Trace is at the heart of it today...

We don't think that anyone can fail to recognise our talented Trace's inimitable style. Today she's at the heart of it all with her second DT make...

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Trace

For my second word play piece I made a hanging piece with words connected to affairs of the heart. I created the heart and added to a distressed background and used chit chat stickers to add lots of words. For all the details please pop across to inkypinkycraft.

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A beautiful and sentimental project Trace, it demonstrates our theme so well too - thank you!

Tomorrow sees us into the final week of our challenge so please prepare to finish your projects and think about getting them entered. We'll be back on Saturday with a gorgeous project from Doreen.

Have fun! >;o)

Chris and the team xxx

Sue C's a material girl...

Sue has brought a material element to her project today by using fabric on her tag - and what a tag!!

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Sue C

For my second piece this month I've used fabric as my starting point on a jumbo sized tag. Fabric brings another element of texture to your project and is a great surface to work on. For all the details hop over to my Stamping Sue Style.

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Beautifully designed with stunning colour work, this is gorgeous Sue, thank you!

Whatever your favourite genre, whatever textures and media you like to work with, you can combine it all with our theme this month!

Our next post is a project from Trace on Thursday, we hope to see you then. Have a fab day!

Chris and the team xxx

Sue B has been driven up the wall!

Yes, our post title describes what Sue is up to with her project today but what a fabulous idea and such a stunning result!

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Sue B

Wall Art is fun to do and I used some chip board for this creation, the sentiment is computer generated, the delicious flower is made from vellum and my Key is altered with paints. More info on how I put this together over on my Blog.

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How fabulous is this? Such a kewl idea and a brilliant example of our theme - a gorgeous project Sue, thank you!

How are you all doing? We hope we're giving you lots of good ideas - yes? If so, we'd like to see them please - there's still plenty of time to enter.

Our next post is on Tuesday and it's a wowser of a project from Sue C! Don't miss it! Enjoy your Sunday. >:o)

Chris and the team xxx

Sandy is on the road...

We're midway through the month and what better to inspire you than a guest post? Today we're joined by the very talented S@ndy Diller, one of our Top 3 guests. S@ndy is kindly sharing her project with us despite being on a road trip and what a project to share!

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S@ndy

Hi, S@ndy here and I am so happy to be with you today to share my "Word Play" project.  I'm happily retired and spend my time traveling and crafting, not necessarily in that order.  I am so lucky to be doing both at the moment. As you read this, I am somewhere in Alaska seeing the sights.  I'm sure there will be many more pages to come on this trip. 

The quote I used is one by Charles Kuralt, an American journalist.  Although I am not finding it true on my current trip - I got a chuckle out of it and wanted to use it.  He said: 

"Thanks to the Interstate Highway System, it is now possible to travel across the country from coast to coast without seeing anything".

While traveling through Canada recently I took the time to "capture life's moments" and was inspired by the beautiful pine trees.  I hope you will stop by my blog, My Crafty Life on the Internet,  to read all about how I created this scrapbook page.

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Such a creative expression of our theme this month S@ndy and how apt! This is beautiful, thank you!

We hope this sparks some ideas for you to get busy and enter.

We'll be back on Sunday with a fabulous project from Sue B - cya then!

Chris and the team xxx

Jennie's journalling with her Mother-in-law!

Journalling is a fabulous alternative to scrapping to celebrate and remember family members and events and that is exactly what Jennie is doing today with her gorgeous project...

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Jennie

I love this Maya Angelou quote and thought it would be most appropriate for this rather glamorous photograph of my mother-in-law taken in 1927. I am loving the freedom of creating art journal pages and learnt a lot from creating this page.  There are more details and a step by step on my blog.

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Wow, what a stunning example of journalling AND our theme for this month Jennie, thank you!

We're almost half way through the month so if you've not entered yet it's time for you to think about it. We're seeing some fabulous entries already but we're greedy, we'd like to see lots more! >:o) Don't forget, everyone that enters has a chance of winning the Country View Crafts' £20 shop voucher as our winner is selected at random (using random.org).

Our next post will be on Friday when we have another T3 guest here sharing her creativity. We hope you'll be able to join us. >:o)

Chris and the team xxx

Blog candy winner

Whoop, whoop! We have congratulations to make to our July Pinterest blog candy winner!

Everyone who joined in has been entered and the winner has been drawn at random using random.org. The winner is...

Lori T of Certified Mad Crafter

Well done Lori we'll be in contact with you shortly so that we can send you the candy. >:o)

Thanks to everyone who joined in and to ALL our Pinterest followers.

More tomorrow....

Chris xxx

Gabrielle's journal is.... SENSATIONAL!

Whichever way you look at our next project, it most definitely IS sensational!

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Gabrielle

I really love words and often turn to quotations to act as inspiration and this Oscar Wilde quotation always makes me chuckle! There are stamped images in the background and then very thin layers of paint over the top to make new colours and areas of interest. The images are from Lynne Perrella for PaperArtsy and I love mixing these images up to make new people. I love using individual letter stamps for each word, the act of stamping each one out gives me great pleasure as I watch each word form on the page! There's more detail on my blog.

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Yep, sensational colours, sensational imagery and a sensational project Gabrielle! Thank you!

Whether you like journalling, or another form of crafting, we want to see your creative efforts please. If you've never entered a challenge before it really is simple, just navigate to the main challenge post (HERE) and use the linkie tool to enter.

We'll be back on Wednesday when our wonderfully creative Jennie will be here with her second project for this month. Cya there! >:o)

Chris and the team xxx

Jenny t3

Hi everyone,

Many of you will know our Top 3 guest today as she is a contributing DT member for several of the most popular craft blogs, it is the very talented Buttons herself... Jenny of Pushing the right buttons!

