Wednesday 30 April 2014

Crafting with Dragonflies Challenge#25 - Use a CD in your Card

Challenge # 25: Use a CD ( as the card or on the card)


Well, where did I start with this one! I had a look around and Hilde gave us this site  - CD art - as a start. Both Eureka and QKR offered us some stamps and I chose this one of the little girl on the sled from Eureka, so I had make a card that suited the image AND used the CD theme. Originally I thought I would create a card with a CD that held various images on it or video's attached to it as gift but then I just decided to use the lovely lustre you get with a CD as the snowy sky background for the small girl. 



So, our sponsors are
QKR stamps
Winner gets to pick 3 Digi stamps

Eureka Stamps
Winner gets to pick 3 Digi Stamps

I started with a CD and trimmed a small edge on one side to a straight line - only broke one CD doing this! I used a Fiskers knife and carefully cut down the line and then broke away a piece at a time; filed it straight. This was where the hinge was going to be. Then I cut a circle exactly the same size by just drawing around the CD -  in some thicker card I got from Blue Edge Crafts. Yes, joined them together with workshop masking (TD) tape! A strip either side. 


Do you remember this tool from Stampin Up? 


I love mine for creating circles bigger than my dies. I cut three circles from some SU DP to cover my CD back, and the inside and outside back of the cardboard. 


Then I got to decorating! My little girl has been coloured up with Prisma Pencils and fussy cut out. The background DP is from the Christmas stash (no name) and TomBow is the glue I used on the CD. A Memory Box die or two, and some flakes cut from old Christmas cards, with a bit of bling added. 


The sentiment is some Christmas tape mounted on a scrap of SU Real Red. I also ran a bit of silver pen/paint around the edges of the CD as the background paper was showing through the edge and was a bit of a distraction. there is some glitter glue in there too on the edge of the paper. 


An inside shot


Outside shot  - shows the colours up better


Snowflakes


Inside shot

I will enter this in the following challenges: 
A Random Fan: anything goes - closes 3rd May
Crafty Sentiments Designs: anything goes - closes 5th May
Party Time Tuesday: Fussy Cutting - closes 5th May
Through the Craftroom Door: Anything Goes - closes 6th May



Tuesday 29 April 2014

Finally got some time to post

Life has been hectic but enjoyable and then it was quiet and enjoyable too!

We had visitors over the Easter as you know, and the craft supplies did get a bit of a run. Miss 10 is quite a crafty lady.  She arrived with a present for both her Nin's - one each - and this one is mine:



She made three of these in a couple of weeks, learnt to make one by making her own,and then made two more for us. These are my colours apparently and the other Nin had bright primary colours. She is going to sewing classes at a local shop.

This is the finished card she made with the image she had coloured up using my Copics for the first time.


She then went on to draw her own figures and colour them up - I will share them another time. 
Mr 8 is not so much into drawing and colouring at the moment - he was more into the Easter Bunny and chocolate! 


I will also share this too:
Runner-Up Blinkie

Monday 21 April 2014

Unstampabelles Halfway inspiration


Well, we are half the way through the Unstampabelles Challenge so why not go over and have a look at the inspiration provided by the team for you, and then use the holiday break time to have a bit of a go at creating a card or scrap page without using any stamps!

My inspiration card for this half-way blog has some of these in it!
Isn't that the cutest Easter egg die? I have backed it with some card from a freebie pack.


I used my Hero Arts alpha letter dies to cut these letters out and place them in a nearly straight line!


This is from the freebie pack that came with the magazine I mentioned before: Creative Card Making (UK)  - baby rabbit is too cute!


My card is a  square blank from Regal Craft - they are our sponsors for this challenge! 

The addition of a ribbon and a bit of pink spotty paper and it was done. 


Have a lovely Easter break and enjoy being with family if they are close enough and enjoy being if they are not! Don't eat to much chocolate - yes, there is such a thing!

Easter - a Spring Festival for the Northern half of the world, and sometime in Autumn for me down here - a Christian Festival to commemorate the death of Jesus and his resurrection or a time to commemorate the rebirth of nature. That's why we have eggs (fertility) and chickens and rabbits (fecundity)......not sure why we have chocolate Bilbies though! Easter buns are from Jewish Passover (that was on Monday past) and Lent and we eat Fish because some Pope in the Middle Ages tried to help the local economy of the Fishers and decreed that fish would be be the only meat eaten on a Friday! Anything else? Oh yes, the Easter Bunny! He is a purely American invention - it is from the idea of a March Hare from Europe (that's why his ears are so big) who was just like the rabbit in Europe and going at it like crazy in spring to reproduce! The German settlers into the USA bought the tradition of the fertility symbol of sugar rabbits with them to the USA.

According to this site The children believed that if they were good the "Oschter Haws" would lay a nest of colored eggs. 

The children would build their nest in a secluded place in the home, the barn or the garden. Boys would use their caps and girls their bonnets to make the nests . The use of elaborate Easter baskets would come later as the tradition of the Easter bunny spread through out the country.

So, there you have it - why we use these symbols on cards today - eggs, rabbits, baskets, bonnets and caps, nests and such as well as the resurrection cross and spring flowers! What a strange mammal we are! But it's still fun to have an egg hunt or egg roll, and to see the family and enjoy each others company, and if you are so inclined, go to Church - Easter Sunday is supposed to be the biggest day of the year for Church going in the Christian world!

I will enter the following challenges:
Challenges 4 Everyone: anything goes - ends 2nd May
Cupcake Inspirations: bunnies

Sunday 20 April 2014

Joy Ride - with the Squirrel and the Fox!


