At the Beach

Hi It's Keryn here. Thank you so much to everyone that showed us your fabulous snow themed cards for our team dare last week.

That was an extremely hard dare for me as in New Zealand the skies are blue the sun is out and the kids have all finished school for the year and don't return until early February.

So this week I want you to make a card that shows what you'd be doing if you were here. Would you be going to the beach with your bucket and spade or would you be sunning yourself on some Pacific Island. If you just can't cope with the thought of sunny holidays right now make your card with yellows, oranges and other hot colours.

This week we say "Farewell" to Saskia, who has been such a wonderful Guest Designer for the last few months, thank you Saskia - we hope you'll come back for another GD spot soon!

We're off on our Christmas holidays for a couple of weeks after this dare, but we'll be back on January 7th to start off 2011's challenges.  So we'd like to take this chance to wish you all a Wonderful, Peaceful Christmas and a Very Happy New Year.

Don't forget to eave us a comment so we can come and admire your creations this week though!

To give you some inspiration scroll down and see what the design team have been up to with my dare.

Lynda

Saskia

Samm

Keryn

Kathy

Rein

 

Snow Much Fun

Thank you to everyone who joined in with our Turquoise Birthstone challenge this week the cards were so beautiful and so varied too. We wonder if any of you made a card for every single one of the birthstones over the year, they would look wonderful all displayed together, but they were probably all sent to your friends and relations straight away!

A huge thanks also to our lovely sponsor
Flourish With A Bling
for donating such a luscious prize for our lucky draw. All those (who met the criteria) went into the draw and we used the random.org number generator to pick a name.....and the winner is:

Amanda, aka Scotspanda

Congratulations, Amanda, you'll soon be seeing this prize in real life

Please contact Kathy via the email address on her blog with your postal info and your prize will be on it's way from Australia as soon as possible. For those who didn't win but would like some Bling of their own, you can contact Flourish With A Bling via their website to find their stockists. Oh, and do visit their fabby BLOG for all the news from the store - and some great craft ideas too.

This week should have been our lovely Asia Wu setting the challenge, but the dreadful weather we've been having in the UK has messed up their house-moving plans and she is currently without the internet (shock, horror). So we have a substitute, but very apt dare for you:

Snow Much Fun

Any sort of card you like, as long as it's got a snowy sort of theme will count this week and we hope you have some fun - let's face it, at least you get to stay in the warm and do your crafting even though you're thinking about the snow!

As always we'd love to see your creations so come back and leave a link telling us where we can see them.

Here's what the team have been making this week

Lynda

Saskia

Kathy

Keryn

Nat

Rein

.

Turquoise is December's Birthstone

Thank you to everyone who went Spotty and Stripy for Christmas during this last week - it was such fun seeing all those fabulous cards - spots and stripes have got to be one of our favourite design elements!

"If cold December gave you birth

The month of snow and ice and mirth

Place on your hand a turquoise blue

Success will bless whate'er you do."

We'd like you to use this gorgeous stone to inspire you this week,
you can make any sort of card you like and we're sure you will be creating wonderful things!

This week sees the very last of our monthly birthstone dares - we started this series way back with the very first challenge of January and here we are in December with this month's birthstone, the Turquoise.
To celebrate the end of the series we have a wonderful prize to give away to one lucky winner:

This fabulous set of flourishes and stones is generously given by  Australian company 
Flourish With A Bling!
At the moment their gorgeous goodies are available via their website but they are looking for stockists in other parts of the world so if you like what you see and, pass on their info to your favourite craft shop and keep your fingers crossed! Meanwhile of course, you can order direct from their website
As always our prizes are given at random - as long as you do these three things you'll be in with a chance of being the winner and receiving these goodies through the post direct from our fabby sponsor.

1.  Make a card inspred by the December Birthstone, Turquoise
2. Add links on your blog to Flourish with a Bling! and the Daring Cardmakers
3. Enter your project for no more than 5 challenges, including this one

There's lots of information on the internet about the Turquoise, about it's history, myths, the powers attributed to it and where the stones are most commonly found. You may find some inspiration for your cards by visiting HERE.

