IT'S MIDNIGHT MADNESS SKETCH TIME AGAIN!!!

It feels like one day, not one week, ago that I posted a picture of my latest Midneight Madness Sketch Challenge Card ...

i would like to share my #68 sketch challenge card, and once again I have used one of the digistamps I designed for the Digistamps4Joy online store. Her name is "Rosie" and when I saw the sketch that was presented for this week's challenge, Rosie immediately came to mind. I think she matches perfectly the the lacing embellishment that was called for on the sketch, don't you?

Rosie comes from a group of digistamps nicknamed "She ain't heavy, she's my seesta" which perfectly describes these buxom beauties. If you would like to see Rosie's "seesta's" please use the Digistamps4joy link on the right hand side of this page.

I won the NanaVic's Digitals Weekend Quickie!!!

I am so pleased I won the Weekend Quickie (I think we should rename it to THE VICKIE QUICKIE) last week - cos that meant I could go and shop for a digi - have you been over to Vickie's online store yet? I have added her badge alongside on the right - yes scroll down a little - that's it!!! (the cute granny image - see it) now click on it and it will link you straight through to the blog and all the great digitals she has designed. Thanks Vickie - I had a great time, both in using "I'm not ageing" and then shopping to spend my prize voucher.

PRISCILLASTYLES : CRAFTERS DIGITAL ART CENTRE : a new round of challenges!

What fun - A new round of challenges is on the go, and so am I. But before I start creating cards for those, I wanted to share that I won the Embellishment Challenge in the previous round. Here we had to create a card using digstamps as our embellishments, and initially I was stuck - no inspiration - and sat - and pondered. I looked at the digis, two bows, two flowers, a buckle and then the card appeared in my head. Once I started I couldn't stop until the card was finished, and this is the end result. I love the colours and other than the little rhinestones, I created everything from scratch.

DOODLE PANTRY DESIGN TEAM

Laurie, from Doodle Pantry, has chosen the perfect design team to showcase her abfab digstamps, and although I didn't make the team for the coming season, she has invited me to join her DT for the month of September, as the Guest designer ... wow - I am honoured that she has found my work worthy of that! Today I received my badge which I will proudly display on my blog here, hopefully, when you click on the Guest Designer badge on the right hand side of my blog, it will link you to her fabulous blog, crammed full of inspiration and digistamps. Thank you, Laurie, for the invitation, I really look forward to working with you next month. (Oh yes, there is a great tutorial on how to colour a background scene there too and it's well worth a visit!)

When I am an old Woman ...

Jenny Joseph wrote a fabulous poem ....

WARNING
When I am an old woman I shall wear purple
With a red hat which doesn't go and doesn't suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
And satin sandals, and say we've no money for butter.
I shall sit down on the pavement when I'm tired
And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
And run my stick along the public railings
And make up for the sobriety of my youth.
I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
And pick the flowers in other people's gardens . . .

But maybe I ought to practice a little now?
So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised
When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.

... and this is what immediately sprang to mind when I saw Nana Vic's "I'm not Ageing..." digi and bcame the inspiration for my card. It is my entry into Nana Vic's WEEKEND QUICKIE challenge ... and here it is ...

FOOTNNOTE ... mmm now that I think of it - I am starting to discover a lot more purple in my wardrobe ... I think I need to go out an buy myself a RED HAT today!

PROUDLY SOUTH AFRICAN....

South Africa has a great online digistamp site, www.digistamps4joy, a challenge blog and groups on Crafters Digital Art Center and Scrapbook News and Reviews. Besides being a great source of exciting and fun digistamps, Mel, it's creator, has some great tutorials, hints and tips, and an awesome photo gallery of projects already made using digistamps4joy (ds4j) products. One of the cute digistamps is this Christmas hat, which I coloured using watercolour pencils, and embellished with rhinestones and polystyrene balls. The background paper is Christmas gift wrap, and the little gold embellishments are the kind you use to sprinkle on your Christmas dinner table, mounted on a strip of red cardstock embossed using my Spellbinder Wizard! I just love the modern look of this card, despite the fact that very traditional colours have been used. I will enter this card in the ds4j challenge. If you would like to enter too (there are fabulous digistamps to be won!) please follow the digistamps4joy link on the right hand side of this page.