Our fabulous sponsor for this is the one and only  -  Kenny K
 
Prize - 5 digi stamps


You can tell what my diecuts are! Tim Holtz Gadget Gears!!



This is the Kenny K image I chose to play with today (supplied to us by KK - many thanks!)

This was printed off onto XPress Blending card, and then coloured with Copic pens, and die cut with my new Stampin' Up Square dies. I also sponged around a bit of Momento ink for the sky and the ground. The whole is backed with some SU Real Red card. I have added a bit of sparkle with Stickles and Smooch gold.


The background papers/card are both SU - and the card blank is folded SU Black card. The gears are cut from some scrap card.The yellow card has been embossed with a TH folder called gears also.  I have added a mount of the Real Red card and a strip of silver zigzag for a road surface - has to be bumpy, doncha think? The blue background is old DP and the metal gears are also TH embellies.  The sentiment is from SU- Rev Up the Fun - and black Momento ink.

I will enter this in the following challenges:
Dragonflies Dreams: for the Boys! - closes 3rd May
Eclectic Ellapu: Pink team for the boys - winners on 3rd May
Scribble and Scrap: Anything Goes




Thursday 17 April 2014

lily's first go at Copics

Here is granddaughter Lily's first attempt at using Copics.
.

She is 10 and a half.

Wednesday 16 April 2014

Crafting with Dragonflies - Challenge# 24

Challenge # 24: Mothers Day/ Special Lady - elaborate card



Today we have two sponsors for our challenges:

 Heather Ellis (you may know her as Digistampcharacters

and


Meljen's Designs :: Digital Stamps by Melissa Jenkins

My card is a gift card that goes with a book (gift) to a Special Person 
I used a Meljen's image which was provided to us by the Sponsor

The image is printed off, coloured with Copics as per usual and then I add SU Dimensional Magic to give it a lovely sheen. I fussy cut it out and added to the die cut with foam dots to raise it a little.

I have actually made two items - a gift card and redecorated a booklet as a gift to a Special person in our life. I need to be careful as she reads the blog sometimes, so I will leave it at that but you will notice it says "Merci" on both the book and the card - Thanks in French!


There is another die cut and the sentiment stamped in blue Momento (Paris Dusk) and an SU ribbon, with some old SU DP and a blank card from Blue Craft. 


Here it is with the booklet as well


How did I use the image with the booklet? I just enlarged the digi, copied it and printed both off on the wonderful XPress Blending card. Wielded the trusty Copics again on the first one, and then just the blue flowers on the other one. I fussy cut these out and added them to the original one. I will confess at this stage I was going to make a card with this, but I stuffed up some die cutting across the top and side and so it hurriedly got reused for the book front.


The book was purchased when on sale for $2 at a large well-know store (K Mart) and I have had it for over a year. You now the scenario - walk past the bin, look in, see something that  might become useful.......in the future......well, it did!


A close up of the jug and flowers - there might be some Stickles used there........

I backed it with SU Daffodil Delight and the old SU DP (remember, It came in a big 12 x 12 pad?) which I used on the back as well and yellow card on the inside covers.  I added the ribbon earlier (when it was still going to be a card) and so I used a length of this to make a marker for the book as well. A tag with Merci on it (WMS) and a lovely Japanese bead for the end of the marker. 

See, it matches the blue!

Here are the two again.......

I will enter these in the following challenges:
Digi Galore: Flowers


Wednesday 9 April 2014

Dragonflies winner and some LOTV love!

Hi, just to let you now that the winners have been announced at Crafting with Dragonflies of the Baby Blog Hop winners. For my own blog comment prize from Meljens, my winner is as below and was selected by pulling names out of a hat! Congratulations to:

Meljens prize: four digis for the winner  
Meljen's Designs :: Digital Stamps by Melissa Jenkins 
Susan has this one
The winner is: - Barb

Please go to the CWD blog for details on collecting prizes for the Blog Hop

Now, I have three Lili of the Valley Easter Stamps - so I gave them an annual outing! They are all stamped up using Momento ink onto XPress Blending card and coloured with my Copics. The rest of the card is from SU and the embellishments from stash. The background papers are from a magazine freebie set. I did find the one 12 x 12 I have but not before I did these - otherwise the colours used may have been very different!


I stamped each image twice so got six cards made


So cute this image - sentiments are mostly from WMS


Regal Press provided the card blank here

I will enter this in the following challenges:
Fan-Tastic Tuesday: Anything goes square



The magazine freebie had some diecuts and these eggs are from that one with a bit of glimmer added!


SU punched butterflies with glitz - also on bunny's tail!


I don't have a big enough platform to diecut this scalloped circle so I hand cut it using the die as a template - I followed instructions from a fellow blogger to make the side steps but my SU Whisper White is really not strong enough I think - anyway, it did work, just. 

I will enter this in the following challenges:
A Random Fan: Pastel spring colours



Holographic gold card egg diecut  (Spellbinders Easter eggs) and a partial diecut of another smaller egg and then fussycut his ears. 


Whole egg is on a wobbler!


You can see it here

I will enter this in the following challenges:
Cuttlebug Mania: Make us Smile
Papertake Weekly: Spring is Sprung!


So sweet this image

Die cut some eggs from card which had been stamped with a discontinued lace background stamp from SU, and then heat embossed with SU EP's - lovely texture created for the eggs


I will enter this in the following challenges:
Crafty Blogger: Diecutting and embossing




MFT's sentiment stamp and die cut for banner


I will enter this in the following challenges:


This one was the first made


The Spellbinders edging is dramatic


That's it!
I will enter this in the following challenges:
(Pin)spirational Challenges: pink and eggs from the photo