White (and Gold) Christmas

Well, I finally got back on to my blog... I have a couple of very simple Christmas cards to share today, with the common theme of being Gold and White - and being from last year. 

The first one is using an image I got from the internet, printed on linen card using a laser printer then foiled using Deco Foil and a laminator.  Matted onto gold card and mounted on foam dots.  I used a digital sentiment from (the now sadly defunct, sob) Digistamp Boutique and gave it the same foiling treatment, again matted on gold card and popped up on foam dots, two layers for the sentiment panel

The second card uses plain white card, the background is embossed with two embossing folders; the bottom with a freebie I got in a magazine, the top with a Couture Creations folder (Tied Together) - It looks a bit unfinished in the photo, but it looked better IRL.   I cut the gold card circle with a L'il Inkers Stitched Circle Die - It's actually the "negative" of the circle I cut for this card... the great things about these dies is there are stitches on both side of the cut line, so both "inside" and "outside are usable.  The white Merry Christmas die with the snowflakes I've had for ages, can't remember where I got it.

The third card incorporates elements of both the first two cards, this time I used a kraft card base and plain white cardstock.  

I used the same image (foiled using the laminator) mounted this time on a kraft mat cut and embossed using a Spellbinders Scalloped Oval die (the image panel was cut with a Spellbinders Classic Oval die, and embossed the whole background panel using the Sizzix folder, I added gold "pearls"... well, flatback thingys :-) from my stash to the intersections of the diamonds.  The sentiment, a digi, is from Pink Petticoat, their Traditional Christmas Greetings 1 set (I think it's no longer available) was given the foil treatment... not that it shows in the pic, lol

That's it for my three cards.  I would like to enter in the following challenges:

Crazy 4 Challenges has "Make a Card", Fab'n'Funky Challenges has Christmas, Merry Christmas Challenge , Crimbo Crackers, Sweet Stampin' Christmas and Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas Challenge have "Anything Christmas" as always, and Through the Craftroom Door, Digi Choosday, Crafty  Creations, 4 Crafty Chicks, Creative Fingers, Li'l Patch of Crafty Friends,  Polkadoodles, Creatalicious Challenges and Crafting With Attitude all have Anything Goes challenges

I am super busy (what's new?) at the moment, making a couple of cakes for my lovely neighbour... she is 90 and so "together", I just love her :-)  I will try and get back soon to get some of my drafts stuff... well OUT of Drafts :-))
Until Then, Happy Crafting, Donna

Summer is Here at Di's Digis

Time for a new challenge at Di's Digis Challenge Blog, the theme this time around is "Summer is Here"... even though it's NOT Summer here, lol.  Here's my card

 I've used an image I've used before, mainly because the fortnight just flew by and I didn't remember to grab a new image from Di - she has lots - in time to make my card... but Henry Hazy Days (available here) is soooo cute and PERFECT for the Summer theme, that it's "all good" I reckon :-))
I coloured with Copic markers and Prismacolor pencils, inking the sky with Versamark ink and a homemade stencil.  I'm really happy with my colouring on this one, but still struggle to capture it in photos 

The paper I've used is from Merci - it's from Big W, but the quality of these packs is fabulous; the paper is heavy, really rich/intense colouring and has a texture, really good paper, and not just good-for-the-price either!  I used a punch to cut the edge of the panel at the top, then decided it was too fussy with the print (especially with the mat having a print too) so I just freehand cut along the edge of one set of scallops on the print, it only took about two minutes, ironic really as I faffed about with the punch for AGES!!

The gold metallic trim is from my stash, I've had it for years and am down to my last few centimetres... wonder if you can still get it, mmm.  The wooden butterfly is from my stash; this may be Merci too, but I'm not sure.

I bought a few "generic" dies from ebay recently, the "hello" cut from gold foil card is one of these... I 'll have to track the source down for these too as they have a few more styles that I fancied but I thought I'd wait til I got these to see how they cut; the answer is "brilliantly" so I'm going to get some more.

I finished the inside of my card with elements from the outside, don't I always, lol. That's about it for today's effort, I hope you get a chance to check out the rest of the team's inspiration... so much Summer it makes me long for some... no, not really, winter in Perth is the BEST :-)  I hope you get a chance to enter the challenge too, great prize (as always) this time from Crafty Ribbons, and extra opportunities if you use one of Di's Digis or a Candibean rubber stamp, if rubber is your "thang".

