Meljens first card challenge

We have been asked to show our first Meljens Designs card, well here is mine, it's a freebie stamp and I made the card on 22 July 2010. Before I started blogging and taking my cards with a camera.  It's coloured in PS and is scanned, that's why there is a dirty mark on it, it was the scanner not the card - honest! LOL.  Such a cutie stamp.

LIM 30

What a challenge - 

We have chosen a Recipe this time

Take 3 Challenges

We want you to choose 3 from any of our previous 29 and combine them in your design.
There is a list of our previous challenges under the tab heading at the top of our blog and you can also see the previous sketches under a separate tab.

Please state which 3 you have chosen.
NB There is no need to adhere to the One Layer if that is on the week you choose.

You may wish to go for your favourites or maybe your least...acetate springs to mind!

Most of all, be creative, have fun, remember our white space and the all important

"Less is More"

 

This is my card, representing weeks 5 - Pastel, 15 - embossing, 25 - Button or Ribbon, and the biggest challenge for me week 28 - inking.

This lovely image is my winning stamp from Wags n Whiskars. I coloured it in with my Reeves water colour pencils, I know, me not using Photoshop to colour?  YES it was awful not using Photoshop as I usually do, the colours are not as pale as I thought they would be and I can't say the colouring is perfect, it's only a few times I have coloured any stamp in my entire card making time, so all in all I'm quite pleased, even though it could be a lot better.  The bow was made as tiny as I could go on the bowmaker my hubby made me, and the embossing is from the Cuttlebug folder Flower Fantasy.  Nothing more to say about it really, but I am going to use it as a Sympathy card for a friend.

flower embroidery

NO this is NOT my work, but I have to show you what my No 4 SIL Linda does (I have 4 all clever in some way).  She does free hand machine embroidery and makes flowers and pictures and the most beautiful handbags.  Aren't these just gorgeous, there is no pattern and she just works her machine until happy with the result, I am in awe with her creativity and all with a normal sewing machine.

Now a little card I did last week as I have a little spare minute today to blog.

The image is by Shellysimages.co I coloured it in PS and the papers are Spring Meadow by Jannisscrapdesigns, I was asked to do a plainish card for an 85 yearold to give to her DIL and it had to bo done by the next day. It was well received I am pleased to say.

Hope you are all enjoying the Late Summer Bank Holiday, it's a shame the weather hasn't been too good, but at least hasn't been raining here in this part of Wales for a change :)

Soccer card

 A bit of a free day today being a Sunday.  I had a request to make a card for a friend's son again this year, it seems he has kept the last few years cards as he thinks their great! So of course I HAD to make him one this year.  All his cards are Chelsea football club theme as he is an avid supporter, the rest of his siblings and parents are Man Untd supporters, so he is the only one out of 7.  As he is getting older it's getting  a bit more difficult, from the child into the man.  I had a look on the web for some ideas and saw a card HERE which sent me to HERE for the SVG file, she has some amazing SVG's as freebies.  I had already started making the inside with football paper I made, by copying a football and making a pattern fill in PS. I then made 2 circles out of the football page and merged them to make one shape a top and bottom, added a white circle to the bottom half and added a verse. then printed it out. As the size was A4, it was then easy to make a shape the same size in Fairycuts, which I cut out of white card and pasted the printed inside to it.  I folded the top in half to make an easel card.  It was then on to the football, I cut a circle from the SVG onto white card and the shaped out of black card, I was thrilled with the result, it looks so good. Thank you Beth for the file.  I then added it to the folded part of the card, then added the 15 and his name made in Fairycuts again, to the front of the card, I stickled it (of course) then I added the digi stamp by Kenny Keirnen HERE coloured in Chelsea's colours in PS, printed and cut out  and added to the card raised on 3d stickers.  I printed and raised a T shirt copied from the web, as a stop on the card then cut and added a small football as well.