We hope you enjoy using the turquoise this week and look forward to seeing your creations - don't forget to come back and leave a link telling us where we can see your cards.

Here's what the team have been making this week -

Saskia

Keryn

Nat

Lynda

Kathy

Rein   

Jo

Asia

Spotty Stripy Christmas

We had a huge response to our We Three..... Dare last week so thanks to everyone who took the time to enter a card. There were some stunning creations as always!

If you like papers, ribbons, buttons, stamps etc featuring spots and stripes then this week's challenge will be right up your spotty, stripy street because we'd like to see lots of them on your cards!

We'd like to see Christmas cards this week, but featuring

both spots and stripes.

There you go, nice and easy, have fun!

Here's what the Design Team have come up with this week:-

Lynda

Saskia

Rein

Kathy

Samm

Keryn

Asia

Nat

Jo

We Three ................

Thank you to everyone who joined in last week with our Armistice Day special dare. The cards were beautiful and we hope that the subject gave everyone a chance to stop and think for a while.

Today, it's me (Kathy) here with this week's challenge:

"We Three ........"

Although inspired by the Christmas Carol "We 3 Kings of Orient are",
I wanted to to give you the chance to get more creative so you can make your card We 3.... well, anything really!

So, feel free to make a Christmas card if you like - or any other sort of card you fancy - as long as there's at least one set of three something;3 kings, 3 trees, 3 cupcakes etc on it anything goes! In fact - for an extra challenge, you could see just how many sets of 3 you can get on your card by adding 3 brads, 3 ribbons, 3 patterned papers....

We'd love to see where your imagination leads you, so please come back and let us know where we can see what you make

Here are some ideas from the team to start you thinking

Saskia

Kathy

Nat

Rein

Keryn

 Samm

 Lythan   

Asia

A Time to Remember

First of all a huge thank you to all of you who took part in our Topaz Dare last week – there were some stunning creations and it was a joy to come and see them all.

This week the Team have got together for a very special Dare:-

A TIME TO REMEMBER

Remembrance Sunday, the second Sunday in November, is the day traditionally put aside to remember all those who have given their lives for the peace and freedom we enjoy today. On this day people of many nations pause to reflect on the sacrifices made by our brave Service men and women.

The poppy became the symbol of remembrance as they were the only living thing that survived the bloody battles of Flanders during the First World War.

So to mark this very special Day of Remembrance we would like to see your cards based on the Poppy – be it the flower itself or it’s vibrant Red colour.

Please come back and leave us a link to your card. Here’s a little inspiration from the Team.

Lynda

Nat

Saskia

Rein

Kathy

Keryn

Lythan
Samm

Topaz, the November Birthstone

First of all, a big thank you to everyone who shared their Halloween inspired creations with us over the last week - it was definitely a Treat to see them all!

As you know, October was our Anniversary month and the DCM is officially four years old - so what better way to celebrate the start of our FIFTH year of challenges and inspiration (we hope!) than to introduce a new member of the Design Team. If you've been following the blog over the last few weeks you'll have met her already because we're delighted to announce that our recent Guest Designer

Samm

is moving seamlessly from Guest Designer to full time DT member - and we're absolutely thrilled to have her aboard.

We're also delighted to introduce our brand new Guest Designer, who will be with us for the rest of the year. Please welcome the very talented

Saskia

we're sure you'll enjoy seeing her lovely cards on here over the next few weeks. You can see the first of those she'll be making for us just below.

Now to this week's challenge

All this year we've been using the monthly birthstones as our inspiration

for the first challenge of the month.

The birthstone for November is the

TOPAZ

Found in places such as Brazil, Nigeria and Sri Lanka, the Topaz comes in a variety of colours. Probably the most widely known are light blue and tawny-yellow but there are several other colours of topaz too. It's associated with constancy, loyalty, faithfulness and friendship.

The team have used the colours and the meanings of the stone to make their cards this week and we hope you will be joining in and sharing yours too.

Please come and leave a link so that we can see your Topaz creations

Saskia

Samm

Rein

Kathy

Nat

Asia

Lynda

Keryn

Lythan