspberry. 

I created this piece using the Chocolate Baroque Wild Meadow stamp set - a firm favourite of mine.  The greeting is from the Chocolate Baroque Artistic Affirmations set.  I've used a clock mask in teh background and stamped in dark shades of archival and Versafine inks to give that silhouette effect.  A final bit of white and black highlights adds the finishing touches!

happy crafting

Jane

www.aldridgecrafts.co.uk

Green Daisy #108

My final sample from Monday's workshop - this was to demonstrate the Cosmic Shimmer ink Misters.  I started by spraying the background with green and orange shades of mister - being very generous with the covering of ink, and while still when then sprayed over some masks to add extra detail.

Once dry, I then applied the compass mask and added ink through the mask (distres Ink Peeled Paint).  I stamped my Daisy (Jumbo Daisy - Stampendous) onto separate card and coloured using distress inks - scattered straw in the middle, peeled paint and I think peacock feathers on the petals.  I also added some yellow stickles in the centre of the daisy too.

I stamped the floral accent from the Chocolate Baroque flourish butterflies set to add extra flourishes behind where my flower would sit. and also stamped the greeting (Kaisercraft).  As extra detail I drew around a mask in a few places using white gel pen and added a dash border with my fineliner and added some gem accents.

The pictures do not do the colour justice - this is a really vibrant green and the mica shimmer is just fabulous!  It'll be up in the shop if you are local so do come and have a look at this - and the panels from the last couple of days.

Not long to go now til our birthday event on Saturday.... getting excited!!

happy crafting

Jane

www.aldridgecrafts.co.uk
Shop for Cosmic Shimmer Ink Misters
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Zentangled Daisy #104

Today's creation features the fabulous Jumbo Daisy stamp from Stampendous.  It's been on my 'to do' list to zentangle this lovely flower - all those large petals lend themselves to the technique perfectly!

So... I knew I wanted to zentangle the flower - what to put it onto... how about a shot of vibrant purple colour!  I just love the contrast.  I've sprayed using a mix of purple and pink shade misters - Cosmic Shimmer - including the chalk pink and purple to add some muted tones too.

The flower mask is from Crafty Individuals and inked using Archival Purple ink and the ruler design is a that special touch mask.  The words is from a Kaisercraft stamp set stamped with archival Black.

I've also put a few feint dots in the background with a mask too as the background was lacking a little something interesting.

some borders and detail with a black fineliner and I'm all done!

I've got a fun day tomorrow - teaching a lovely group of ladies to use the Cosmic Shimmer misters and stamps to make a decorative panel - I'm expecting about 25 and just little me in 2 hours.... it'll be manic... and fun fun fun!!

Hope you have had time to fit in some crafting time today

happy crafting

Jane

www.aldridgecrafts.co.uk

PS - Don't forget there's only a few days left to enter into our Tattered Lace Die Giveaway - every tattered lace die purchased between now and midnight 11th April will gain  you one entry to win a Tattered Lace die of our choosing!

Shop for the Stampendous daisy stamp
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Shop for masks.

Butterflies and cogs

Today's project has been created over many different stages!   I'll try my best to remember them all!  It started life as a white sheet of card which I stamped the butterfly stamp from Crafty Individuals using Flitterglu and then added flakes.   It then remained in my craft box for ages (when I flitterglu I tend to do a few to make the most of the glue!).  When I rediscovered my butterflies I thought I would play around with contrasting with a dark ink - so out come the favourite Distress Inks and I started to apply colours...  browns, a bit of yellow, a touch of mahogany - all warm tones to compliment the gold.  I then stamped the script and postmark background using a Creative Expressions stamp and Distress Ink.  I then got artists block... just couldn't decide what to do to finish the piece off... so once again it sat in my craft box for a couple of weeks.

I was given a lovely Tim Holtz stamp which I wanted to play with and when rummaging in my backgrounds box, I found this and thought it would be perfect.  A little detail was needed on the right hand side, so I picked out my cogs border mask and run it through as an embossed detail with my Cuttlebug.  A little Gilding wax to highlight the detail gave me a good base. 

I stamped my words onto a separate card and drew boxes round each word.  I added a little distress ink - mainly yellow tones so it took away the starkness of the white card and then cut out each word and mounted it onto my card.

It took a while.. but got there in the end!  So if you get stumped with a project - don't bin it... put it in your stash and come back to it.. sometimes you rediscover it when you have a new stamp or topper in your collection - or sometimes another day just brings a fresh idea!

happy crafting

Jane

PS... and finally... we may not have won..this time!.....  but I'm displaying our runners up badge with pride!

www.aldridgecrafts.co.uk

Creative Birch Leaf

Today's card features my Tim Holtz leaf stamps.  I started by creating a background using Distress Paints - this card was picking up the paint from my craft mat after getting the most of the paint off on a previous print.  This gave me a nice random effect in the background - nicely patchy!