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges: 

Simon Says Challenge Animal Magic

My Time to Craft Summertime

Creatalicious Challenges  Anything Goes, opt: Animals as Focus
Simply Papercrafts, Craft Your Passion, Through the Craftroom Door, Create and Inspire, Crafting With Friends Challenge 23, Creative Fingers, Art by Miran, Cute As A Button, Little Miss Muffet and Paper Creator Crafts Anything Goes

Thanks for looking at my card, I hope you like it... until next time, Happy Crafting, Donna  

GDT for Little Miss Muffet, and never a dull moment

A couple of weeks ago the lovely Faye from the Little Miss Muffet Challenge offered me the opportunity to be Guest Designer for the challenge starting today... of course I jumped at the chance :-) It's an Anything Goes theme... Here's my offering

 I took the opportunity to make a birthday card for my niece's little boy... he turns 3 the same day as my darling twinnies turn 1, so I know I'll probably run out of time if I leave it until closer - 28th March will creep up on me, I'm sure :-) 
I used the adorable William With Blocks image, one of the Polka Dot Pals available here; the great thing is (apart from the obvious cuteness!) that it is actually a set of images; there's William with blocks, without blocks and the blocks without William :-)  I made my own little scene up by adding some of the blocks to the picture of William, easily done in Microsoft Word with a little cropping.  I coloured with Copics and Prismacolor pencils, adding some Stickles to the star on his shirt.
The red glittery cardstock I used for the mats is from my stash, I added some Red Stickles to a wooden "3" also from my stash... I can't believe how well they match!  Clear It Out has a Birthday theme and want to see Bling from our Stash... I'm in! and Divas by Design has Make It Sparkle, so I'm  in there too.
The stripy paper is from Kaisercraft and the one with balloons is from a Merci pad.  My Mums Craft Shop has a Spots and/or Stripes challenge, so I'm entering there.  The blocks spelling Nic's name are from a discount store pack designed for necklace making.

I used the sketch from Sketch and Stash this time around, I do like a nice straightforward sketch :-) I just realised I took the horizontal element right across my card - hope it's close enough!  I used the sketch for the inside too - nothin' new in that!  
Crafty Creations and Delightful Challenges want us to Keep It Simple; you don't get much more simple than this little card so I'm entering there.  Colour Me Copic, Through the Craftroom Door and Tuesday Throwdown all have Anything Goes challenges so I'm entering there too.
Well that's it for my card today, thanks again to Faye for having me as your guest :-) Pop over to the Challenge Blog and check out the fab makes - you won't be disappointed.
It was just as well I got my card done early as I had a little mishap with our new under-construction swimming pool - or as my son Chris now calls it "the Crime Scene"; it is half finished (as in the sand is halfway up the outside and the water is half way up the inside) so on Monday evening I thought I would step from the solid ground over the excavation onto the edge of the pool to shine a torch in so we could get a preview of what it's going to look like when the underwater light is fitted - shouldn't have been a problem, we've been in the industry for over 20 years and in my younger days I helped my hubby install literally hundreds of pools requiring stepping onto edge beams from solid ground thousands of times..... of course the primary thing to note here is "in my YOUNGER days"! 

Hubby and Rocky at "The Crime Scene"

I have arthritis now, and it does restrict some of my movement, particularly my hips. I didn't allow for it, failed to bridge the gap, one leg went into the excavation and my momentum carried me over the edge beam into the pool - I was so glad it had water in as I landed head first and would have done some serious damage falling six feet and landing on my head!  As it was I did do some damage.  I was in serious pain in my hip, and ended up in hospital for a couple of days after an X-ray showed a fracture to the neck of my femur.  I thought it unlikely that it was a fracture as I could put some weight on it the next day but had to have a CT scan to check, which failed to confirm either way but showed something else so I had an MRI.  The conclusion is that my arthritis has progressed much more quickly than I thought, knees and spine are Severe and the hip has End Stage OA meaning the only thing left is a hip replacement.  I am technically too young to have one, they are designed for the activity level of a seventy to eighty year old and the concern is that the pain-free me will wear it out too quickly, but the Orthopedic Surgeon says we should start planning for it now and try everything to delay it - including, ironically I think you'll agree, Hydrotherapy!!!  Actually, it was one of the reasons we put a pool in again (after removing our last one 13 years ago!) I find the treadmill and other weight bearing exercises very uncomfortable but swimming is much less so, so good exercise.
So as the title of my post says, there's never a dull moment here - sometimes I long for "boring" lol
I came home from hospital last night, good pain meds, physio and crutches for a few weeks - that's going to slow me down in the help-to-landscape-the-pool-area department!!  We were trying to get it all finished for my hubby's 60th in April, mmmm, we'll see.
I'm trying desperately to get to my DT card for Di's Digis, so hopefully I'll be back with that on Saturday (if not I'll drag one of my drafts out)  Until then, Happy Crafting, Donna