SOME ODD GIRL STASH CHALLENGE : Ribbons and Rub-ons

For my contribution I used a SOG image (Mae as Alice), removed the mushroom and repositioned her feet to make her stand instead of sitting on the mushroon. Satin ribbon was used to create a little to-tiered flouncy skirt and the sash through the pearly buckle along the bottom of the card. The sainty daisy border along the top of the card is a rub-on. Lilac glitter-glue and flat-back pearls completed the card. I layered the image on lilac cardstock and then on lilac floral textured scrapbooking paper. I am SOSO pleased with the result, and will definitely use this 3D technique (my own 'invention') again! I really enjoyed this challenge... and the outcome of the card. I hope you will too.

TEDDY BEARS' PICNIC

There is a challenge on http://teddy-stampers.blogspot.com with the theme "Teddy Bears' Picnic" and I have a particular "soft" spot for teddies, I thought I would join in the fun. This is the card I made, using a freebie from Meljen's Designs, called "Love is Sweet". I made the picnic basket embellishment myself, using raffia and a thick embroidery needle and woven the basket straight onto the cardstock. The little slice of birthday cake was a RAK gift from one of my ATC swap partners - doesn't it fit the theme perfectly? All the rest is from my stash.

DOODLE PANTRY DESIGN TEAM CALL

Laurie of Doodle Pantry, has the cutest digistamps that are so great to use on papercraft projects! She has called for applications to fill 6 spots on her Design Team and I have decided to apply. I used her "Hello Turtle" digistamp on my application card, and this is it! It is what I call a "back-to-front" card with the image on the inside and the "envelope" being part of the card itself. The sentiment on the outside reads " Just popped out to say "HELLO". Once folded closed, the card is secured with a matching lime green ribbon. I hope Laurie loves what I have created as much as I loved creating it.

MIDNIGHT MADNESS SKETCH CHALLENGE #67

OOO - I just love these sketch challenges! For this week's challenge I used one of my own pencil sketches, that I called "Embrace". I used patterned papers for the background, and then hand-sewed the sequins around the oval, as well as the sequin flowers and buckle. This card came together in a flash, as the background papers started off a whole chain of inspiration. I think it works rather well, although the lighting when I photographed it seems to make the digi very much lighter than it actually is.

FAIRY KNOLL CHALLENGE CARD

The Fairy Knoll group sketch challenge was a stretch for me - the first card I made was totally ruined by the wrong glue I used and the final product turned out to be a soggy mess! Fortunately this second card turned out MUCH MUCH prettier than the soggy mess! Here it is! Phew I thought I had the wrong sketch I worked on but apparently not - what a relief!

MICHELLE PERKETT STUDIOS CHALLENGE CARD

My card for this challenge "ANYTHING GOES" is a Back to School card, using mary Margaret, a little schoolgirl with holding an apple for the teacher. The digistamp is soso cute, just love her, and I added a little button that looked like an old-fashioned school house. The three pencils I made myself and the sentiment "School is Cool" is a bought one, the colours and design of which was the inspiration for the layout and colours of the card.

priscillastyles MIDNIGHT MADNESS SKETCH CHALLENGE #66

I just love these sketch challenges and I found an image that perfectly fitted this fabulous sketch! Although we don't celebrate Halloween in South Africa in such a big way at all, I used the pumpkins digistamp which was a freebie, and regrettably this was one of the ones from which I omitted to take the artist's details.

HAPPY 21st BIRTHDAY : NICHOLAS

Today, my first blog is not A, B or C - I'm just a proud mum celebrating the 21 birthday of our oldest son, Nicholas. He is such a joy to us, a wonderful example and role model to his two younger brothers, Blayne and KelLan, and a level headed boy who knows what he wants out of life and how to get there. He is permanently employed in the shipping industry in the operations section of a large international company here in Durban, South Africa, and is currently furthering his studies at the S A Maritime Institute.

Happy 21st Birthday, my darling boy, you make your mum's heart swell and bring a tear to my eye. I love you lots, Nic, and may your future bring you health, happiness and God's richest blessings!

SOME ODD GIRLS - "Something Punny" Challenge

I participated in the "something Punny" challenge on the SOME ODD GIRLS Challenge Blog, and this is the card I made, using their latest freebie. This little guy, called "Toby and his Dog" is so cute and I felt that he needed to be colopured without shading, more like cartoon-style, and I used the striped background paper and the simple blocks of solid colour to achieve this. Hope you like it!

