Review - Creative The Textures Collection

To say I was happy to be chosen to review these products was an understatement. I have had so much messy fun play with the stencils.

The thing I find frustrating with plastic stencils is they move and when they are delicate like the paint drips, they can be easily caught and bend, so I find it better to use a re-positional spray. Try to push upwards on your stencil so you are minimising the risk of bending those paint drips e.g start from the bottom of your paint drips and move upwards.

Creative Irregular Paint Drips - Glitter paste and I don't have a love bond, but I gave it a go and I was impressed with how it came out, I'm thinking snow on a roof or icicles, upside down could be snow and draw in some trees.

The Cosmic Spray turned out good and lend themselves to halloween, watch this space to see what becomes of them.

I love how the Distress Oxide one came out and I have a few ideas for that one, this one came about as I was cleaning my stencil after using the Cosmic Shimmer sprays and seen rain falling.

Creative Texture Collection Irregular Paint Drips

Creative Paint Splatters - I used Daley Rowney mixed media paper which is great for different media. Using Dainayu water colour paint without the re-positional spray, you can see how it bled underneath the stencil, so I waited till it dried and then using the stencil again went around with a fine Sakura Micron pen. I then washed over with a paintbrush dipped in clean water.

Following this I then used Crea Box acrylic spray ( Lidl's best), sprayed the mixed media paper and then with a damp cloth rubbed over the stencil blending the colours into the page. As you can see I'm right in the messy zone now and go hunting in my stash and find Crea Box Acrylic mousse and plastered it on the stencil using a pallet knife. The only frustration I had with the stencils was that it has been so long since I used my gels and textured pastes they were rock hard and in the bin they went. Lesson learned....

As you can see I went onto texture not only mixed media paper but also coloured card. Oh such messy fun.

Creative Textures Collection splattered ink

Creative Hessian Texture Die - This die caused me a bit of frustration as it wouldn't cut no matter what thickness of card I used. I tried it on my Big Shot, Cut n Boss and Emerald Pro Cut machines and they all had the same result on first pass through the machine.

mirri card, coloured card, thin card and glitter card and double sided mat gold card

On all my machines it took more than two passes to cut the hessian textured die, however, with the help of a card shim (maybe a metal shim if you have one) and also using my embossing plates I did achieve some cuts and I love how it has my mind thinking . This die has me thinking of a fishing net, flower trellis, a fence and a skyline of lots of windows, to mention a few. I especially like the one on white card, which I sprayed with water and sprinkled brusho over it. I would recommend using a weeding brush on this die to get all the bits out, it saves so much time.

Black glitter card, red coloured card and white card sprinkled with Brusho.

This one was done by accident but I love the out come of it and I will have to see if I can replicate it (watch this space).

Creative Partial Brick Die Set - The first cut I made with these dies was with blue mirri card and it didn't cut all the way through, but it doesn't matter as it will come in for a project, or I could run it through my machine again. After the first cut and a little help from a shim the Mirri card cut like a dream, I tried these dies on my four cutting machines and was happy with the results every time. They are the perfect size for my Spellbinder Sapphire or my dinky one as I call it.

Again I used Brusho on white card stock and let it dry before I cut it, to give me a garden wall feel to it. The black is glitter card which cut better than the mirri card. The double sided mat gold card that I had trouble cutting with the hessian die, cut like a dream with these dies. I have purposely left some of the bricks in as it saves me having to paper piece them, (lazy or just good planning you decide lol.)

red and cream card stock, black glitter card, white card with brush, gold mirri card, blue mirri card

As I said, Im not a texture paste kind of person and do tend to shy away from some stencils, but no more as I had lots of fun playing with the stencils, even now I keep thinking what else can I do with them.

I LOVE the dies and even though the hessian die caused me a bit frustration I would say it is worth it for the outcome. REMEMBER new dies are like new shoes, they have to be broken in, the more you use them the easier they cut.