Here Come the... Squares!

So it's that time of the fortnight... time for a new challenge at Here Come The Boys, the theme this time around is "Only Squares" - easy peasy!  I went Squares to the max:-) I made a square card with squares on the patterned paper even a square button!  Here it is.

I've made the card base out of Kraft card, Sweet +Stampin' has Use Kraft so I'm entering there.  Great Impressions want a Square Card so I'm in there too!  I've only used Kraft a few times before, but I think I've found a new fave!

I didn't actually have any Kraft card (I have an A3 pad, but it's just paper) so I bought an A3 folder from Officeworks and cut it up; I got two 15cm cards, one 13cm card (ready folded) and a load of good sized off cuts (at least three cards worth plus odd sizes) from this one folder - it's really heavy card too, certainly a good back up supply, and it cost just $2.50
The image is from Bugaboo Stamps, who are our Sponsors for this challenge (YAY!!), this is Theodore Birthday Sign.  Hobbycutz has For a Child so I'm entering there.  I've coloured with Copics, adding some faux stitching with a fineliner, I've used brown as it's not as stark as black.  Totally Gorjuss has Hot Hot Hot as their challenge, I'm thinking my colours are "hot", so I'm entering there and Allsorts Challenges has Stitching so entering there too.
Digi Sketch Challenge  has an "Anything Goes" challenge whereby you can choose any Sketch; I used the sketch from January 2013, the last sketch from when the challenge was known as Willow Sketchie Challenge.  It incorporated Squares and suited the fairly CAS look I like, Whimsy Inspirations Challenge has a Clean and Simple theme, so I'm in.  I popped each layer up on foam dots, Delightful Challenges has Make it Pop (Use layers or dimension) so I'm in there too.
The papers are from Kaisercraft, Technologic and Class Act.  By Lori Designs wants us to use Designer Paper - I have, I'm in :-) and Paper Pretties wants us to Use two or more Designer papers, again I have!
The ribbon is from my stash, as is the square button; this is actually the back of the button  (the front is patterned blue and green) and I coloured it with Copics to match.  The metal "2" and "U" are from my stash too.  Cards for Men have Use metal for their challenge and Corrosive Challenge has Birthday with a number for theirs - this is a birthday and it does have a number on so I'm entering there.
I finished the inside of the card to match the outside... minus the button :-) oh, and I didn't pop up the layers either (it's too hard to write on the sentiment panel if it's wobbling about, lol).
Send a Smile 4 Kids,Hanna and Friends, Crafty Calendar, Papertake Weekly, The Crazy Challenge and Through the Craftroom Door all have Anything Goes challenges running, so I'm entering them all.

Well that's it for today's card, pop over to Here Come The Boys and check out the rest of the team's inspiration... they've really thought "outside the box" within a Squares Only constraint of course!!  I hope you get a chance to make a "square" card (for a man or boy remember!) and enter the challenge.  Don't forget that great prize on offer - 7 digis from Bugaboo Stamps :-)

I'm just settling in for the evening, we'll be watching the fourth test (cricket) soon, though I use the term "we" loosely; hubby will be watching and I'll be crafting or blogging with the odd glance to update myself... test cricket's like that, you don't have to watch every minute (unless you're my hubby of course, lol)  We just finished watching the (Aussie Rules) Footy, our team won - against the odds - and it was a great game (yes, I actually do like "footy", but only the Aussie Rules kind, soccer is too slow for me, I am easily bored, lol) the dog may get a run before the cricket, but I must admit I'm not feeling that motivated :-) a friend is popping in, with any luck she'll want a glass of wine, and then it'll be too late to walk the dog!