I shall be enetering the following challenges with this card
http://ellephantasticchallenges.blogspot.com/ Add some layers
http://onestopcraftchallenge.blogspot.com/  Anything but square
http://papercreatorscrafts.blogspot.com/  Easel cards
http://sendasmile4kidschallenge.blogspot.com/  Punches and diecuts (I hope the Cricut counts)
http://2sisterschallengeblog.blogspot.com/  Boys and their toys
http://challengeupyourlife.blogspot.com/  Something for the Men  (I hope this is old enough)
http://crazy4challenges.blogspot.com/  key code C4C102  Create Male themed

Spring chicken

I am under a lot of pressure for making cards (wanted yesterday!!) this week and other things, so this is a late entry to Less is More, it's a fun card, that's how I feel, so I am entering the challenge hoping a few people will have a bit of a chuckle.  The image is Spring Chicken, if you hadn't guessed, by Creative Mind of Sylvie, I have 3D'd the spring and put the chicken on a real spring so he moves :) it's a digi so coloured it in PS and cut it out, Stickled it like mad.  Hope you enjoy it.  Sorry couldn't comment on many, but have had a VERY quick look at quite a number and so many beautiful cards entered as usual.  Well done everyone.

  I think this may be my last post this week, but I am leave next week, we are going away to my bruvver & SIL in Lincoln, so really really looking forward to seeing them and a bit of crafting with like minded SIL whooppeee.  Will try and post on the weekend!! if not have a lovely Bank Holiday everyone.

Wedding card

This is one of the wedding cards I was asked to do, hope she likes it, it's been cut on my Cricut with an SVG I downloaded, oh! I wish I would add the name to the file at the time of downloading,  The only thing I have is the files are names HBDPD-t and HBDPD-b. If anyone knows where I had this from would they let me know, I could then credit the person.  This is a fabulous cut and it cut beautifully with me welding the shape in Fairycuts.  The image is from Gina Jane Honeyville Spring, the heart was cut from the Cricut Home Decor cartridge, the flowers are from Papermania, the font is HavixHmkBold, the bow is from stash so is the bling. The finished size is 6x6.
I still have cards to do I should have done yesterday, where did the time go to? so on and upwards - hopefully.

I will be entering the following challenges with this card
http://designed2delight.com/blog/ Anything Goes
http://littleclairesdesigns.blogspot.com/ Wedding / Anniversary theme
http://blog.cuddlybuddly.com/ Swirls and Bling
http://digiswithattitudechallenges.blogspot.com/ Anything Goes
http://thepoodlesparlour.blogspot.com/ Anything Goes

Food Poster

I was asked by my Manager to make a poster so that it could be put onto the fridge as a reminder to staff to remove old food! She gave me a poster to work off, which showed an old fridge and the words "terror in the fridge".  As it's for a hospital staff fridge, I had to get my facts and spelling right, (hope I have. I'll know if they like it on Monday when I take it in. I would guess there will be a few alterations)

I wanted to do something "arty" and as my knowledge of Photoshop is limited for that kind of thing. I looked at a few tutorials online, I came across this one HERE this is the poster I aspired to

It had a lot of additions and new things that I hadn't tried before, I failed a few times and had to retrace a few steps to redo and understand, but I have to say I loved doing it, what a challenge and learning at the same time.

I then had to come up with who presents the "film" in association with, produced by, who would star in it etc, my "odd" sense of humour came in then with Gastro Enteritis and Salmon Ella!, Music by - it had to be Wind! casting by Rotten Food!, camera by Endoscopy and photography by Xray! I've had a laugh learned a few things and hope everyone who sees it will get the message about their rotten food!  We will see.   I bet you can't wait to see my interpretation of the "film" poster - well here it is, in the flesh -

TERROR STALKS THE FRIDGE!

OK it doesn't look as bright as the original, but it will when it's been laminated!  AND the original is off the screen so would look brighter AND mine is on plain paper, OK enough excuses, it does look better in real life - honest.

I altered the size of the original to an A4 size to fit, and for me to do a borderless poster.  That's all for this post, I have a few blogs to look at now and see what challenges I can enter, I also have 2 wedding cards to do and a birthday card, so I think that's keep me busy for the rest of the day!

50th Birthday

Another rush order, the card was asked to contain, green, Irish, wine, glamour, princess and the name Iris of the recipient and she has a sense of humour!  I knew instantly what I would use for glamour as I had used this image before. I  have had it for quite a few years.

