Mel and Nerine's First Challenges for 2009

As many of you know, Mel sets weekly challenges on her blog which I conscientiously try to participate in (except for when I'm on the other side of the country). This year, another sister stamper of mine, Nerine, is also setting weekly challenges which I am alos going to do my absolute best to have a go with too.

Nerine's first challenge was a sketch. I had the card made in time, but haven't been able to get onto here to post it and she has already set the next challenge... oh well. Here's my effort:

I went back to the good ol' colour wheel for this combo - I'm trying to use colours I tend to forget about! The base is Ballet Blue, with a strip of Creamy Caramel which has been pierced along the top edge, stamped in Creamy Caramel with the little flowers from Live Your Dream, and finished with a bit of red gingham ribbon (something else I don't tend to use a lot of). The main image from Live Your Dream is stamped with Always Artichoke on Very Vanilla and the flowers are Real Red, fussy cut and then attached with Aged Brass brads. I lightly sponged the edges of the Vanilla with Artichoke, trimmed the corners with the corner rounder and ran all the edges along the ink pad for a bit of definition. The greeting at the bottom is from A Little Birthday Cheer with the dots being provided by In The Spotlight.

I've changed my mind about my mother-in-law's birthday card, and this one is now going to make it way down to her!

Just to show you something completely different now, here's what I came up with for Mel's 'doozy' of a first challenge:

Apologies for the poor quality photo - it was quite overcast this weekend and this was the pick of the bunch.

Mel usually sets a colour OR technique OR accessory challenge but this week she laid all three on the table. A gorgeous photo of an orchid was her colour inspiration and she pulled the colours Orchid Opulence, Barely Banana, Certainly Celery and Whisper White. We were required to use the kissing technique and either Stampin' Dimensionals or pop-up glue dots.

I kissed the Baroque background stamped with Paisley in Barely Banana and stamped this on the Whisper White for the background (didn't turn out too badly I thought!). I pierced the 'exposed' White areas for a bit more interest and mounted the panel on Orchid Opulence and then on a Certainly Celery card base. The feature stamp was from Baroque Motifs stamped in Celery with the little middle bit in Orchid, with a bit of Dazzling Diamonds in the middle and attached with dimensional. This was mounted on Barely Banana and the with dimensionals on a rectangle of Orchid Opulence with the bottom torn. Make a Wish is from A Little Birthday Cheer and white embossed to make it really stand out. The final part is a small piece of celery ribbon.

I was pleasantly surprised with how this turned out.

Thanks for the challenges girls, I look forward to what you come up with in the future!