Freebies - Beach sandcastle, starfish and seashell

I refuse to give up on summer! The sky is grey, it's only 15 degrees, it rained a few minutes ago and the forecast is for a wet and cloudy week ahead... still, there's sandals on my feet! (mind you, my feet are frrrrrrrrrrrrozen!)

With this mindset I decided to use my crafting skills to hold on to whatever summer we have left for a bit longer, and drew this little beach scene: a sandcastle, a starfish and a seashell.

For all those who are still holding onto the warm weather, here are some summer freebies! Enjoy them until Saturday 14th August (when they will be replaced by watermarked images).

I would love to see what you create with my digis. See my next post to see how I used these images!

Usual rules apply: these digital images belong to me and are for personal use only. If you would like to use any commercially, please contact me. If you use any of my images to enter challenges or in any other creation, I would appreciate it very much if you could acknowledge it by mentioning DesigNeAl and linking it to my blog. Thank you and enjoy!

Please leave a comment after downloading the images, thanks!

Little Pink Fairy

Good (and sunny!) evening
Here's todays card, which enters the following challenges:

Critter Sketch - Sketch # 26

Sugar Creek Hollow - No Designer Paper
Our Creative Corner - Embossing
Lots to do - Ribbon and Lace
Cupcake Crafts - Lace
Ooh-la-la - Spots and Dots
Sentimental Sundays - Anything goes
Sweet Stampin - Pretty in Pink
Just Scraps - Anything goes

The cute fairy image is June Bug, coloured with Letraset Promarkers, using my new blender pen :-); Papermania and Cuttlebug embossing folders; distressing tool; Diamond Stickles; lace, ribbon and cardstock from my own stash.

I {also} chunky dunk!

I purchased the Born to Shop stamp collection by Docrafts last weekend and have been looking forward to using them all week. I feel soo identified with the sentiments! LOL! Last night I finally got the chance - and the pleasure to play a bit :-) and here's my first creation with them:

Born to Shop stamps by Docrafts; Papercraft Perfect Match backing paper; Fiskars border punch; hot pink and pale blue cardstock and ribbon from my own stash. Image coloured with Letraset Promarkers.

This card enters the following challenges:
Alphabet challenge - O for Ovals
Get sketchy - sketch # 50
Stamp Something - photo inspiration
Crazy Amigo - Free theme
My Time to Craft - Let's eat cake!
Creative Card Crew - Cute and Girlie
City Crafter - Yum!

When Life gives you Lemons...

A quick one today...
I've had these gorgeous lemon papers for a while, they are from Pink Petticoat; the sentiment is a freebie from Meljen's Designs - don't you love it?! I also used Anita's embossing fluid and Stickles to emphasize the colour and texture of the lemons.

I sincerely apologise for the quality of the photo; it does not matter how much I retouch the colours it keeps turning into this horrible blue-ish... the card is so much brighter and yellow IRL :-(

Onto some challenges:

Cute Card Thursday - Whateva!

Dutch Dare - Anything goes

Frosted Designs - Celebrate Life (the sentiment says it all!)

The Stamp Man Challenge - Take 2 colours (white and yellow)

Have a nice weekend!

Welcome Little One

Happy evening to you all.

One of my lovely neighbours has become a grandmother. This is my card to congratulate her on such special occasion.

The fabulous teddy digi stamp is a freebie from Wendy, mounted on 3D pads; the sentiment stamp is from the Honey and Hugs collection by Papermania; new Docrafts Polka dots embossing folder; Circle Nestabilities; Xcut border punch; buttons, gingham paper, blue and yellow cardstock from my own stash.

Onto a few challenges:

Totally Gorjuss - Baby baby

Die Cut Dreams - Gingham

Charisma Cardz - Teddy bears

Meljen's Designs - Clean and simple

Pixie Dust Studio - Cute as a Button

Tissue holder

...And this is my project with the rhino image - a pocket tissue holder for the tough guy in the house, using my digital rhino - which will enter the following challenges:

Alphabet Challenge - N for Nature
Creative Inspirations -  Animals
Bee Crafty - All about the image
Cowgirls Sunday Stamp'en - Animals/bugs
By the Cute and Girly - Animal antics
Rosie D's - All creatures great and small
Scrappy Frogs - A stitch in time

Please leave a comment!