I put together and made a couple extra parcels from DP's, placed a wine bottle and glasses and then added a crown for good measure. I also found a shamrock I had from somewhere, one of those lost names I'm afraid, and placed it on 2 of the parcels.  I thought the font added a light touch.  Not too much on this one, but it took me 3 hours in PS, no colouring by me though for a change, but the placing & deciding (the worst part) then deciding what I would do on the inside and finding a verse etc etc. I then printed another hat and scarf and umbrella and the front of the cloth and 3'd them onto the card.  I'm pleased with it and I love the images.  It's not quite as purple as here IRL I also added Stickles on the parcels and her hat.

Images from Olivia’s Frenchy at DAISIE
crown is from Gina Jane Fairy Princess DAISIE
font is Fontdinerdotcom Sparkly

In Shock!!!!!!!!

I entered a card on the Wag n Whiskers blog and guess what I WON, HERE I am thrilled silly, I get to have one of their rubber stamps, I have chosen a really beautiful stamp called "Say a Prayer" so look out for my attempts at rubber stamping when I receive it.  After my Xmas card I am going to have a go again.

A few days later I got another win, to say I was shocked was an understatement,  perhaps I should buy the lottery ticket instead of my hubby!  I must admit I have been as excited.  

My win was with Meljens Designs for my Back to School card HERE  I won 3 of Meljens Digi Stamps, the following card is one of my choices called Girl Tunes, which I shall enter into this weeks challenge http://meljensdesignsdt.blogspot.com/2011/08/challenge-71-and-new-release.html Something Black, I will be in by the skin of my teeth.

The DP's are by SummerTime Designs, the Digi as I said is by Meljens Designs, I coloured her in PS,  the colour combination came about by me colouring her iPod blue for some reason, so I followed through with the mirror card and ribbon from my stash.

LIM one layer

This has been the biggest chllenge so far, I gave it my best shot, but I am a digi / computer girl at heart, sorry to those stampers who produce the most incredible work, including Chrissy and Mandi, this week.  I cannot get my head around it.   I have a box full of stamps, a few inks, but every time I try it, I throw so much away I give up. 

I watched a recording of  Barbara Gray demonstrating stamps in "The Classroom" on Create and Craft, thinking I would learn something, she was great and made it look so easy, so out with my stamps,I chose a 30's lady from Docrafts, played about with some Brilliance inks I have, what a mess, OK turn the card over and try again.  I tried another stamp this time with some Adirondack inks I have and never used, I put a few drops on a piece of plastic, quite liked the effect put the card on top, YUCK!

I am not going to be beaten thought I, so I looked through my stamps again and decided to go simple (a bit like me stamping) and found a lovely Xmas scene, that one year I decided I would use as a Xmas card, it failed so I didn't.  However today it beckoned I stamped it onto navy card with embossing ink, then used, I think, Docrafts Heat It Up embossing powder Silver Pearl.  It went all over the card, out with my paint brush and very carefully I brushed off the excess, still specks on it though.  I know this week's challenge is one layer, but I pasted the navy card onto white as I didn't have any larger navy card and the stamp was too big onto a smaller card, if that makes sense!  I then decided it was too plain, so out with my water colour pencils and I went over the trees with green, then realised duh! the tree should have had snow on it, so I went over it with my white pencil. At the end of all that, I have to admit, I loved doing the colouring and the end result is OK!

a cuppa

I had very little time today to play, but felt guilty I hadn't done another card for the CDAC challenge, http://priscillastyles.ning.com/#?=  I loved the tea cup and tea pot by Sandi Samples and saw a colour challenge with unusual choice of colours I had to go with and it suited them both, so here is my VERY quick card of the teacup only.  I have even left off a sentiment because of time, at least I can added it later.  I hope to do more of this cup with the teapot, taking more time :)

The background paper is from Winged Jewels by Audrey J Roberts, cut out with Fairycuts on my Cricut, I made a shape in PS for the eggplant colour middle, which I embossed with my Cuttlebug folder Flower Fantasy, I wrapped green ribbon around it, which is from stash, I also coloured the teacup in the Periwinkle Blue, Eggplant, and Pistachio! a gorgeous combination, required by the challenge at http://www.blog2.ourcraftlounge.com/ I shaded, cut out, then duplicated the teacup and 3D'd it. I cut silver card from Hobbycraft in a circle then put it all together.  A quick, but I think pretty card, hope you feel the same.

