October Challenge Week 2

Here's your week two reminder for our prize challenge.   This month we have a theme and the theme is ANYTHING BUT A CARD.   I thought it might be nice to give you some ideas for handmade gifts for Christmas so you could choose to make framed pictures, stamped candles, glassware etc etc and I will be giving you more ideas as the month goes on but if you can't manage something complex, then think scrapbook page or tag.   As long as it is NOT A CARD it counts!   You must still use at least ONE PRODUCT from the range we sell in STORE.

Here's some inspiration from the DT - they've both got Christmas decorations in mind this week!

Kate

Made using Lawn fawn dies, Stitched scallop borders  Stitched snowflakes  Mini snowflakes   and Bows and holly  stamp set

Keren

                                      

My project was a little tag gift box using the Hero Arts/Lia Griffith 'Elves by Lia' and 'Joyful Tidings Tag Set by Lia'   I've done it in non traditional Christmas colours so you can see it could be adapted for any occasion ( including the bauble dies).

You have until 10pm (GMT) on MONDAY 26TH OCTOBER to link up your project on the challenge page when you're ready to play  http://makethedayspecialcards.blogspot.co.uk/p/challenges.html

August Challenge Week 2

Here's your first reminder to play along in our sketch challenge this month.

You can flip the sketch and change the shapes a little to fit your design, as long as we can see our sketch was your jumping off point.  You must also use at least one product we sell in store to be eligible for the £15 prize voucher.

Need a little inspiration?   Well our fabulously talented design team will be here each week with our interpretations , here are the two great ones but make sure you come back in 7 days to see some more.

Keren used WPlus9 Encouraging Words

Kate used  Newtons Antics stamp set.

You have until 10pm on the 22nd August to link up your entry here when you've made it.

July Challenge Week 2

How are you getting on with our Christmas in July challenge?   Ours has a twist - we don't want Christmas cards - we want you to use your Christmas sets to make ANYTHING BUT a Christmas themed project!

Here's some more inspiration from the design team to kick start the creative juices.

Kate used Winnie and Walter Happy Christmas set.

Keren

The rest of the DT will have their projects to share over the next couple of weeks but in the meantime get your craft on and link up to the challenge post when you're ready.  As long as you use products from the store then you have the chance to win a £15 store voucher!

The challenge closes at 10pm on the 22nd July.

June Colour Week 2

So here we are with our second week of inspiration for our by the sea inspired colour theme challenge.  Just pick one picture and use 3 shades from it.

Our fabby DT have some more great projects to inspire you.

Kate

using Lawn Fawn products

Keren
using W Plus 9 Dockside stamp set

You have until midnight on Monday the 22nd June to link up your entries to challenges page - make a card, a scrapbook page or even a 3d project - whatever takes your fancy for a chance to win £15.   Don't forget to use a product we sell!  http://makethedayspecialcards.blogspot.co.uk/p/challenges.html

May Sketch Challenge Week 2

It's time for your reminder to join in with our monthly challenge - just make a project using the sketch above and you could win £15 to spend in store.   We have some more awesome projects from the DT to get the creative juices flowing....

Kate
Used Year 5 from Lawn Fawn

Keren
Used Mama Elephant supplies; Slim Tags Trio Creative Cuts , Honey Bunny & Make A Wish

You have until 10pm on Sunday 24th May to play along and you can combine with other challenges as long as we can see our sketch in there somewhere.   You must include a link to the challenge in your blog post and you must use at least one product from the store to be eligible for the prize.  Link up your entry on our challenge page when you're ready to play.  http://makethedayspecialcards.blogspot.co.uk/p/challenges.html

Stamping Contrasts - Die Cutting vs Stamping

For today's penultimate Stamping Contrast post Keren and Julia are focussing on Fresh Cut Florals from Wplus9 and their contrast is focussing on Stamping vs Die Cutting with a set that has matching dies. 

Julia

To me, the Fresh Cut Florals is the stamp set that introduced me to multi layer stamping. Before, I had no idea such delight existed, but seeing this set used for the first time was like a revelation. For today's card, I decided to focus on a) doing a color that contrasts with Keren's card and b) do a twist on the multi layering of colors. I decided to only go with one base color (light blue) and then use gold embossing powder for the second layer. Some of these stamps have more images (three or more layers), but I decided to leave it at two so the contrast between the blue and gold would be as stark as possible.

