Don't let go!

Good morning all! Hope you are fine and well on this Tuesday morning. The weather isn't quite living up to the weatherman's promise, but we can live in hope!

I didn't quite manage to get this post written last night, so here is a slightly belated second inspiration post for this week's challenge at Incy Wincy Designs. Just to recap, our challenge is for you to Make a Pocket Card, and there are plenty of tutorials if you go to SplitCoast Stampers and type Pocket Card into the Search Resources box on the Tutorials page.

We've got 2 amazing sponsors for you again this week! Firstly, we're welcoming back Janet and the team from Pink Gem Designs who are offering one lucky winner a great prize.



And we're also very pleased to welcome a new sponsor this week - Tamara and her team from The Stamping Chef, and they are offering our second lucky winner a $10 gift Certificate to their store. And here's a bit about them:
The Stamping Chef was born in November 2012, after I (Tamara) decided to switch from the scrapbook community to the crafter side of designing. Drawing is my passion, and my style is fun, cute and doodlish..I think =D.  I love to see images come to life when they're colored by amazing crafters. Creating digital images can be a tedious process, but I love each and every step of it. I have a lovely bunch of ladies standing next to me, creating, giving me advice, and help me everywhere they can. I'm so totally new in this great adventure, but I love it! It's so totally different than I'm used to. I hope I can provide you with loads of cute, happy, funny images you can work with.


Today, I'm showcasing one of the beautiful images from Pink Gem Designs and I have made a Criss Cross Card, which is a twist on a pocket card:

My card recipe is follows:

• Base Card - is 160gsm card in white which I cut, scored and folded following this tutorial to make the criss cross card base.
  
• Design Paper - is from a collection called Emma's Garden, which was a magazine freebie last year (I think!). To make sure the flowers go the same way, I cut two rectangles and ensured that I cut the diagonals so that I had a left side and a right side!
• Card Band - is made from a strip of 160gsm card in white onto which I've stuck another floral paper from the Emma's Garden paper collection. 
• Image - this cutie holding on tightly to her balloon is Chloe with Balloon and she is by Janet at Pink Gem Designs. I have used the pre-coloured version here, but your purchase also includes the line drawing so you can colour her yourself. I've fussy cut Chloe, and then fixed her to the Card Band with foam pads so it looks like she's sitting on the bottom of the band.
• Insert Tag - has been digitally designed in my word processing programme using a stripy paper from the Emma's Garden paper collection onto which I've superimposed a rounded corner rectangle in white, which gives a large area for writing the message to the recipient. I shrunk Chloe with Balloon to quite a small size, and inserted her on top of the white rectangle, again making it look like she's perched on it! I rounded the corners of the paper, before sticking it to another rectangle of 160gsm white card, which also had the corners rounded.
• Sentiment -  is by Debbie at The Crafty Pad Designs and is called Happy Birthday Plain Sentiment (available from Card Making Downloads). This was superimposed digitally onto the Insert Tag before I printed it out.
  

That's it for now ... I hope I've inspired you to try Making a Pocket Card. But before you do, please come over to Incy Wincy Designs and look at the gorgeous creations which my team mates and Linda (our Guest Designer for June) have made to futher inspire you. This challenge ends on Sunday 23rd June 2013.

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges:

• Challenge #46 - One for the Kids at The Cutie Pie Challenge
• Challenge #12 - Fold It! at Quirky Crafts - 2nd Entry
• P for Pretty in Pink at ABC Challenges
• DSC #40 - Photo Inspiration at Digitally Sweet Challenges I've been inspired by the girly pink colours in the photo. The insert to my project is all digitally layered up - hope this counts, if not please feel free to delete my project.
• Challenge #187 - Let's Go Pink at Crafty Catz

Hope you have a great day - catch you soon!

Hugs, Helen x

It's a Gem of a Sketch

This is my first post of the day - please scroll up to see my second post

Good morning my crafty friends! 

Firstly, I'd like to welcome my new followers JustYolie, Crafty Rose and Heather (Hev) ... I do hope you enjoy this crafty journey that we're all on ladies! 

Secondly I must apologise for the delay in this post going out. We are in the middle of redecorating, and I am down to sharing the computer with the rest of the family in the dining room ... which makes life difficult as I can't slope off to another room to do my blogging!!!!

 It's new challenge time at Incy Wincy Designs, and this time we've got a Sketch Challenge for you, which has been drawn by our own team-mate Sheryl ... and it's a totally awesome sketch, and one that I can see will be getting plenty of use.

For this challenge, we're welcoming Pink Gem Designs as our sponsor - they are offering this week's lucky winner 3 Digital Images from the store! The lovely Janet has also very kindly supplied the DT with images to use this week so, without further ado, here is my card for you using Sheryl's sketch which I have rotated 90 degrees clockwise:

My card recipe is as follows:

• Base Card - made from Centura Pearl in Snow White onto which I embossed the largest rosette shape from the "nest" on the Ultimate Pro Embossing Board Springtime Sweets and Cupcake Treats. I folded the card to make a hinge at the top, and 2 "feet" at the bottom and then cut round the embossed shape.
• Design Paper - is one of the lovely snowflake papers from The Snowman Papercrafting Collection CD-Rom. I embossed the largest circle from the nest on my Ultimate Pro Board, cut this out and then fixed it to my base card.
• Image - This gorgeous little fairy is called  Faye With Snowflake and she is just one of the gorgeous digis drawn by Janet from Pink Gem Designs. I set Fairy Faye onto the smallest rosette from the "nest" on the Ultimate Pro Embossing Board Springtime Sweets and Cupcake Treats, embossed the shape and then cut it out, before mounting it at the lower edge of my DP. To bring this little sweetie to life, I used my Spectrum Noir Pens in the following colours:
• Skin - FS2, FS3
• Hair - GB8, GB10
• Coat, Mitts & Boots - TB1, TB3, TB4
• Wings - Silver Gel Pen
• Fir Branches - CG1, CG2
• Outline - GG1
• Sentiment - is by Paulette from Create with TLC, and was one of the goodies in her Christmas Club last November. This year's Christmas Club is due to start on 3rd November and this is a great way to bulk up your Christmas stash without it costing the earth - you won't be disappointed!
• Ribbon - is 3mm Galena Opal wired ribbon from my stash, and was part of a Fantastic Ribbons blog candy I won last autumn from the lovely Annette - just perfect for this project of 'cool' colours!
• Snowflakes - made from Centura Pearl in Snow White using 2 different sizes of snowflake punch

My Incy Wincy team-mates and Saumya (this month's Guest Designer) have got plenty of further inspiration for you, so do pop over and check out their creations for this Sketch Challenge. Don't forget to come back and share your creations with us - you've got until Sunday 21st October 2012 to link your cards up.


I would like to enter this card into the following challenge:

• Challenge #135 - Music or a Song at One Stitch at a Time - the song title just has to be "Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow"!!!!!!!!!!!
• Challenge 87 - Things with Wings at Top Tip Tuesday
• Challenge #116 - Christmas Sentiment at Ooh-La-La Creations


Have a great and crafty week!

Hugs, Helen x