Is this thing still on?

A combination of the good (Number 1 son's graduation) the bad (some tough work times) and the ugly (a horrendous bug) have kept me away from the blog - and from crafting in general really.
But now I'm back
(from outer space, you just walked in to find me here with that sad look upon my face)

I will go back in time through the Daring Cards I have done recently and not blogged...
(ooh bet you are so excited!)
(I am actually as there have been some fab dares)
Sooooo
this week is our 24th colour combination! The December colours chosen by Zuzana are awesome

Lovely eh?
And here is my attempt at matching them

the yellow is a bit too strong really. I should have put some gesso on it I think. Ah well. The woodgrain paper is a My Minds Eye On the Brightside paper and all the rest are Fancy Pants Parkbench. I diecut the feather using a Clearly Besotted die, turning the blue die cut into the calamus (guess who just found out what the hard bit down the middle of a feather is called?). When it was all stuck down I added some glitter paste to the feather for interest. The sentiment is also by Clearly Besotted and was stamped using a Hero Arts grey ink.

Last week's Daring challenge was Going for Gold. Which, if you are of a certain age like me, probably means that you are now singing the theme tune to the cheesy European quiz from the 1980's. Leo wanted us to use gold and white. So we did

although it is quite difficult to photograph in the low light of December. The bottom panel is vellum outlined with gold pen. I then stuck some gold mesh onto a square of white card and added white glitter ribbon and some gold thread across the top (to hide the sticky tape attaching the mesh to the card). For stability I added two tiny staples to the top. Next I die cut a star from vellum, dry embossed it and then rubbed a gold ink pad across it. I used some American Crafts alphabet stamps for the word "Peace". The gold ink is a bit dull in colour so I went over it with a gold gel pen. The gold gems are actually liquid gel beads.

And finally, the card and tag for the 15th November dare - having a Funky Christmas
(eek - it is a month almost since I blogged!)
The generous and talented Anice gifted us some downloads to use. I made a card using the Sleigh Ride papers

 

I did put a version of this card on the blog but Phil had taken our good camera somewhere and I had to use the runner up with tends to be blurry. This is a little more focussed. The snowflakes were cut on my Cameo and then covered in Glamour Dust. 

I also had fun die cutting and layering the digi papers .

I made a tag with the Silent Night papers - lovely traditional colours. Here are photos with two different cameras! The top photo shows off the lovely gold details and the glossy accents that I added

 but the colours are really a little bit more like this - only slightly warmer

Sticking them both together would be about right I reckon!

Now I am off to catch up with things I have made for Quirky Kits - a scrapbook page featuring lots of sewing and some cards to use up the scraps of the latest kits. See you there?