I have been Spotlighted!!!

CRAFTER'S DIGITAL ART CENTRE spotlighted my card for their Embellishment Challenge #3on the main page of the site, and I earned my first "badge" Thanks, Priscilla, I really appreciate the recognition and feel humbled in the company of such other accomplished artists and crafters! Please follow the link by clicking on the beautiful purple butterfly on the right, and you will be able to view all the other beautiful creations....

A little bit more of the bellydancing

Last Sunday, the Belly Button bellyrinas danced at The Stables Lifestyle Market in Durban for the Women's Day promotion. For those of you not familiar with Durban's wonderful weather, this was taken at midday, in MIDWINTER!!!! Note the bright sunshine, and although there was a cold front on the way and the wind was blowing, Durban is a wonderful place to spend the winter months, as the (un)dress of the dancers shows!

I love my bellydancing, and creating and beading the costumes, and if you'd like to visit my website, www.jencraft.co.za, you'll be able to see a lot more.

Things that Fly - Mo's Digital Pencil Challenge

I just love Mo's images and used this one for my entry into her latest challenge, "Things that Fly". Maybe I will give this card to Blayne and Kellan to use for Nicholas' 21 birthday on Wednesday. I can hardly believe that our oldest son, Nic, will be turning 21 YEARS OLD - so in this case ... something that does fly is ............... TIME!

MIDNIGHT MADNESS SKETCH CHALLENGE #65

The Michelle Perkett Studio is sponsoring the prize of the MIDNIGHT MADNESS SKETCH CHALLENGE #65, and this is my contirubition for the cheallenge, which I have never entered before. I just love this digistamp Leilani, if my memory serves me correctly, and I used hot, summer colours to go with the Hawaiian theme. The digistamp was designed by Michelle Perkett.

NANA VIC'S DIGITALS : Weekend Challenge Card

Over on CDAC, in the Nana Vic's Digitals group, I entered a challenge using one of Nana Vic's oh so cute digistamps, and this is my creation. It's a little bit of watercolour pencil colopuring, gel pen colouring, paper piecing, and 3D work, all on one card. I just love that quotation by Isadora Duncan.

Kenny K's Krafty Girlz Challenge #4

Oh wow - what beautiful images - I finished mine for this "On the Dark Side" theme Challenge, and you can see it here. I had great fun doing this one, I hope you like it too!

ABC - you've seen the A and B - so here's the "B" part ...

Belly dancing is my other passion - I just all the aspects of oriental dance - the music, the passion, the styles of dance, AND ESPECIALLY the costumes. Besides dabbling a little bit in belly dancing and the tribal dancing styles, I just love to design, sew and create the beadwork for the dancers' costumes. In the past few years I have made countless costumes and even more bra's have been beaded, each to the dancer's own colour specifications. This is one of the more recent bra's I beaded for Preena, and I think the colour combination is stunning - royal blue and turquise has always been one of my fave colour combos to work with. Preena dances with style and loves her flamboyant costumes and nothing is too OTT to her. She loves this costume - I hope you do too ...

Wow I won!

Over on CDAC, on the TLC group, I entered a 24 hour challenge to colour a dgistamp of a vintage fruit bowl. I had never attempted to colour anything with so much black in the drawing but thought I would give it a bash - and to my surprise, mine was the winning image! As my prize I was given a voucher to spend in their online store and chose some background papers that I then used to create a card from the digistamp I had coloured. These are the pix of "before" and "after". Kinda-kool - I am soso please with the outcome as it is something completely different to what I usually do on cards, but yet it works, I think!

wow - TWO POSTS IN ONE DAY!

There is a 24 hour challenge over in the TLC Group on Crafters Digital Art Center where a digistamp of a very vintage-loking crystal bowl of fruit needed to be coloured. My entry for the challenge was printed on kraft board, and then coloured with pencils, some watercolour, some not, and the bowl embellished with crystal glitter gel. I think it looks quite vintage, but let me know what you think, .. I would love you to leave a comment!

MORE SKETCHES ... DIGISTAMPS IN THE MAKING

I have been sketching again, and have four sketches that each are the first in a range that will soon become digistamps for Digistamps4joy.com. I'd like to share a preview with you - let me know what you think ...