Ruby wedding card

I did a Pearl wedding card a few posts back, well it seems the occasion was a Ruby not a Pearl anniversary, so the Pearl card goes in to the bin!!!!! My customer got mixed up.  I haven't tried to recycle yet as I was a bit upset to start, then thought, well there are mistakes by me with some and they are wasted, very few thankfully. As it had been saved in PS I was able to adjust the colours and the years for the inside, but had to completely renew the front.  here is the new card

I cut the new circles on my Cricut from the Doodlecharms and Straight from the Nest cartridges with gold paper from Hobbycraft, the "ruby" card is from stash.  The fancy heart was cut from the Home Decor cartridge.  The ribbon is grosgrain from Dovecraft and the roses and bling are from stash.  The leaves were cut with a punch, I can't remember where I got it, but it has www.L-Em.com on it.

Son's card

I made this card a few weeks ago, not knowing I was going to post it tonight after using another of Elizabeth Dulembo's images. You can see the link in my previous post, I love this image and as my son is a LEO and loves reading, more so since he has had a Kindle, I thought this apt.  I have used DP's by Summertime Designs HERE and part of her"A BOO-tiful Night" set. I have used the font ArabBruD, cut the shapes on my Cricut and followed a sketch Cupcake20June. I coloured it in PS.

I am going to enter this in to the following challenges
http://tuesdaythrowdown.blogspot.com/ Birthday
http://anythingchallenge.blogspot.com/ Happy Birthday / Celebration
http://aspoonfullofsugarchallenge.blogspot.com/  Happy Birthdday
http://thestampingboutiquechallengeblog.blogspot.com/ Birthday for young males

LIM Flag colours

I love this weeks challenge, I knew straight away what I would do for the Welsh flag, this is what I have found out about it, most of which even I didn't know!  I live at the bottom of the country near Swansea.

Y Ddraig Goch or Red Dragon

Map of UK, Wales is in the pink :)

According to Ancient and Heraldic traditions much symbolism is associated with colors. The colors on the Welsh flag represent the following:

• • White - peace and honesty
  • Red - hardiness, bravery, strength & valour
  • Green - hope, joy and love acred significance

• The Meaning & History of the Welsh Flag
  • The Welsh flag is known as Y Ddraig Goch, the Red Dragon 
    how to say the Welsh,
    Y is pronounced - U as uh! not why, 
    Ddraig - Thrige the th as in the and a hard g as in get, 
    Goch  - another hard g as in get, o as in oh! the ch has to be pronounced in the back of the throat! as if you are gargling.
    Now try it, LOL. 
    I'm not a Welsh speaker, but can read, say and understand a few words I can also sing the National anthem.
    
  • The Romans carried banners bearing Dragon emblems - it is believed that legends about dragons were passed to the Romans from the Persian Empire
    
    
  • The Welsh hero Cadwaladr carried the dragon standard in the 700's (not 1700's)
    
    
    
  • The Tudors claimed Welsh ancestry and their livery was green and white. The Tudors claim to the English throne was strengthened by this association
    
    
• The Welsh flag has been officially used since the 1950s
  
  
  • Welsh Land Size : 8800 square miles
  • Climate / Weather of Wales : temperate; moderated by prevailing southwest winds over the North Atlantic Current; more than one-half of the days are overcast
  • Welsh Population : 2,946,200
  • Former Name(s) : Cambria
  • Welsh Main Industries :  machine tools, electric power & automation equipment, communications equipment, metals, chemicals, coal, petroleum, food processing, textiles, clothing, and other consumer goods
  • Welsh Agricultural products : cereals, oilseed, potatoes, vegetables; cattle, sheep, poultry; fish
  • Welsh Currency : British pound (GBP) Stirling
  
  

Now on to my card if I haven't bored you too much.

