Would You Like to be an Astronaut...?

Well, a new challenge starts today over at Here Come The Boys... it's Monochrome!  A colour fan such as myself did see it as a challenge, lol, though once I realized "Monochrome" doesn't mean "dull" I was fine; even though I used shades of one colour (gold/brown - probably stretching the definition of Monochrome a bit there, to be honest!) I still managed to get a fair dollop of colour on to my card J

I used an image I found as a freebie colouring page here; this is Newton Firework - I  grabbed a couple more Newtons while I was there… they’re so cute! I coloured with Copics, it took about five minutes, lol.  Charisma Cardz challenge this time around is For the Guys, so I’m entering there, and Cards for Men has Animal Magic so entering there too.

This picture at least shows how shiny the gold is, lol. 

I like a nice sketch as a starting point, I've used this little beauty from Tuesday Morning Sketches for today’s card, rotating it 90°.
I thought I’d start with a coloured base, so nice and rich!  The patterned paper I've used is from the Basic Grey’s Indian Summer pad, the mat for the image panel and the stars are gold foil, it looks green in the main photo but is “very” gold IRL, some of the leaves on the background paper look greener-than-they-are-in the pics too - who knows why?!  

Cupcake Inspirations 

Creatalicious Challenges

Crafty Calendar has Browns and Creams for their challenge theme,  and Catch the Bug has Autumn Colours; Crafty Creations has Autumn Leaves, Crazy 4 Challenges has Leaves while Creatalicious Challenges and Cupcake Inspirations both have photo inspirations that are nice and autumnal with lots of leaves... like my designer paper! so I'm entering those. The Joanna Sheen challenge theme is Down in the Garden, while I'm pretty sure there aren't any teddies tied to fireworks down there, I'm equally sure there are leaves, so I'm in. 

I cut the image panel and mat with an Mpress die Curved Rectangles, I trimmed the top and the bottom of the mat as I feel there is too much difference in the size of the largest and second largest dies.  I embossed the mat and the plain coloured banners with Cuttlebug’s Forest Branches folder to add texture.  As always, I finished the inside to match the front.

The gold stars, which seemed the “right” embellishment for an Astronauts card, lol, were cut with MFT Dienamics Stacking Stars die.  My Mums Craft Shop has Stars as their challenge theme so I’m entering there, and Totally Gorjuss has Punches and dies so I'm entering there too.

Creative Craft Challenges, The Paper Shelter Craft Us Crazy and Simon Says Challenge all have Anything Goes themes, so, you guessed it, I’ll be entering those as well.
Well that's it for today's card, why don't you pop on over to the Here Come The Boys blog and check out the rest of the Design Team's inspiration... there's plenty of scope in Monochrome let me tell ya!  Why not have a go at the challenge yourself, there's a great prize to be had - don't forget to make your project suitable for a boy or man though :-)
I'll be back soon with another offering, until then Happy Crafting, Donna.... and Newton the Astronaut J