I'll be back in the week with a card I made for my Mum's birthday, until then Happy Crafting, Donna

BINGO...It's the latest challenge at Here Come The Boys

A new challenge starts today over at Here Come The Boys, it's a Bingo Board.  I made my card before dismantling my craft room - here it is :-)

I used the line Die Cuts/Free/Twine... or was it Buttons/Twine/Image, or even Patterned Paper/Free/Buttons?!  Either way you can see how versatile our Bingo Board is :-)

The image is Work James from Digistamp Boutique, with the background image City Corner from Make It Crafty.  Cards for Men has Men at Work as their challenge theme so I'm entering there as well as Digistamp Boutique's monthly challenge.
I coloured my image with Copics, then cut it out using  Nestabilities Labels Three.
The papers are all from Basic Grey's Oliver Collection, fab for men's cards :-)  I embossed the green paper with an embossing folder I got for Christmas (Craft Couture), Gem of a Challenge and Totally Papercrafts both have Embossing as their themes, so I'm entering there.

I used this month's sketch from Crafting Life's Pieces.  
The great chipboard cogs came from Make It Crafty too, I used a brad from my stash in the centres.  The Outlawz Greeting Card challenge this time around wants us to use brads and something new (the embossing folder is new, and I've never used either image before though they've both been sitting on my cyber shelf for a while, shame)
The buttons and twine are also from my stash, and the sentiment is computer generated, Joanna Sheen has New Beginnings as their challenge theme as does  Creative Craft Challenges and That Craft Place so I'm entering them.
I finished the inside of my card with elements used on the front and the same basic layout.
Inky Chicks, Craftroom Door, Bearly Mine Challenges and 

Paper Crafting Journey all have Anything Goes challenges running so I'll be entering those too.

Pop over to the Here Come The Boys blog and check out the rest of the DT's inspiration - it's well worth the trip, hope to see you at the challenge too.

On a personal note, the tilers have finished at our house and we've moved much of the furniture back into it's respective rooms -giving us the use of both the refurnished rooms AND the spaces the furniture is in.  I have bought a new table for my craft room, I'm picking up a couple of chairs this week. Then I only have about a zillion bits of craft stuff to put back in to my cabinets - and I can play, yay!!  Here's a couple of pictures of my room empty, probably the only chance it gets at being truly tidy, lol

Entry through to my Craft Room

Kitchen from Family Room

The electrician is coming next week to install the canopy over the hotplate and a ceiling fan in my craft room, these hot flushes are being very persistent and I'm sick of the little pedestal fan!  The new door for the pantry comes on Tuesday, and that's about it.  Hubby and I are completely exhausted, chipping up the old tiles, moving most of the furniture in the house, painting the entire living area of the house (my job, my legs are killing me from going up and down the stepladder)  

We're really pleased with the results, we've got the same tiles running from the front door through the casual living (and my room, lol) to the back hallway, it looks really crisp.  The kitchen came up well too.

The Dining Room with the Study Furniture in it too!

There's still some small jobs to do, like choose new fabric, recover the pelmets and make curtains, but nothing that has the time pressure we've felt over the last couple of months.  

It's really nice to NOT be living as if we were camping too, I can finally start making real progress on the dust that's pervaded everywhere for the duration.  I am a tidy person and the clutter has just about driven me mad - or is that simply madder, lol.  I thought I'd share what I've been up to this week (actually it's been goin' on since November!!) over at Sassy Cheryl's Show Me Thursday blog, such a fun "challenge" :-)

Anyway, that's it for today.  I'll be back in a few days.  Until then, Happy Crafting, Donna

More Christmas

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas and that the big guy in red brought you lots of crafting goodies; he dropped a few bits off at my place, now all I need is the 30 hour day so I can use them, lol.

Today I have another one of those easy Christmas cards I made, only one more to go after this, promise.  There's snow on my card again... I would love a bit of snow at the moment... it was 39C (102F) today after an overnight minimum of 24C (75F), it's forecast 42C (110F)for the next few days falling to a (what will by then seem balmy, lol) 32C or 90F by New Years Eve.

The image is one of those gorgeous pre-coloured die cuts from LOTV (what a godsend they've been) with Stickles added to the hat trim, present bow and snow. I added faux stitching around the edges of all the panels with my paper piercer and a gold gel pen.