I had an Elizabethe Dulembo digi HERE of a wonderful dragon, I used Shellys.images.co HERE "grass" and made up the sentiment, the font I used is Freebooter Script, because I thought it suited his tail :). coloured in PS

Oh! sorry, I added the Union Flag a little later than the rest, as I forgot to add it

The Union Flag was a little harder, of course it was red white and blue, but what image, I eventually found an image from TLC Vintage HERE and thought her perfect for my interpretation (big word there, are you impressed?) coloured in PS, the font is Fashion Victim and I used a gradient in PS to make it red, white and blue too, I then mounted her onto blue and red card from Papermania and  Stickled her hair piece.
I hope this VERY long post hasn't been too much for you, but you have found out a little about my country. Diolch (Thank you)

I WON!

I entered a card on the Wag n Whiskers blog and guess what I WON, I am thrilled silly, I get to have one of their rubber stamps, I have chosen a beautiful stamp called "Say a Prayer" so look out for my attempts at rubber stamping LOL.

I am entering this card in to the Wags n Whiskars challenge for this week, well I HAD to didn't I? LOL.

I have done another card with the same image and background for a friends daughter as in my previous post, I love this image. Luckily I had it all set up on PS and just had to print it out, cut her out and then cut out the round shapes and Stickled and put them all together following Wags n Whiskars sketch. (I thought it strange that the sketch I followed on my last card a Fridays Sketches challenge was almost the same.)  Wags n Whiskers also has a recipe with the sketch, hope I'm near enough to it. 


Recipe........

I want to see

1. Something Blue
2. Something dimensional
3. Something patterned
 This is the link to the challenge
http://willowsketchiechallenge.blogspot.com/

The details are all the same as in my previous post, except I have added shaped gloss paper by Cuddly Buddly and silver card by Hobbycraft, (which is behind the pink and you can hardly see) and pink and blue ribbon from The Range.  I hope you don't mind me posting nearly the same card, but as I said I love this image and even all the colours.  I seem to be in a blue mood, I think the last few cards have been blue, I suppose it's the Piscean in me LOL

Hope Monday has been good to you :)

Back to School

I have used  DP's called Pink Surprise by Bearly Designs and Funky Fairy Free Blue Xmas, pink ribbon from stash and the beautiful Dance by Whoopsiedaisy Digi Stamps.  I have coloured her in PS and paer pieced her dress with another of Funky Hands Free Xmas paper and layered or decoupaged her whichever side of the Atlantic you are :). I then cut out, with the help of Fairycuts and my Cricut, Back to School and then stickled the words and her ribbon and frill.

I shall be entering the following challenges with her
http://wagsnwhiskersrubberstamps.blogspot.com Sparkly
http://priscillastyles.ning.com/#?= Freebie Challenge
http://meljensdesignsdt.blogspot.com/ Back to School

Pearl Anniversary

I have had an order for a Pearl anniversary card, which if possible I have to include - missing shorts, narrow boat captain, Proms in the Park , a Plaster jacket for the lady, a cottage in Solva (Llanelli), Picnic by the river, French bread/wine/mussells, Dolphins, and a caravan in France.  NOT much is it?

It has taken me all of Friday night, half of Saturday and most of Sunday, but I did it and the only things left off were the plastic jacket and the mussells. I didn't know what plastic jacket she meant and thought the mussells would be too small!!!!!.

The sketch I followed is named CS25H1

I have used a an A3 card in half, making the finished size A4, the shape I cut on my Cricut from the Straight from the Next cartridge, the grey celebration card I used for the back of the shape and the tags I have had for years, sorry don't know who by, the silver card is from Hobbycraft, the flowers are by Papermania, the ribbon was from PaperMill direct before they closed their shop, the pins are a win from Pink Paper Palace, the hearts are cut on the Cricut and embossed with the swirly folder by Cuttlebug, phew! that's a lot.

The "memories" are bits of digis I had from the net and from file, I have altered 2 slightly to fit the brief, the table and chairs, wine and bread are Frenchy by Olivia, man is Hunnybunny, I've hidden his pants underneath by making his shirt longer and the woman is Forgetful Freda both by Marlene at Squigglefly, the cottage is by Bird Cards.com, the caravan is one I have had for years, no name for it I'm afraid, with a background from PC HugBug.  Proms photos are from the BBC web site. Oh! yes and the pearls are from Papermania.  All coloured in PS.

I think that's all, if I have left anyone out, my apologies.  It has been, believe it or not a difficult card to work out and on.  I'm glad it's a one off!!!!!  now all I have to do is hope that she likes it.