Once completely dry, I stamped and embossed my leaf stamp.  I then used my Distress Paints in autumnal shades to paint in the detail, taking care to wipe the paint away from the embossed outline so that it remained nice and crisp.  I stamped my words (Chocolate Baroque) in Archival Black and as a final detail I used a dot mask to add my dotted border around the outside with a little walnut stain distress ink.

I was very pleased with this card.. the colours look even better in the flesh - nice and vibrant!

I will be doing a Sweet Poppy Stencils demo in the shop this coming Saturday - starting at 10am - hope some of you can make it!

happy crafting!
Jane

www.aldridgecrafts.co.uk

A new style for me!

I'm not one for doing cutesy characters...  not generally the sort of style I would pick - but I borrowed this stamp from Sarah to challenge myself to do something a bit different.  I raided my box of Ink Mister backgrounds and found this particularly vibrant busy one and thought - right double the challenge to put this stamp onto such a vibrant piece.  I was determined not to paper piece - but to stamp directly onto the background.  I started by stamping and embossing my little girl (she's a Wild Rose Studio stamp).  I then set about experimenting with colouring mediums.  Because the background was so saturated with mica, I was finding the paints and promarkers I was trying was just sinking below the mica and getting lost.  So I decided to paint in the stamp design with some gesso.  I did this slowly and gradually and after painting each time I wiped over with a jay cloth to make sure the heat embossed areas didn't get paint dried on the top.  After a few coats it was enough to start trying some different colours.  I tried some distress paints, but I couldn't get a strong enough colour, so I went back to my Promarkers - and after building up a couple of layers of colour I got the effect I wanted.  I found the colour went on a lot easier using the chisel end rather than the point - that seemed to move the colour about.

I added the words (Chocolate Baroque stamp) and added some lines with a black promarker and drew through a mask with a black fineliner.  I also added some white gel pen highlights around the wording and around my little girl to make her stand out from the background even more.  Finally I mounted the piece onto black card and onto a 5x7 card blank.

It's nice to challenge yourself... always a bit daunting but satisfying when you complete your project!

Started to get excited.. only one more day before I travel up for the trade show woohoo!

happy crafting
Jane
www.aldridgecrafts.co.uk

Shop for Chocolate Baroque stamps
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Little Cub

I'm a little late with today's blog!   I got myself too comfy with having a Friday evening relax and time escaped me!  Today's card features a new range of stamps I've recently got in stock.  They are Stacey's stamps from the USA.  The stamps I have in stock are all amazingly detailed animal designs.  I'm most impressed with the detail in these designs.

I stamped my cub and used watercolour pencils to colour him in - this gave a nice soft look.  I created the backgroound mount using my Tim Holtz Shatter Stencil and Gathered Twigs and Walnut Stain Distress Inks.  The ticket is from the Tim Holtz Adage Tickets book and I tinted it with the same Distress Inks.  The sticky mesh, backing papers and other embellishments are all elements I found when I rummaged through my embellishments and I thought they went well with this design.  Its all been mounted onto an 8x8" card blank.

I rather like this card.  I plan to do lots more with this stamp!  Back tomorrow with my next card project... hopefully a little earlier this time!

happy crafting

Jane

www.aldridgecrafts.co.uk
Shop for Tim Holt Shatter Stencil
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All Day Mixed Media Canvas Workshop

Well... what a fun day we had!....  the heatwave couldn't distract us..... even the Wimbledon Final couldn't distract us (alright... we did keep an eye on the score!).... we were in paint/ink/stamp heaven!

We worked onto 12x12 stretched canvas (now in stock - just £5 each).  We worked with a range of acrylic paints, spray inks, texture paste, masks, stamps, stencils and dies to create these fabulous canvases.

We know that a few people would have loved to have come along.. but had prior arrangements.... if you are one of those people, please email/phone us to give us your name as we are arranging a date for this workshop to run again.  It will be an all day workshop - on a Sunday - 10-3pm(ish) £40 including a goody bag worth (£10).  Call on 01953 454976 or mail at aldridgecrafts@googlemail.com.

My Steampunk Canvas

My Butterfly Canvas

Getting painty!

Janet's canvas in progress

Jon's Canvas in progress

Ann's Canvas in progress

Angie's Canvas in progress

Four happy crafters!

Jon's Canvas

Janet's Canvas

Ann's Canvas

Angie's Canvas

If you've never worked onto canvas... go on - give it a tray - it's great fun and has endless possibilities!
happy crafting
Jane
www.aldridgecrafts.co.uk

Just had to get inky!

Well I did have an inspired creative day yesterday - I spent some time browsing through some very inspiring blogs and that got me itching to get inky fingers!  So I pulled out my journal to finish of a piece started a long time ago.  This has been stamped using stamps from Chocolate Baroque (Elusive Images as was) and background created using Cosmic Shimmer mister sprays, Distress Stain and a mask from That Special Touch.  The teal edging was created using a fine paintbrush dipped into my mister ink so I could control where the colour was applied.  Hope my inspired creation inspires someone else!...
enjoy
Jane