I've used more of the lovely vintage-y paper from Kaisercraft it's either December 25th or 'Tis The Season (or quite possibly another collection, lol) matted on gold card from my stash. 
I used the sketch from Totally Papercrafts, though I have missed the deadline to enter their challenge I still wanted to credit the great sketch.
The kinda-circle shape behind the image is a lovely translucent paper embossed with gold snowflakes (it's very shimmery IRL) that came from Starfish Lane - doesn't all my "special" paper?! cut with an Mpress Antique Frames die.
The snowflake is a Martha Stewart punch backed up with a Marianne D die; the glittery flower centre is from my stash, as is the twine.
Totally Gorjuss has Easy Does It as their challenge theme,  Deep Ocean Challenge has Santa Claus is Coming To Town,  My Time to Craft has Animals in the Snow, Crafty Calendar has White Christmas, That Craft Place has Christmas, One Stop Craft Challenge has A Christmas Carol (Let it Snow) and Cutie Pie Challenge has Cute Christmas, so I'm entering there too. 
The Pink Elephant, The Paper Shelter, Divas by Design, and Paper Crafting Journey  all have Anything Goes challenges so I'll be entering those too.
I finished the inside with papers from the front... too simple to even bother taking a pic of :-)
Well that's it for today's card, I'll be back in a day or so with the last of my Christmas cards.  Until then, Happy Crafting, Donna xx 

24 Carat Easter

This is quite a long post, I'll forgive you if you just "look at the pretty pictures", lol.
Finally, I have a card to show today.... Mrs Mojo is still conspicuous in her absence but I did sit and play over the weekend and I've come up with a couple of cards - this one I started before I went to Malaysia!!  

It looks darker in the photo than IRL, I didn't take the picture until dusk and my options were "take it in the shade" or "take it in stippled light"... I went for "shade" :-)
The image is Dusty Rabbit from Just Inklined, and I think he looks like we do with our Easter eggs - he's certainly having a "24 Carat Easter", lol.  I got this image LAST Easter and never got around to using it, now I have so I'm entering Lisa's Waste Not Wednesdays challenge to use stash.  He's coloured with Copics and Prismacolor pencils.  
My Mums Craft Shop and Top Tip Tuesday want to see our Easter creations or things with Animals on... I've got both! Do You Stack Up wants to see our Friendly Critters, Crafts 4 Eternity has Bunnies and Chicks as its theme, Crafty Sentiments MONTHLY Challenge, The Secret Crafter and Craft Your Days Away have Easter themes and The Paper Shelter has Anything Goes with Easter in Mind, so I'm entering all those challenges.

I've used the sketch from Sweet Sketch Wednesday, always a great source of sketches... this one was perfect for the larger than normal image panel, cut using my new Impress Ornate Frame dies.   I bought eight new sets, here, and they're pretty good; they cut really crisply and while not as sturdy as Nestabilities (they "warp" a little, but flatten out again) they're really good value.  Simon Says Challenge this time around is to use our Favourite Crafting Tool - I think my Cuttlebug is my favourite, if I discount my paper cutter, which I use on every card (you do tend to dismiss those "essentials", don't you?) 
The Crafty Pad has Just Die Delicious and Sweet Stampin' has Dies and Doodles; you can see my attempt at doodling around the edge of the mat behind the image panel.  To be honest, there's quite a difference in size between these two dies (largest and second largest) and it needed something to fill the space up a bit, so the doodling fit the bill well.  The sentiment is computer generated, with some Card Candi.
The inside of the card, as always, is finished using elements from the front.

I've used Martha Stewart's Garden Trellis punch as a border on the yellow cardstock, from American Crafts (as is the orange).  The metal floral trim on the front is a purchase from Malaysia (though it was harder to find "stuff" there than I thought it would be - my Mum always brings stuff back, she does well!!)

I've used papers from my Inque Boutique Kabana pad, luckily I bought two of them (actually they were stuck together and we couldn't get them apart without damaging them so I got a "deal" for buying the two!) as I find it very versatile. I distressed the edges of everything with Versamark Lime ink, I wish I hadn't, but once I started I was committed, as it changed the whole look from "clean" to "country",  sort of :-)
 The flower on the front is from my stash, with some Diamond Stickles to "lift" it, those on the inside were punched using Nellie Snellen Floral punch set (which does add some texture, but I go over the back of the petals with my ball tool to add more dimension, and a small flower punch from my LSS (embossed for dimension also).  The centres are Dew Drops from Robins Nest, Green Stickles in the centre of the small flowers.  The greenery is a Martha Stewart punch too, "Pine Branch". 

