Strings Attached!

Wow this is promising another blog post, I'm on a roll!! So I just wanted to share a card that came about after seeing a lovely card online, that was beautifully collaged with different stamps and me being me didn't really have the stuff to do it, so improvisation was required!! First instead of fancy matting and layering I decided to use my lovely apertures to create a focal panel, so a bit of inking with distress inks, bundled sage, faded jeans and tumbled glass, gave me a lovely panel of colour but it lacked the texture if the card I had seen. I needed a background stamp, but I didn't have one, but I did have some garden twine and an acrylic block, so I wrapped the twine around the block a few times, tied it in place and voila I had a background stamp. All the little fibres of the twine created lovely fine lines like pen strokes, so I inked and stamped it randomly through the aperture and created a lovely faux script effect! Then it was just a case of inking through the tulip silhouette mask slightly off set of the middle and a matt and layer here and the card was done!
So moral of the blog post, if you don't have what you need, improvise and sometimes you will surprise yourself!!

Happy Crafting

Ali xx

Just Chalk it up!!

Ok not too long between posts, but enough time for the NEC show and a couple of fun Create and Craft shows and a pile of new products to have a good play with!!
One of the most used new products in my crafting arsenal at the moment is the aperture sets, these lovely masks are ideal for all sorts of techniques and make amazingly simple but effective cards. But they also mean you can let your creativity flow, and so I have!!
One of my favourite recent experiments was to make my own chalkboard paint. And it is so easy!! Simply mix a teaspoon of tile grout (the fine stuff is best) with a tablespoon of acrylic paint, mix well. Now apply to whatever surface, I have done jars but my favourite is on cards, so you can write little messages, I stipple the paint through an aperture on to a nice patterned paper, let it dry (which doesn't take long) then mat and layer. Add chalk on a string and away you go!!
Great fun and tonnes of potential projects in the pipeline with this.
Happy crafting

Ali xx

I know, I know

I am possibly the worst blogger in the land of blogdom!! But I have my excuses!! The last few weeks have just been crazy! Like proper crazy, very very long hours and hard work and I am only just starting to catch up!! But we have released a new DVD on using Masks, released some fab new designs of masks and some beautiful stamps!
So a quick share in this occasion as I haven't done much experimenting but have big plans over the next couple of weeks!!
What I have been trying to do is explore different card layouts and Pinterest has been an amazing source of influence. The card below is using the beautiful lighthouse stamp, coloured with distress markers, spritzed with water and stamped to give a lovely watercolour effect and then scraps of patterned papers patchworked in the background. The second card is a patchwork of background that were made during demonstrating at the trade show. When I demo I always create a huge stack of backgrounds many of which never make it to a finished card, but this style is a great way to use up these play pieces!
Right best get back to it!!
Happy Crafting

Ali xxx

I can't plan...

I change my mind like the weather (just ask Paul) and this card is one of the prime examples!! I was going to demonstrate this card on Create and Craft today, but the stock ran out before my demos did!! so here is a little run down on how it came about.

It was going to be like wet stamping, where you ink the mask and lay it on wet card, let the colour bleed out and then over stamp! But shock horror I changed my mind and decided to lay the inked mask onto the wet card and then ran it through the Grand Calibur (on the nesties cutting sandwich) and wow I loved the effect. The colour was sort of washed out and around, leaving the mask design pale, and as the card I used was a pulp card (more like water colour card) it compacted slightly giving a slight embossed look. I matted and layered it, as I thought it needed nothing else. Hope you like it.

Happy Crafting

Ali

Transferring...

Last week we launched our washable verses on Create and Craft and they proved popular, so popular I didn't get to demo the below card. Now on first look you think "nothing special" a greeting stamped on patterned paper and matted up with co-ordinating papers. But the greeting is not stamped it is from the washable verses, these are black printed verses on 300gsm card, so how do you get it on to patterned paper??
Well the secret is in the fact that the ink is waterproof. So choose your greeting, and cover in Sellotape (I used the wide parcel tape as it covered the entire greeting with one piece), take the back of a teaspoon and run like billy o, you will see the tape adhere better to the card, then cut roughly out of the whole sheet and drop the tape covered greeting into a saucer of warm water. Leave it to soak for a while, and then run away the card, if it is difficult, leave to soak a bit longer. Then take a piece of kitchen towel and rub away any paper residue, until you are just left with the words on the back of the tape. Allow to dry, the tape will still be sticky so make sure you leave it to dry face down. When dry adhere to your patterned paper of choice! Simple!!

Enjoy

Happy Crafting

Ali xx

Plenty of dough!!

I know I know I am rubbish!! But at least I have plenty to share...so lets get started with the first post of the year!! I wanted to share my salt dough project! The dough itself is easy to make, 2 cups of plain flour, 1 cup if salt, 1 cup of warm water, mix together into a dough, unused dough will keep in the fridge. Then just roll out like pastry. Then use your stamps to make impressions in the dough, if you leave the stamp clean you can ink after the dough is dry and also brush on mica which looks amazing, or ink your stamp up and then as you stamp the colour is transferred to the dough. But my favourite is to fully colour the stamp, even into the recesses with distress markers, then wipe off the ink on the raised parts, now when you press it in to the dough the ink from the recesses is transferred to the raised elements of the design. Then simply use cookie cutters to cut out your designs. Leave to dry, in the air it will take a while or you can pop them in a warm oven to speed up the drying process. You now have stunning unique embellishments for cards. Fun and cheap!!

Happy crafting

Ali xx

Wet, Wet, Wet

I know I know, I have been an appalling blogger, but time has got away from me so drastically I just don't seem to have 5mins to breath. But enough of excuses I will try and share some of the stuff I have been working on, starting with some of the new montage bits. I love this technique, it is simple effective and creates stunning backgrounds. You basically stamp with water!! How easy is that? Now the tricks to getting a good result with this technique are, you need nice bold stamps, they don't have to be big just bold or solid designs, and plenty of water! So first ink your background up with a distress ink, then fold up a piece of kitchen towel into a wad, and wet it, really wet it! This is now your "ink pad" simply press your stamp into the wet towel, and stamp onto your inked background, hold in place for a couple of seconds with a good bit of pressure and the remove. Watch the colour fade as it dries. Repeat randomly over the background. To finish off stamp in the same colour randomly over the background to provide more depth with the darker shade of colour. Ready to use it on your project!

Happy Crafting

Ali