Freebie - A digital Rhino for you

A while back I offered my digital zebra as a freebie. The response was great and I was thrilled to see the amazing creations some of you came up with it!

Today and for 3 days only, following with the African theme, I am offering my DIGITAL RHINO FOR FREE! You can download the JPG by right-clicking the image without watermark and saving it onto your computer. You can then resize it and print it as you wish.
Needless to say, usual rules apply: these digital images belong to me and are for personal use only. If you would like to use any commercially, please contact me. If you use any of my images to enter challenges or in any other creation, I would appreciate it very much if you could acknowledge it by mentioning DesigNeAl and linking it to my blog. Thank you and enjoy!

I am leaving the digital image free of watermarks on the blog until Friday 6th August for anyone to download it (the digital image without watermarks will be then removed and replaced by a watermarked one), and I would appreciate it very much if all those who download it leave a comment. Cheers!

For ideas on how to use the image, see my next post :-)

Side step card

My good friend Wendy and I were shopping yesterday when we came across the Smooch Spritzers by Clearsnap. Completely new to me, they quickly caught my attention so I decided to purchase two colours: Log Cabin and Wine Berry. And of course, I couldn't wait to get home to try them! For the last couple of days I had also been working on a new technique, a side step card - gosh, it took me a while to get the measurements of this card right in cms!- and putting the two techniques together seemed the perfect way to spend my Monday evening! And here it is, the final product:

Cream, golden and copper cardstock; Bird stamp by DoCrafts Gstudio; Manuscript background by Hero Arts; swirls stamp by Rhonna Ferrer; Pirate Gold Stampendous Embossing Powder; Log Cabin Smooch Spritz; Inspirations Golden pigment ink; Metallic copper pigment ink; circle and scalloped circle punches; the sentiment is a golden sticker; the copper ribbon is from my own stash.

My side step card enters the following challenges:
CupCake Craft - Distressing
Ellephantastic - Distressing
Ooh-la-la creations - Birthday
Stampin B's- Birthday
Squigglefly - Ribbon
Alphabet Challenge - N for Nature
Sentimental Sundays - New technique/new style
Creative Inspirations - Anything goes

I need to practice a bit more how to use the Smooch Spritzers so please let me know of you are aware of any good videos out there :-)

Thanks for your comments.

Jak's fab blog candy!

Have you seen it? If you haven't yet, go and check - http://www.jakheath.com/2010/08/blogcandy-hanglar-stanglar-promarkers.html

It runs til August 8th - hurry up!

Sewing again

You may remember the summer dress I made for my friend's daughter back in March?

Well, it was my two gorgeous nieces' birthday a few weeks ago and while on holidays I managed to find a sewing machine and some beautiful fabric to make another one of those summer dresses and the short top version of it. Being sisters of such close age (10 and 8) they really do not like dressing like twins, so making a dress and a top with slightly different colours for the bow seemed like a good idea.

Here are the girls, happy with their present. (again, apologies for the bad quality of the photo, but you should get the idea of what the end projects looked like).

Comments? Thanks!

Summer Holidays 2010

Here are some photos of our summer holidays this year (the quality is not great, but I only had my pocket-size camera).

  As you can see, we had a great time, did several day trips and visited some beautiful markets, an Aquarium and an Eagle centre.

All and all, a great holiday!

Thanks!

