MIDNIGHT MADNESS SKETCH CHALLENGE #81

It's that time of the week again, and for my entry into this week's MMSC#81, I have used the very beautiful Victorian tea cup image available from the priscillastyles store here.

I recently added some Fabscraps scrapbooking papers to my stash, and the one I have used today is called Heritage Florals. Fabscraps is a South African company, situated not far away from where I live. Initially their products were only available locally, but I have just heard that the first shipment is on its way to the USA! I am sure that international papercrafters will love this range!
But back to my card ~ I used colours inspired by the floral backing paper to colour the teacup, and am so pleased with the result. The teacup is backed by some very pretty pink fabric print paper (a thrift store purchase)which I cut using a Nellie's Creations die. A strip cut from a paper doiley is the Victorian 'lace'.
As embellishments I used three pink paper roses, inked to match the colours of the b/p, and three flat-backed pearls.

The prizes to be won this week on the MMSC#81 are absolutely AWESOME!!!, and I would LOVE to be the winner of all those gorgeous crafting goodies! If you would also like a chance to win, why not pay along this week .... click here for more details.

This challenge is one I love to participate in, as are the exciting challenges on Crafters Digital Art Centre, a wonderful place for the crafter! Are you a member there yet?

DIGISTAMPS 4 JOY - "Use a Feather" Challenge

Time for another DS4J Challenge card from me ... and for this challenge you need to use a feather on your card - how easy!.. or so I thought! My first effort went into the bin ... this is my second, and a much better one.

Instead of the usual coloured image, I used a sentiment from the Digistamps 4 Joy store here, and this one is lovely ....

WORK
like you don't need the money
LOVE
like you've never been hurt
DANCE
like nobody's looking

and the meaning of that for me is to be PASSIONATE, I don't need be be the best at anything I do but I must do it with passion. I have no need to do anything with the sole purpose of becoming wealthy or famous, but I must be passionate!

There is not much to say about this card, it is what it is, a simple re-coloured sentiment printed onto a die cut card using a die from Country Crafts, some sewn on beads and sequins, a peacock feather and a satin and organza ribbon bow.

We would love you to take part in the DS4J challenge this week, just click [HERE] to link straight through for more details - you could be the winner of a gift voucher to spend in the Digistamps 4 Joy store.

If you love creating with digistamps and learning and sharing with fabulous and friendly crafters, and you are not yet a member of the Crafters Digital Art Centre, please click [HERE] to sign up. Oh yes, by the way, membership is free, and there are great tutorials, groups, challenges, free images and lots of new friends to be made. Now where else could you find that without hitting the PAY NOW button first?

GLITTERBABES "EASEL CARD" CHALLENGE

On Glitterbabes Challenge blog the challenge this week is to make an easel card, and as usual, embellish with lots of sparkle glitter. Her challenge is being sponsored by Nana Vic's Digitals so I decided to make an easel card using one of the free digi's Vickie provided on her Vickie Quickie for this week.

I know the bp was a download, but I am really not sure if it was from Glitterbabes freebies or that I saved them in her folder in error. I coloured the image using my watercolour pencils, added lots of crystal sparkly Skwiglues and sewed on a few stars and snowflakes. A blingy bow was added as the "doorstop".

I am rather proud of this card, as I get to enter it into two challenges, both the Glitterbabes Thursday Challenge, and Nana Vic's Vickie Quickie Challenge.

THE "Trim a Tree" Challenge @ Wink Wink Ink

The Wink Wink Ink Challenge Blog is running a "Trim a Tree" Contest. The tree image is supplied and all you have to do is to trim it! How much fun is that, and how easy-peasy???!!!

I printed the image after I had recoloured it to purple - YES! purple! cos I wanted to break traditions - PURPLE AND PINK - girly colours for a girly Christmas Tree!

I then set about decorating my tree, and you guessed it - out came the sequins, beads and rhinestones! I sewed them all on until the tree was suitably blinged, added a cute polka dot organza bow, a stick-on sentiment (very blinged!) and added a marbled paper background with a purple border.

Don't you just love the angel on the top of the tree?

MY BLOG AWARD - deleted

For those of you who I nominated for a Digi's with Attitude blog award -

If you are unable to find my post regarding my award i would like to let you know that I have deleted the post and the badge.

