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The theme for the challenge at The Game is 'Jack's R Better'. I know nothing at all about poker and couldn't find any playing cards in our house but I looked online and found this handsome chappy on a gambling site. It's a long time since I made a tag for a challenge so I have made one for this. I hope this is ok for the challenge.

Here we are at the end of yet another month with a thought provoking challenge thought up by all of us at  Out of a Hat Creations  but with the 'If I Had Wings' title by Florence I am still in a fun holiday mood I think after being away for a week. Mine is sort of a comedy with me as the central character. I made the jointed doll from a template at Mirkwood Designs templates The wings and my face were created in Paint Shop Pro and the hat and skirt added as an after thought. I could almost feel myself being transported up into the air as I made this Hope you will visit Janet , Sandra and Florence's blogs and see their wonderful creations for this challenge. But then---- ------this happened.

I just found these 2 more places to enter challenges and I love the Design Team Samples on both of them. At Sugar Creek Hollow their 13th Challenge is Vintage Fashion and at Crafty Cardmakers their 69th Challenge is Distress Something so I have combined the two. I recently won some wonderful blog candy at Crafty Individuals so I used two of the stamps that I won on this card. The flower stamp is just half of one of the stamps and I used it 4 times to make the background of the card. The other I stamped in a different colour as a contrast. The edges of the card were distressed with Tim Holtz Rusty Hinge distressed ink and the image is distressed with Deep Indigo from Stamp Pad. All the images were coloured with Promarkers which I really enjoyed doing. Finished the card off with some simple flowers I made in colours to match the card.

For this challenge at Artful Times  the theme is Ribbon and Lace so I had a think and somewhere in the back of my mind there was an image that I had seem somewhere on a blog or u-tube but I never kept the link unfortunately. This is my version of it and apologies to the person who made the wonderful one that I saw-much better than mine for sure. I have had this scented candle on my hearth for ages and we usually only light it at Christmas so it was due for a make over. The candle is in a glass so I stuck black lace onto the glass then gold ribbon at the bottom and a thinner ribbon on top of the gold. Next I made the embellishment with ribbon flowers, some silk leaves,some other vegetation and a charm. These were all assembled onto a piece of acetate then stuck to the candle holder with my glue gun which has the strongest glue I possess  Had to wait until it was dark to see what it looked like lit and if it stayed intact-it did so it will be a nice addition to all the stuff on the heart

Lovely to see people enjoying our vintage lace challenge and I loved seeing what you had made. This challenge at Out of a Hat is for 2 weeks as I will be away but as there are so many choices you could always make more projects for this challenge using different rows. This was another idea from Florence that went into the hat and I made the BINGO board. The idea is to chose a row in any direction and use the elements on that row in your project. I chose glitter, image, die cut and ribbon for mine. You can't judge a book by it's cover. I made this cover that can be used on most books-just slip the book inside. It certainly looks better on the coffee table than the book I am reading. For the basic sleeve I used a laminate sheet. I bought a box of 50 years ago when everyone laminated everything and most of them never got used. I do use them now on my craft table as they wipe so easily and save mess. The laminator has long since gone as it stopped working. Slice the two parts down

Loved all the samples that are here at Craft Room Challenge  for this fabric challenge. I thought about it then gathered some things together and made this. I had made the flowers a while ago and put them away in box cause I didn't know what to use them for. I cut a ring from an old cardboard box and wound strips of an old curtain around it. Made some ribbon leaves and stuck everything onto the ring. It hangs nicely on the wall Thank you for making my brain work once again and for the inspiration.