Keren

    

We wanted to do things focussing on die-cutting and when I looked carefully at the set, the little leaves jumped out to be used in a different way. By die-cutting the leaves over 40 times (yes, I know!) then stamping in different colours and using the leaf veins stamp to add as petal veins it helped make it look less like leaves and more like a flower. Having the dies were so helpful as otherwise I'd have been there for ages and also, the uniform white line around the flower petals helps separate the different colours more effectively. The flower set up involved tracing around a circle die, adding the outer layer first and then working inwards.
I cut around the whole flower and cut straight lines either side of the flower to give a more streamlined look. I've added this onto a base of acetate and added the Trio of Happy dies and some Christmas washi tape

 

Have we inspired you to join in the fun?
If you fancy having a go and challenging yourself to stamp a contrast along with us then link up your entry below - just pick a contrast from any we'll be demonstrating this week and make your own.   You could either make 2 cards to show the contrast or just choose one of ours and make the contrast to match it (so choose Julia's layered stamped card and make a project focussing on the matching dies like Keren did with whatever stamps and dies you have - you don't have to replicate the project - just the contrast of using the dies as your focus)   We'll leave the link open for a week after our final post on Saturday so you have time to see all the contrasts before picking one to join in with and then have a full week to play.   You never know, we might even find a prize for the best contrast ;-)

An InLinkz Link-up

Stamping Contrasts - Colour

It's day 3 of our week long stamping contrasts series - we do hope you're having as much fun as we did as a DT getting together to bring this series to you.

For our contrast today - Keren and Sarah are showing you what a difference colour can make - you can achieve such a different look from a set like Painted Butterflies by playing with Colour VS Monochrome.

Keren

Colour is definitely the easier one.. I wanted to do something really bright without it being 'rainbow'. We had both picked 'Painted Butterflies' by Altenew and I wanted to showcase the little butterflies in the set. I had the idea of them flying beyond the card and so cut out an acetate hollow heart shape. I folded it in half and then started to add the butterflies. These are a 3 step inked stamp- and trust me, this set is so forgiving, you won't need to worry if they're precisely lined up.

Once I'd stuck them all down, I added foam pads at different stacked heights so the heart would remain folded on the card and then added a thin strip of acetate in the middle to rest the white embossed sentiment onto.

Sarah

Isn't Keren's card spectacular?!  Initially I scratched my head in terms of how I could use the layered butterfly stamps from Altenew in a black and white design.  Black on black would just look like a smudge :)  I decided to stamp the butterfly in Black Soot Distress Ink on watercolour card.  I didn't stamp all of the layers and tried my hand at watercolouring to give the butterfly some dimension and interest. I splattered some ink in the background and added a sentiment from the same set.  The central panel is die cut with a Lawn Fawn stitched square and matted on black card.  I think it came out quite atmospheric and a real contrast to Keren's gorgeously vibrant (and dimensional) design.

Have we inspired you to join in the fun?
If you fancy having a go and challenging yourself to stamp a contrast along with us then link up your entry below - just pick a contrast from any we'll be demonstrating this week and make your own.   You could either make 2 cards to show the contrast or just choose one of ours and make the contrast to match it (so choose Keren's colourful card and make a monochrome one like Sarah did with whatever stamps you have)   We'll leave the link open for a week after our final post on Saturday so you have time to see all the contrasts before picking one to join in with and then have a full week to play.   You never know, we might even find a prize for the best contrast ;-)

An InLinkz Link-up

February Challenge Week 2

Ready for another week of inspiration on how to use our sketch for this month's challenge?  Well here we are with some more ideas to get you going. 

Remember you can change the heart to another shape if you'd prefer - just keep the overall feel of the sketch so we know our challenge inspired you and make sure to use at least one item we sell to be eligible for the £15 prize.

Keren

Kate

Once you've got your project ready, link it up on our challenge page.

We'll be back next Sunday with another reminder!

 

Challenge 4 - Week 2

Are you playing along with our theme challenge this month?   We want you to look back at your early work - pick a card you made the first year you started to blog (or the first year you started to craft if you don't blog) and CASE it and see how different your new version is and how far your crafting style has changed.   If you are not familiar with the term CASE - it stands for Copy And Share Everything - and is just a term for "be inspired by" so you don't have do a direct copy of an old card, just see what sparks you from looking at your old work - it could be the style, the stamp (a good way to give a little love to long forgotten stash), the colours, the theme - anything.   Don't forget to share your original card with us too so we can see what sparked the inspiration.

We have more CASE Histories from our DT to share this week to inspire you if you are stuck for to play this challenge:

Lou

This was one of my first MTDS blog posts-before I even had a blog of my own! Here is the original:

And here is my new take on it:

Kate

I decided to case my first card for make the day special as that was pretty much when i started card making.
I have still used some patterned paper but just a panel, i rarely use ribbon so switched it for some twine.

Keren

Here's my original card- I was amazed that I've blogging for as long as I have- looking back was pretty embarrassing!

I took inspiration from the colours, the scenery & the sentiment placement. Hopefully you can see a little improvement!

You have until 10pm on Tuesday 22nd July to play along - just link up your projects on our Challenges page http://makethedayspecialcards.blogspot.co.uk/p/challenges.html    We'll be back next Tuesday with a final reminder and projects from the rest of the DT.   As usual there is a £15 Store Voucher up for grabs for our favourite project.