Red letter Day

I was thrilled to be a winner on the CDAC challenge with LiaStampz, this is the badge I had, I'm now a Cookie" instead of eating them LOL.

 One of the winning stamps was catmail_liastampz, I chose him, 'cause he's so cute.  The card is made from pearlised card from Cuddly Buddly, the DP's are from Jannisscrap Designs, the envelopes are a "shape" in PS, the fonts are Fultoon and Gill Sans Ultra Bold.I decoupaged the mouse as you can see in the closeup.  I coloured it in PS.

 I shall be entering the following challenges with this card

http://cardmakinmamas.blogspot.com/ Birthday cards
http://glittergeeks.blogspot.com/ Furry and Feathery Friends
http://stampchallenges.blogspot.com/ Just use a Digi
http://stampingwithdragon.blogspot.com/ Red Green and White
http://frosteddesigns.blogspot.com/ Colouring
http://thepoodlesparlour.blogspot.com/ Round and Round The Garden
also putting it on to the CDAC gallery and LiaStampz gallery

Chef card

 Firstly I must thank everyone for their lovely comments on my recent fruit card.  It certainly makes a difference to hear what other "cardies" think of what's been done.

CDAC have got a challenge going where for entering the challenge you get 6 digi's for free, I love the artists there and have quite a few of their stamps.  This is a card I made last night, that will go in to the challenge, I will then make more (hopefully to enter another 2 of the 6 received). The link for the challenge is http://priscillastyles.ning.com .

My card is made up of different DP's and the hearts paper, must be one of the first I ever downloaded, so sorry I don't know from where I can tell you it includes fairy images and a few other papers as well. The stripe paper is by Summertime Designs, the plain blue background is called Australian Dubo Grass!! sorry again, don't know who by.  The little chef is by Digistamps4joy, I love him.  I coloured him in PS. and the blue check trousers I paper pieced is called "gingham light blue" sorry don't know who by.  The font is FultoonHmk I printed the plain blue background straight on to the card, a lovely pearlised from Cuddly Buddly, and the rest on card also from Cuddly Buddly.
(Just noticed that his left cheek in my lightening process has disappeared, I hadn't noticed before, so a little touch up is called for LOL.)

Fruit CAS

I have remade the card, why? well Diva Mandi wasn't that impressed and if it comes to it I wasn't either, I just wanted to get the card posted, so I redid it and made a "proper" Cas card  out of it.   I couldn't think of a sentiment so thought a basket of fruit, is usually given for celebration (OK this isn't a basket of fruit, but its mixed fruit!)  LOL
I hope our illustrious leaders will think this better and more in line with the CAS requirement and I actually thank Mandi for giving me the push to NOT accept the half hearted.

I shall be putting this on Priscilla Styles gallery too.

Fruit

These are the instuctions from our Illustrious Limette Leaders. 

Ok, so we have our 'Lucky Dip' week as it's the fifth Saturday of July.

The challenge is 

FEELING FRUITY

We would like to see fruit on your cards or fruit colours...easy peasy 'lemon' squeezy!

How do I do this - easy peasy 'lemon' squeezy!, well, I did a card the other week, posted earlier in my blog of a melon, so thought I would "cheat" and  copy it, then thought that wouldn't do for Chrissy and Mandi their standards are too high and they do say "no backlinks" so I thought as I had a lot to do I would copy it!!!! to make up the time I didn't have -  this is it.

I preferred the first melon thanks, so on Sunday I started looking for a suitable image I had, digis for me as you know :)  then found a Priscilla Styles "Fruit" that I had forgotten I had and decided to have a go at that, colouring on PS, sorry I can't do otherwise, I make such a mess.  I finished the colouring and printed it on Cuddly Buddly pearlised card, then decided to use Penny Duncan Shaplies on my Cricut to make a shape around the fruit, I edged it in purple with my Whispers ink pad, added another layer of purple and then cut the corners with my ribbon punch and threaded green ribbon through each corner.

I'm not sure what it's suitable for at the moment so will hold it back and see what happens.  I hope you like it. (them)  Sorry for the photo quality, but I photographed it at night.