The postman has just brought me the most amazing package with so many goodies I don't know where to start. It was the blog candy that I won at Crafty Individuals  and I am sure nothing could have prepared me for what was in store when I opened the package This is what I received and it was like my birthday and Christmas all rolled into one- no it was even better than that :) Thank you so much I feel so lucky to have won. Love Chrissie xx

A friend gave me a link to a new challenge blog that has just opened. The DT are very special people and have made some wonderful samples. It is called THE GAME so pop there and have a look if you want to be in at the start of something different. The first Challenge is Tic Tac Toe and I chose the top row and made this card The beautiful image is from Dezinaworld I used my Cuttlebug and Nestabilties to make the mounting shapes and then dry embossed both the layers. These I distressed with ink. Then I stamped the card and coloured with Promarkers Used staples to fasten on the bottom ribbon--sure need more practice with those. Lastly I made the flowers from ribbon--if you want to have a go there is a tutorial at Scrappydayz Nice to see your new challenge blog and I wish you Good Luck Hello June :)especially

This time at Artful Times the challenge was chosen by Von and theme is birds-always a nice subject to think about especially when the sun is shining and the birds are singing as they are today I saw on Neet's blog that she had used mounting board and suddenly remembered that I had a lot stashed away that I got ages ago. I used some for the main part of my picture and never realised you could stamp on it so well. The background stamps are quite old and were from Lakeland and the bird stamps are Swirly Birds by Personal Impressions. Did a bit of colouring with Promarkers and a lot of messy bits with black ink. The white background was put through the Cuttlebug in a folder and inked- and there you have it-sounds easy but has taken me quite a few hours to make.

This week at Out of a Hat the challenge is to use vintage lace on your project. I haven't made any cards for a while so I thought it would be nice to make one for this theme. Sandra sent me the beautiful lace when we first opened Out of a Hat and I have been waiting for a special time to use some of it. The clock, corner and butterfly stamps were free with the 2nd edition of 'Cardmaking in Easy Steps', together with a lot of other stamps and 212 card elements.I didn't count them but it said on the front of the magazine :). The picture of the lady was from a free vintage picture site and the bow I made in Paint Shop Pro. Distressing around the edge tied it all together and I am quite pleased with it in the end. Then a few little pearls Always lovely to craft with Janet , Sandra and Florence and see what they make for the challenges. We all love to see people joining in with the challenges so we hope you will give it a go if you have time. Love Chrissie xx

I am not a big fan of card making magazines but I saw this one in Hull and wanted something to read on the train coming home. It must be quite a new magazine as it was only issue 2 and the free stamps took my eye. I have used the stamps on a few projects but forgot all about the rest of the freebies and only glanced through the magazine. I am in a YUKU forum where the challenge was to use things from a magazine you have bought in the last couple of months. Time to open the packet and see what was inside. There were 212 items it said on the magazine and there sure were an awful lot-enough to make at least 10 cards I reckon. Not really my sort of stuff but I can't resist a challenge. Here is the card I made using stuff from the goodies packet and some of the stamps-the card is not as bad as I thought it would be.

I quake in my shoes when I see the word emboss-well except for using the Cuttlebug and folders type of embossing that is. They do say practice makes perfect so I thought now was the time to put aside my fears and have a go as I do love to join in the Craft Room Challenges I stamped the flower border once in the middle and used bronze embossing powder. Then again in bronze ink and clear embossing powder and lastly I used some silver embossing powder on another row. I used a brayer to add some brown ink all over the piece and the embossed parts showed up better. I made the flower from a tutorial at Live the Dream  and inked some wooden shapes to stick on and also some text shapes that I got in a swap ages ago. I know the embossing leaves a lot to be desired :( but I will keep trying :) Thank you for the challenge and the wonderful samples by the Designers

Last week's challenge went well at Out of a Hat with 5 people joining us with their really special work This week at Out of a Hat  the challenge is 'A girl can never have too many shoes' I thought of shoes and then thought  'A girl can never have too much chocolate' so I combined the two :) Thought a lot about 'staging' my projects to take the pictures-thanks to Florence who always shows all her projects so beautifully. I am only a learner but will keep trying lol. All I did this time was drape a scarf on a small stool and make some 'shoe makers' tags to stick on with blue tack. The wonderful shoe idea and the template came from here  and I really enjoyed making the shoes though they were a bit tricky in parts. Hope everyone will join in the fun at Hats this week and have a look at what Florence , Janet and Sandra have posted on their blogs about what they made to inspire everyone.