Challenge 128 - Crafty Cardmakers & More - Distress it

Lin  is hosting our 'Distress It' challenge this week at Crafty Cardmakers & more... 

She would like to see distressing, preferably lots of it, on your project.

Now, I love my distress inks, but I don't usually physically distress the papers much.  I don't like it when it looks like my layers weren't stuck down properly and have got caught, but that's just me.  I know the grungy look has a huge following, so I thought I would have a go.

For my project, I used a Kraft tag that I got as a freebie from a Do Crafts magazine (along with a very bright red ribbon and various other elements).

First thing was to rummage through my stash, and I found an offcut of a hobbycraft 8x8 sheet that was perfect for my base layer.   I used scissors to ruck up the edges and then distressed the edge with gathered twigs distess ink.  

Next, I used one of the old book pages I had bought from Chocolate Baroque a while back.  I like very much the effect of stamping onto old book pages, and I have numerous old books... but I couldn't bring myself to pull the pages out, in fact, *is mortified at the very thought of doing so* .  Great compromise - lots of pages of random old books at really reasonable price!  I stamped a poinsettia arrangement from a really old and favourite stamp set my mum liked to use a lot - (It was a docrafts papermania collection callled "at Christmas time".  It's probably not available any more, so I am looking after it!) and then coloured it in with promarkers and fussy cut it out.  I pulled at the edges of it with an x cut distressing tool to make them look less pristine and then distressed it lightly with the gathered twigs ink.

I cut a piece of the remaining book page to size, and distressed the edges with the tool and the distress ink and then spritzed both pieces of paper with docrafts artiste gold spritzing ink.  When dry, I put the layer paper onto the base layer, and then stuck the poinsettia topper onto that. 

The ribbon was a very bright red and stuck out, so I distressed it down with some walnut stain until it matched the colour better, and then I stuck it around the corner of the layers and tied it in a bow.  To ensure it stayed in place, I put double sided tape and glue on the back of the layers and stuck them all onto the kraft paper tag, which I distressed with a combination of gathered twigs and fired brick ink.  

I used an offcut of my base paper to stamp a sentiment onto (from Spellbinders Christmas Creations stamp set) and went round the edge with a gold marker.  I stuck this onto the top of the tag using foam pads.

Lastly, I stuck a balsawood embellishment from hobbycraft onto the corner, and using glossy accents put a nice gold star in the middle of it.

And at the end of all that it doesn't look bad at all.  Maybe I should stretch myself into doing other things more often?????!!!

I am entering my tag into the challenge at  
http://www.fashionablestampingchallenges.com/
http://glitternsparklechallengeblog.blogspot.co.uk/

We are hosted by

 

DI'S DIGISTAMPS

with a $12 Gift Certificate

I have been drawing since a child and studied graphics at College many years ago, I now work as a Medical photographer part time but my love was always drawing. I started cardmaking about 4yrs ago when I bought my daughter a cardmaking kit which we did together, but I’m afraid I got the bug! My daughter preferred scrapbooking. I then started looking online at other blogs and this then became my passion and I loved sharing my cards with like minded people.
I love stamping and loved finding images, but sometimes I could not find what I wanted so I started to draw myself.
This then has become my second addiction and I have never looked back, I love thinking of new images, and its just fabulous to see others take them and make them into beautiful works of art. Long may it continue!

 

and also by

WOODWARE CRAFT COLLECTION

With a prize of £12.00 to spend at your favourite Woodware Stockist, either in store or on line.

Woodware are a Yorkshire based family owned business, as well as distributing Dreamweaver Stencils and Stampendous Stamps we have a wonderful range of stamps designed for us by Francoise Read and Jane Gill. We also scour the world for new and innovative products for the crafty card maker, and have a great range of punches and tools of the trade, to find stockists in your area or to see the range visit the website www.woodware.co.uk.

Our design team are playing along with the challenge so check out our blog, which is there for inspiration at www.woodware.co.uk/blog.