The Pink Elephant has Flowers as its challenge theme, so I'm entering there. 

Stamping With The Dragon, The Craft Place, Cards for Men and Cupcake Craft Challenges all have "Spring" challenges, so I'm entering there and Fairy Fun Fridays and Papertake Weekly both have Anything Goes challenges, so entering there too.

That's it for today's card, ended up being a much longer post than I intended, sorry about that :-)  I hope you had a 24 Carat Easter and don't find going "back to the grindstone" too hard.  

Until next time, don't forget to enter my Candies - links in my sidebar, Happy Crafting, Donna

Santa's Turn To Party

I have another Christmas card to show today.... only one more post after this and I'll be done with Christmas 2011 - PROMISE!  I made this one for the staff of one of the swimming pool companies we work with, it is really appropriate for Christmas in Australia, and particularly so for our industry I feel :-)

The image is Santi Beaches (I love clever names!) and he's a digi from Dude Time Doodles.  He looks well relaxed, doesn't he?  He's finished with all that present giving (much of it at our house, I might add!) and is ready to Par-Tay!!!  Totally Papercrafts challenge is "Time To Party" and Crafty Emma's is Party Party Party, so I'm entering there.
I coloured the image with Copics, adding high gloss to Santa's sunnies and his lovely cocktail.  Crazy 4 Challenges has "It's Santa" for their challenge, so I'm entering there too.  I cut  the image panel with Nestabilities Labels 4, Pollycraft has Punch It as its theme, so I'm entering there.  The papers are from Kaisercrafts "Tis the Season collection, the glittery green card and the cord are from my stash (handy hint: melt the ends to stop them fraying...but don't set fire to them, hmmm, the voice of experience, lol).  I made the sentiment on the computer.  Cutie Pie Challenge is to Use a Sentiment, I have so I'm in.
The inside of the card is finished with papers from the front... isn't it always?! lol.
Bizzy Becs and Paper Play Challenges have Christmas challenges running Digi Stamps 4 Joy has "Christmas but no animals" - even though this Santa is a party animal, I'm entering there, lol.  Papertake Weekly "Last" Christmas - as in their last Christmas themed challenge for the year and Charisma Cardz Anything Goes so I'm in there too.
Before I finish this post I thought I'd share one of the ideas I use to ensure my digis are scaled correctly to fit the Nesties I want to use.  In this case, the Labels Four set. I scanned all the dies in each of the sets I have, saved them as .png files in a folder named for that set.  I then open the one I want, add it to my Word document (position it so that it's readily moved around) then add my digi image (which I have also saved as .png files with transparent backgrounds, though you can do it with .jpg files).  Once the two files (Nestie and image) are open, I resize the image (make sure you don't resize the Nestie!) until it fits inside the Nestie, or it has the "bits" hanging over the edge that I want like Santi has in this case.  All that's left to do is delete the picture of the Nestie from the document and print the image.  You know it will fit inside the Nestie, and you know you've left enough room on the page for the Nestie.  I use the same principle for adding sentiments to Nesties.
Well, that's it for today.  I'll be back in a day or so with the very last of my 2011 Christmas cards, until then Happy Crafting, Donna.

Happy Birthday Dre

I have a birthday card today for my friend Andrena (aka Dre).  The main premise behind the sentiment is the fact that Dre has lost a staggering amount of weight (close to 40Kg, or 90lb) in the last year or so, by sheer hard work; she joined the "Spin" class at her gym some time ago and invariably describes it as "Evil", lol.

The image on the front is digi Li'l Perfect Match Christina from Tickled Pink Stamps, they have a challenge blog too, the theme this time around is Anything Goes, so I'm entering there.

The image on the inside is Maude Doodlebuns, Flab Fighter (how cool is that name?!) from Just Inklined, also a digi, both are coloured with Copics.  I've got to say I'm really happy with all my colouring on this card, it was just so easy and I didn't go out of the lines once (pushing that ink back sometimes is HARD! lol)  I've added some more Copics to my collection too, which does make it easier to add several shades.  The sentiment is computer generated, the sentiment and image panels and mats are cut with Nestabilities Classic Ovals and Nestabilites Classic Scalloped Ovals.

