Firstly I must tell you all about the most fantastic competition going on at Polka Doodles!!! Get over there now to see how you could bag yourself some fantastic Aquamarkers from letraset the wonderful peeps that make Promarkers!!!

Right back to this weeks challenge! We have been set a challenge by Kris to make a Christmas card in July! I think the timing is perfect with the latest Polka Doodles CD that has just come out!! I have opted to use Nikky's fab fairy stamps to go with my xmas paper from the CD!!! I have used mt fav which is BevvieBoo, I just love her! I have stamped her using my Versafine Onx Black ink pad then I have coloured her in with Promarkers!!! To get the fab sparkle on the wings I have used stickles which I have recently fallen in love with!!! Bevvie has been backed onto a white piece of card which I have inked with a brilliance Dew drop ink. I have then matted it onto a piece of snowflake pattern paper from PB2 again this has been inked for added effect! I have used foam pads to give dimension. This topper was then added to aother piece of the pattern paper then added to an A5 tent card! The whole card was then finished off with ribbon and gems. I am now making this card one of my xmas designs this year, I think the fairy really suits Nikky's papers!!!

This weeks challenge over at polka doodles was set by Lou. The challenge was to. . . deep breath. . . abandon our designer papers!!!! ARGH!!!!!! As soon as I recovered from the shock I decided that this was in fact a fab idea!!! We had to create our cards using nowt but stamps!!!! So I set to work with Gracie. I stamped her onto a scallop die cut and gave her a cute lady bug for company!!! Nest I just cut freehand some grass and then layered her up! I used my promarkers from Hobbycraft to colour her in, I decided to stick with red and black as they work so well together! The background is not so much stamped as it is punched!!! I used a circle punch to create a ladybug background for my card finished off with some fab ribbon again from Hobbycraft!!!

I thought while I am trying new things ( promarkers ) I thought go on give this whole masking malarky a try and here it is!!! BevvieBoo now with wings!!!

Well I must admit that I have had these stamps for a few weeks now and this is my first card that I have made!!! My colouring is not great so I have been practising before I made Nikkys fab stamps look poop!!! This fairy is my fav she is called BevvieBoo and she is so cute! Now she has a bueatiful butterfly that she comes with whixh you can use to give her wings but for my first card I decided babysteps!!! This is a C6 card which I have decorated with some elements from an old QVC kit I had hiding in my stash, I inked the edges of the flowers and the sentiment for a bit of depth! The butterfly is from tonic studio and I bought it at HobbyCraft. Finally Bevvie is stamped using versafine onyx black ink then I have used pro markers to colour her in! I only have one set so expect to see alot of purples until next payday!!!

In case you haven't heard me screaming from the rooftops I am now a member of the PolkaDoodles Design Team!!! This week is my very first challenge. The theme this week is wings!!! We could use and CD and it could be for any occasion but it had to include some stamping!!! I opted to use the shaped Miss Twoo from the paper boutique CD. I printed her out at A5 firstly onto plain pink card stock as my base! To create all the layers I printed out some of the fab papers from the Love and Cherish CD, then I ran them through the printer again so I could have the plain templates of the owl on the pattern card!!! It was then a case of cutting out what I wanted and choosing which patterns to layer over each other!!! For my stamping part of the challenge I have used my foam swirls stamps from QVC. I used my pink versa colour ink pad then pink embossing powder to make it more textures! The rub on is from letraset. To complete my Miss Twoo I have given her some big googly eyes, some curled eyelashes, some sparkly gems and a felt flower!!! I can breathe now I have my first challenge under my belt now I had better get cracking on next week!!!

Over at Die Cuts R Us the challenge is to use up any leftover valentines papers!!! Sound easy but . . . the card is not to be a valentines card!!! Thinking caps on this morning and this is what I came up with. The base of this card is actually waste cardboard that was supporting something I had sent through the post ( keeping in with the no waste theme ) I cut the cardboard to fit on the cover of a square card blank, then to make it a bit prettier I stamped the edges with some foam stamps that I had in my stash from QVC a while back! The leftover valentines paper comes from the new Bo Bunny love bandit collection ( so so cut ) I have stamped around the edges with fake stitches ( as I have no sewing machine or knowledge of how to use one ) again using stamps from QVC they are by HOTP. Onto the pattern paper I have mounted a die cut tag that I had free in a cardmaking magazine!!! The bird is a stamp from Imaginisce and I have stamped him firstly on more left over Bo Bunny paper, I have then die cut it with my scallop nesties. This is them adhered to the tag with 3D faom pads. The next layer is stamped onto DCWV texture cardstock then the final layer is a blue spotty card that I had free from a card magazine! The little tree/flower ( I can't decide which it is ) is made up from a scrap of blue card and some teardrop sequins that I had ( yes you guessed it ) free with a cardmaking magazine! The whole thing is finished off with a thank you rub on from letraset. So in a effort to use up leftover I have managed to use up lots of free bits I have been refusing to throw away!!! Thanks for looking!!!

Well I have been at it again with my Kanban cupcake stamps, but I have decided that I am no good at colouring them in so I have stamped them onto various scraps of pattern card or paper and layered them up!!! I really like how they have turned out!!! I have topped them with adheasive pearl gems just to make them a little bit special!!!