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Pushing The Right Buttons

I've been artistic and crafty all my life, sewing, drawing, stitching, sometimes for pleasure, often out of necessity. As a keen genealogist I needed to find a way of presenting my extensive family history research and discovered the joys of scrapbooking. One thing led to another and card making for friends and family soon took over. A persistent Hels Sheridan encouraged me to start a blog in April 2012, I discovered the world of Distress, and it all grew exponentially from there. As a qualified teacher I have a real passion for sharing techniques and ideas with anyone who'll listen! After all, isn't this about 'sharing the love'?

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I was delighted to have been placed in the Top 3 for the June 2014 challenge and given the opportunity to be a Guest Designer at Country View Challenges for their August theme 'Word Play'. Having seen the standards set by previous guests I knew whatever I created for this theme it would need to be something special.



So this card started with a paste-stencilled background that I made, loved and puzzled over, particularly as this month's challenge theme requires words or phrases to be used. Do you keep it simple and just die cut some letters to put on top? Do you attempt to layer things over the whole lot and risk making it way too busy? Well no, in my case you grab a Bigz die and (with heart in mouth) chop into the middle of it to create a frame for the rest of your design. And as a bonus you are left with the central section for another card/project!

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A stunning project Jenny, and a fabulous example of our theme this month - thank you so much for joining us today.

We're delighted to see the gorgeous projects you've already entered, a fabulous variety of genres and colours - keep them coming folks please! >:o)

We'll be announcing our Pinterest Blog candy winner shortly so please watch for that and we have more on Monday with Gabrielle, see you then.

Chris and the team xxx

Announcing July's winners

Hi everyone,

Thank you to everyone who contributed to our challenge in July - so many fabulous and varied entries - and thanks too to those of you who commented.

Our winner each month is chosen at random (random.org) to ensure that EVERYONE has a chance of winning. We also award blog badges to our Top 3 and a DT Members' Special Mention badge to the project we feel is the most creative and original in depicting our theme of the month. Here are our winners...

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#75 Susan Carol of Faith Words Faith Expressions

Well done Susan, your blog badge and winner's voucher will be with you shortly.

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As Sue C had chosen the topic for the month it fell to her to choose our Top 3 and DTMSM blog badge awards. Here are her choices and what she had to say about them...

There's so many I liked I could have a top 10 at least ! Anyway I have restrained myself and below are my picks :

#10 - Kezzy of KEZZY'S CRAFTY JOURNEY

A beautiful stencilled bag, the attention to detail is stunning and the stencilling is excellent !

#32 - Meggymay of Meggy's Way

The stencilled children on this project really caught my eye, coupled with the fairy I think this is a truly magical piece !

#92 - Julie Lavalette of Juliz Deign Post

This is a truly elegant project, I loved the transformation and the use of the doily stencil is gorgeous !

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#12 - Claire C of CLAIRE'S CRAFTY CREATIONS

I loved all the texture created on this beautiful piece and the gold metallic finish is just stunning !

Congrat's to all our blog badge winners, your badges are on the way.

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All of our winers are invited to guest with us next month to show you a project that they've made on the theme for the month. If you'd like the opportunity then please enter this month's challenge to be in with a chance.

Another post tomorrow, a great guest with a fabulous project - don't miss it!

Chris xxx

Sticky post - Blog candy

Don't forget we're offering Blog Candy if you've signed up to be one of our Pinterest followers. Click HERE to see our original post details and to enter.

This post will remain top of the list until the closing date - August 8th.

Normal blog posts continue below this one.

Chris xxx

Donna's got man's best friend...

Yes, Donna is sharing her love of man's best friend with us today by way of this fabulous tag...

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Donna

I love to make tags and I love to use quotes so thought for my second challenge piece I'd combine the two loves with a third....my love of dogs....

...pop over to my blog to find out the bits and pieces I've used. Donna xx

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Beautiful imagery Donna and such a fabulous example of our theme (as well as a great way to celebrate our love of dogs) - thank you!

We love to see the different interpretations and creative thought processes our guests and teamies have on the same theme. What's your idea? What are you making today? We'd like to see what you make of our theme and the creative spark Alison's topic ignites!

Our next post is on Saturday when we have a guest Top 3 post from the talented Buttons (aka Jenny). We hope to see you then. >:o)

Chris and the team xxx

Any excuse to make an album...

Who needs a reason? Not I! With a passion for creating my own box and album templates I needed no more of an excuse than a series of proverbs and sayings to create this album for Alison's fabulous 'Word play' challenge...

Don't be deceived - this simple looking picture actually unravels to a whole lot more! For those of you that want to see the full folding album, or the what and the how, you'll find a step x step with more pictures HERE.

We hope you're feeling the motivation to join in with us this month.....? Remember to follow our simple rules please and remember that for this challenge, greeting card sentiments do NOT qualify as the challenge topic.

More on Thursday....

Chris xxx

Alison is flying today!

We're on our way with the first of our individual challenges today and as Alison has chosen the theme this month she has the pleasure of leading the way forward...

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Alison

For my second make for the Word Play theme, I started with the Sizzix die of that name - and stuck lots of die-cut chipboard letters to a wooden ticket, adding Distress Paint and Distress Crackle Paint in Rock Candy to create my background.  The new Layered Dragonfly takes pride of place, hovering over the glossy dimensional die-cut advice to Enjoy The Journey!  Come and see how I did it all over at Words and Pictures...

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What a stunning hanging to present this well known saying, it's absolutely beautiful Alison, thank you!

We hope you're busy crafting and getting ready to enter your project for this month. Remember, there is no limit to how many entries you make as long as you follow the rules.

We hope to see you on Tuesday when we'll have another project for you.

Enjoy your Sunday!

Chris and the team xxx