I fulfilled all the requirements expected of me, and emailed the owner of Digi's with Attitude store, who sent me my voucher of $10 to spend in her store,

Unfortunately, as I do not own a credit card, my order could not be completed and processed.
I was offered an alternative of one image ($3) but declined the offer. And I also deleted the badge and the post.

I apologize for any nconvenience.

PATTIE'S CREATIONS CALLENGE #5 : Anything but a Card!

....... so i made a little pillow box, small/big enough to hold a Christmas mince pie. What a lovely little gift to send your Christmas visitors home with?

I used cardstock with a dainty holly print for the box - I don't have a tutorial because I make these little boxes out of my head. I addded a length of Christmas ribbon on top of which was pasted a square die cut out using a Nellie's Choice die. Pattie's Cupcake digi was coloured using watercolour pencils and then blinged using green glitter glue for the base and heating embossing with clear sparkle embossing powder and my heat gun.

If you'd like to see more of Pattie's cute and versatile images, you can visit here shop here.

The embellishments used were some gold snowflakes, and a little Christmassy bow.

I added the Christmas mince pie so you can judge the size of the box.

I will enter this into Pattie's Creations Design Challenge #5 here.

MIDNIGHT MADNESS SKETCH CHALLENGE #80

Midnight Madness time again!

My card this week for the sketch challenge has been made using an image from A Day for Daisies, available in their store here.

This really beautiful image has been coloured using my water colour pencils and odourless spirits. The open oval shape in the centre has been filled with some paper roses, leaves and stamens. The embossed paper in the background was made using a Cuttlebug embossing folder and my Spellbinder Wizard. A few sequins, beads and rhinetones have been handsewn onto the card.

The ribbons were made using the "fork" method to ensure that they all the same size and shape. You can check out the technque here.

The Midnight Madness Sketch Challenge is great and I never like to miss it each week. If you would like to participate in the challenge, please click here.

IF you would like to join Crafters Digital Art Centre to join the "A Day for Daisies" and many other fabulous groups, please click here.

I would love to hear from you, so please leave a comment below.

GREETINGS FROM AFRICA

This week's Vickie Quickie in the Nana Vic's Digitals offered a fabulous "Warrior and Son" freebie with which to create a card. The minute I saw it I knew that I would be making a card similar to those that I have made (in abundance) for the Durban tourist trade. Cards similar to this one have found their way all over the world, and I am proud to say to the British Prince William for his 21st birthday. A complete stranger had purchased one of my ethnic African cards, composed a poem, and sent it to him for his birthday a few years ago. She received a beautiful thank you letter, remarking on the card, and she sent me a copy of that letter.

I coloured the image using my coloured pencils and own technique to give it a similar look to the many oil pastel drawings that are sold in Durban's curio shops. The top square features an embellishment made by my online friend, Charlie, who sent it to me in a parcel of RAK's recently. The embellishment in the bottom square has a border of African beading, which I sewed on using invisible thread. I added two porcupine quills, a guinea fowl feather, a raffia bow and beads made from seeds that the ethnic people use to make jewellery.

I will enter this card into the current Midnight Madness Sketch Challenge #79, a challenge that I really love to participate in each week.

If you would like to join Nana Vic's Digitals Group on CDAC and play along on the Vickie Quickie each week, click here

If you would like to join in the challenges on the Midnight Madness Sketch challenges each week, click here.

PATTIE' CREATIONS DESIGN CHALLENGE # 4 : Happy Birthday

As both Pattie (owner of Patties Creations)and Sandi (Lead Designer of Design team 1 for Pattie's Creations are celebrating their birthdays this month, the theme for this week's challenge is "Birthday Card".

I am the Lead Designer for Design Team 2 and for my inspiration card this week I used Beach Pattieboop, and coloured the digi using my coloured pencils. the frame of the card is marbled blue, and onto that I sewed some blingy sequins and beads.
I matted the image and frame onto lilac cardstock and then onto printed "Happy Birthday" scrapbooking paper. The whole bang-shoot was then adhered to a pale blue card. The pale purple ribbon 'ties' the whole colour scheme together.

