Happy New Year!

Woohoo, Happy 2010 folks :)

I've started the new year off with a bang and I've made a card already....yippee.

This card fulfils the challenges as below

• The Pink Elephant #47 - Choice of 2 sketches
• Cards for Men #2 - Use the theme 'New'
• Little Paper Shop #48 - Colours of light blue, Navy and silver
• 365 Cards Day 188 - Use a flock texture
• Fussy & Fancy Friday Challenge #1 - New
• Daring Cardmakers - New beginnings
• Paperplay #46 - New Beginnings
• 3 Clovers Thursday #45 - Celebration
• Cupcake Craft Challenge #71 - Celebration
• Charisma Cardz - Celebration
• Secret Crafter #64 - New Beginnings
• Rosie Dee's #61 - Open Theme
• Creative card Crew #41 - Anything Goes
• My Time To Craft #72 - Anything Goes
• By The Cute & Girly - New
• Rainbow Lady's Challenge #84 - New

The base card is a metallic silver and I have cut a mat in a navy blue sparkle cardstock. The papers are from Heidi Swapp and it is the first time I have brought myself to cut into it. The birdie ribbon in the centre was cut from a flocked sheet, it feels lovely just like Fuzzy Felt when I was a kid :) The circular pram is a cardstock sticker with the addition of a birdie rub-on. This is matted onto more of the navy card and mounted on 3D foam. The sentiment are stickers from a co-ordinated sticker set.

I've gone off the boil in combining challenges for the last few months and I'm going to try and make a concerted effort to do more challenges again. I really enjoyed doing this for some months last year and I felt it gave me more focus in making cards for specific reasons. I start level 2 of my college course next week so hopefully I'll be able to fit more crafting into my schedule and be more disciplined with myself instead of vegging out in front of the TV when I'm tired.

365 Cards Day 140

It's the last day today for Shortcuts sponsoring 365 Cards. I've managed to make the whole week and I've made another acetate card. I've really enjoyed using it this week and I think I will try to incorporate it into more cards. It's been great to use a material that I wouldn't normally and it makes you think about placement of adhesive more to cover it up on the inside.

I have incorporated the following challenges into this card :-

• 365 Cards Day 140 - use Paint on your card (Twinkling H20's on image)
• CPS Sketch 124 - Layour of card
• Cupcake Craft Challenge 48 - Blossoms & Butterflies (2nd card)
• Stampin' B's Challenge #15 - Include a butterfly in your project
• Get Creative with Ann GCA #49 - Include something that flies (3rd card)
• Allsorts #10 - Only use 1 piece of anything

The card blank is the rest of the card that I cut down earlier in the week with the last of the same sheet of acetate. I added a strip of patterned paper from Craftwork Cards. The stamped image was from a swap we did on the forum and it is coloured in with Twinkling H20's. I love these little pots of paint as the shimmer is so very pretty. If you enlarge the picture you can see it especially on the butterflies and the Penny Black hedgehog. This was matted onto red card and the corners were trimmed off with my ever faithful punch.

The little frame has been in my stash forever, I think it's a HOTP one and the rose sticker I think came from Poundland on a massive sheet of assorted flowers and butterflies.

I've managed to complete a full week at 365 cards. That's 7 entries into the Shortcuts competition..... yippeee !!! Good job it's Sunday to Saturday as I will be out all day tomorrow and won't be able to make a card for Sketchy Sunday. Hopefully I can catch up during the week.

Not sure how my cardmaking will fare next week as I start my new job on Monday. It may take me a few days to settle into a routine but I really hope I can fit at least one card a day in.

365 Cards Day 135, GCA 49, TPE 23, CCC 48 & Paper Blooms, ABC

I've had a pretty good day today. It started off with me applying for jobs on the tinterweb and I've managed to get 2 interviews for Wednesday afternoon. One is for a job that I would really like so I'm keeping my fingers crossed on that one. he doctor is really pleased with my BP and I don't have to see him now for 2 months and I've managed to keep up with the 365 Cards challenges this week, that's much better than of late.

After all the rotten luck we have had lately it would be nice to see the tide turning for a bit.

• So this little beauty was made primarily for today's challenge at 365 Cards and incorportate the following challenges :-

• 365 Cards Day 135 - Create a window on your card using see through material
• Get Creative with Ann #49 - Spread your wings & fly
• The Pink Elephant#23 - Red, Light Blue and a darker blue
• Cupcake Craft Challenges #48 - Blossoms & butterflies
• Paper Blooms - make a shaped card
• ABC Challenge - W is for Window

The base card was cut using a free flower template that I got off the Inspire Me website. I cut a window from it to fit the size of the message die cut (can't remember where that came from but thik it may have been a QVC kit) I used my Nestabilities to cut a frame, an acetate window and another frame to sandwich it inside. The card base has been covered with a spotty paper from Clare Curds 'The Big One' from Papermania.

I added a tiny gem to the inside of the card as the flower centre on the die cut. The butterflies are textured cardstock stickers by Papermania. There was a lot of handcutting on this card but I'm pleased with how it turned out. Sorry for the shadows on the photo, I had to take it very late tonight and need to go beddy bies now.