As soon as I got back from holidays last night, one of the first things I noticed was the huge amount of post piled up by the phone. Oh dear - bills!?? So with a bucket of patience this morning I started the most boring task of opening the never ending pile of envelopes. Well, guess what? Among the many - yes - bills and other silly stuff, there was a parcel from Jean, from Just Scraps. It contained the goodies that I won for my Thank you, Teacher's card. Oh, I was so excited!
So today I want to express my sincere gratitude to Jean for the lovely bunch of beautiful embellisments, as well as the cute little Note card she sent me. THANK YOU so much, Jean!! Looking forward to playing along some more of your challenges. xx

Sketch for a 30th birthday

After 30 days away on holidays, I am back! I can't say I am over the moon about it- I will defenitely miss the sunny weather, but I guess there are some positive things about being home: the most important one, I can craft again! And as usual, as soon as I landed, there were already some orders pending. "I know it's short notice but would you be able to...." Well, of course! :-)

Today's card is for my youngest sister-in-law who is turning 30 (bless!) this week.

Since I was feeling a bit rusty after not crafting for so long I decided to use a sketch as inspiration: I Heart 2 stamp.

The card is also entering the following challenges:

Daring cardmakers - It's a Girl thing

Everything but the Kitchen sink - Buttons
CRAFT challenge - Hot and Spicy colours
Cute Card Thursday - Texting Crazy
Dutch Dare - Anything goes
Mami Doodles - Anything goes
Phindy's Place - Clean and Simple
Challenge up your life - Celebrations
One Stop Craft - Patterns

For this card, I used pink foam; Cuttlebug embossing folder; Labels Nine Nestabilities; Sentiment stamp by Hero Arts; orange, pink, green and fuschia cardstock; 3D foam pads; pink staples, patterned paper, orange and green buttons - all from my own stash. 

Thanks for your comments!

Ellephantastic Challenge!

Yippie!! Great news! I made it to the Top 3 in the Ellephantastic Challenge with my Tilda (Birthday Girl) card.

I am thrilled! Thank you, Angie and Elle, it is a great honour to take the "Top3 Banner" :-)

Birthday card for a guitar lover

Last card for today probably since my time in the internet cafe is nearly up! It is a birthday card for my friend's son, who turned 12 the other day. Gosh, time flies, I still remember when Sean was born, so cute, so small...and he's a teenager already!  He loves playing the guitar and I believe he is pretty good at it, so this Little Musing image seemed perfect to wish him a Happy Birthday. I coloured the image with Letraset Promarkers, my favourite means of colouring at the moment I must add.

I am entering the card onto the following challenges:

For Fun challenges - favourite colouring method

Stamp Something - use a digital image

Have a great weekend everyone!

Yummy Cherries

Well, let's try publishing another card, hopefully this time I paid more attention and the challenges won't be closed! :-)

Simon Says go All Fruity this week and All Sorts are looking for Summer cards. I have the perfect card for both challenges ;-) - I love cherries, they always remind me of summer.

Anniversary card

I have access to the internet for a few minutes today, so I will take the opportunity and publish a few of my recent cards. This anniversary card enters the ABC challenge this week: You and Me. (Edit to say that this challenge seems to be closed already!! )

The request was for a "simple, non fussy anniversary card", and I think the colours and simplicity of the design achieved that. I love the heart lock and the male and female figures, don't you?

Thanks for your comments.

Matilda card

A very quick post today - I am still on holidays ;-) This is a card I made a couple of months ago (the style of which have re-used since) but had not published yet. I used Word to create the capital O and one of Matilda's sweet stamps, coloured with Letraset Promarkers; added gems, glitter and a little birthday sentiment from Pollycraft I believe.

I am entering the card onto the following challenges:

Pear Tree Designs - Glitter and sparkle

Paper Sundaes - Layers

Ellephantastic - Birthday

Cute Daisy May - Vibrant colours

Gingersnap creations - Markers

Viv's card

Have you seen Viv's card? She used my digital zebra to come up with this great creation! Have a look at her blog, you will enjoy all her other beautiful pieces too: http://vivsvisuals.blogspot.com/

Holiday time!

And so I am off on holidays until August 1st! :-) 

I am not taking my stash or any crafting tools with me so I won't be able to create new cards but I am hoping to be able to post some of my unpublished material at some point, as well as visiting some blogs.

Hope you all have a brilliant July!