Here are a few links that you may find useful ...
To find Beach Pattieboop and other great images in Pattie's Etsy Store, click here
To go to this challenge on Pattie's Challenge blog, click here
To join the Pattie's Creations group on Crafters Digital Art Center, click here

A RECIPE CARD CHALLENGE : "A Day for Daisies"

Intially, what attracted me to go and see what this group was all about was that delightful name ... "A DAY FOR DAISIES" ... intriguing!!! And I was thrilled to discover that the images on offer here are even more delightful ... all absolutely beautifully created by Tammy! in fact. The store (here) is well worth a visit!!!

The current challenge is to incorporate a tried and tested recipe, so I chose Mediterannean Roasted Vegetables, a dish I always prepare to accompany a BBQ, especially the Christmas Day BBQ!

The ADFD (of course) image was recoloured to a lovely shade of blue and printed onto marbled blue paper (reminiscent of the Greek Isles). The recipe was also printed in blue. I coloured the image using quite a few different shades of blue regular colour pencils and highlighted some areas in green. A navy satin ribbon, royal blue bow and three flat backed pearls were added as embellishments.

I love the look of this card and think that it would make a great card to give a friend (male or female) as a birthday card.

If you would like to join the "A Day for Daisies" challenge, please click (here).

DIGISTAMPS 4 JOY CHALLENGE : Create a Christmas Card

I just love this time of year!!! In South Africa the weather is warming up (or getting hot and humid in the case of Durban where I live), It's exam time, school holidays, and that means it's nearly Christmas!

So, in preparation for Christmas, the Digistamps 4 Joy challenge this fortnight is to create a Christmas project. My chosen project is a traditional Christmas card, and making it untraditional.

A little out of the box thinking for me here ... so I started out using a sentiment that is very close to my heart (How many of us remember to say "Happy Birthday" to Jesus on Christmas Day?) Is Christmas really only about gifts and holly, huge meals and lots of parties? Yes, if we use those to celebrate the birth of our Saviour, but I think Christmas means a little bit more.

In the words of Dr Seuss ..."

And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags.
And he puzzled and puzzled 'till his puzzler was sore.
Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before.
What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store?
What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more?

The shades of blue I chose are not traditionally Christmas colours, but they were inspired by the colour we all perceived Mary's robe to have been. Blue is also a serene peaceful colour, a feeling I wanted to evoke in my card.

The sentiment is from digistamps4joy.com and the flourish of sewn-on sequins and beads has been made using a template from scrapbooking-scrapbook.co.za. I added a spray of roses and a satin ribbon, and some Cola glitter glue (crystal).

I would love to hear what you think of this card - Is it too far removed from tradition to be Christmassy? or have I achieved my goal of a peaceful, thought-provoking card?

DANCE FOR JOY!!!!

Please excuse me - I am still on a high from my trip to Cape Town for the International Oriental Dance Festival last weekend! While there, I created this digi-image I called "For Joy" - and the paisley design in her hair shows the influence, as my friend Mel remarked. Mel digitized her and Joy is now the freebie for November in the Digistamps 4 Joy group.

Here she is, as I coloured her, using the vibrant turquoises, lilacs, golds and yellows. I sewed on some sequins in the paisley centres to add the bling factor - as I felt the image was busy enough on its own.

This card will be my entry for the Week 1 challenge in Card Corner in Simply Scrtappy Crafts, where I picked up on the word "joy" on the inspiration card.

If you would like to own the "For Joy" digi and view the rest of the fabulous digi's in the Digistamps 4 Joy online store ... click here
If you would like to join in the challenge in Card Corner... click here

MIDNIGHT MADNESS SKETCH CHALLENGE #78

I am really relieved that the pressure of finishing the belly dance costumes for the Festival is over, as I now can take part in my favourite weekly challenge, the Midnight Madness Sketch Challenge.

For challenge no 78 I have used a Digistamps 4 Joy image called Winter Oval, and she is one that I designed as part of the Four Seasons Ovals, available in the Digistamps 4 Joy store here.

I coloured the image with my coloured pencils, and sewed some sequins around the oval. Crystal Skwiglue was added to her fur-lined hoodie, and three silver snowflakes as embellishment.

The two triangles are printed metallic white card and those are matted on silver metallic card. A border of lilac has been added to complement the purple in the image.

This was a great sketch to work with, as usual, and if you would also like to participate, you can check out all the details of the challenge here.