I've used papers from Kaisercrafts Magic Happens pad, I love the soft colours, and I'm not even "into" soft colours as a rule :-)  Fairy Fun Fridays challenge this time around is Sugar and Spice, I think this card is girly enough, but can't help having a chuckle when I think that Dre has morphed from "Maude" to "Christina" by staying pretty much away from the Sugar and Spice! 
The Cutie Pie Challenge this fortnight is a Bingo challenge, I've used the "Sentiment/Lilac/Punch Out" line to enter there.

Sketch Saturday has this great sketch to work with, I've flipped it but only because I thought Christina was facing the "wrong" way otherwise.  The only other change to the sketch is that I added some tiny buttons, to tie the colours together, Divas By Design has Button Up as their challenge so I'm entering there too.  I've distressed the edges of the card, image and sentiment panels but left the patterned paper un-distressed (only 'coz I'd already glued it on to the mats and didn't want to ink them, lol)  Stamptacular Sunday has Distressing as its challenge this time, so I'm in.  Love how the picture of the sketch is purple, colour coordinates with my card beautifully, hahahaha.

Crafty Cardmakers, One Stop Craft Challenge, Creatalicious Challenges and By The Cute and Girly all have Anything Goes challenges running at the mo, so I'll be entering in all of them.

I'd like to say Happy Birthday to my "little" friend Dre, and wish her many more...I get to make her fun cards, here's last years BTW.

I hope you like my card today, I also hope it means a return of (at least some) mojo...I've got a chest infection and it seems to be dragging the last of my motivation out of me; the joys of an asthmatic in Australian spring!!  Until next time, Happy Crafting, Dee

Before, During......

...and After, lol

Chop Chop, it's your birthday

I've made this card for our friends' son for his birthday.  It's been quite a while since either of my sons was eleven, so hopefully this will hit the mark.

The photos are a little dark, I just realised I'm down to the wire on one of the challenges I'm going to enter, so I've had to post these photos and hope for the best!

I've used the sketch from Gem of a Challenge, you know how much I love symmetry, and this one is pretty much symmetrical...except for that little triangle, which adds a bit of derring-do, lol.  The papers are all from Kaisercrafts Chapter One collection, the green foil lifts the overall effect, hopefully enough!  Craft Your Passion has Green Yellow Black and White as its challenge theme, I don't know if my yellow/green is yellow enough but I'm entering there in hope!

The image is Karate Boy from Mo Manning, but it seems only to be available from Digital Pencil Too not from Mo's Digital Pencil as many of her other images are. It's coloured with Copics...not a lot of them either, lol.  Lexis Creations has "Card for a child" as its challenge theme so I'm entering there, and Cards for Men has Sports as its theme so I'm entering there too.

Bearly Mine Challenges challenge this time is to use three backing papers, easy peasy, I'm in :-)  I used my Nestabilities Labels Twelve to cut the image panel, and I made the embellishments up by cutting and embossing circles of the foiled paper with Standard Circles Nestabilities and sticking Crystal stickers (that I got ages ago in BigW) in the centres, I used just the stickers on the opposite corner of the image panel.  I put one of my little embellies in the inside of the card too... partly to tie it in to the front but more to cover the join in the strip of foiled paper I put along the triangle of black (which has a tinge of green along the outer edge.  Whoopsi Daisy Challenge has Make Your Own Embellishments as its challenge theme, even though these embellishments are very simple I did make them myself, so I'm entering the challenge.

I cut the sentiment panel using the same nesties as the image on the front, adding a bit of the black and the foiled paper to finish it off; alright, the truth...to cover the inky thumbprint on the bottom, lol.  I only glued the outside edges of the stripy triangle so that I had a pocket to put Andrew's gift card in (I usually try not to give kids gift cards, but not only has he reached "that" age when you can miss horribly with your gift choice, they have moved to the country so I got something I knew he could use on the internet...for which he has a passion!)

Creatalicious Challenges, Digi Stamps 4 Joy, Simon Says Challenge, Crafts 4 Eternity and Sweet Stampin' all have Anything Goes as their current challenge themes, so I'll be entering there too.

I hope you like my card, I really enjoyed making it - everything fell into place, which is a nice change, lol.  I'll be back on Sunday with another bit of DT work for Here Come The Boys, until then Happy Crafting, Dee