Stripes at Forever Friends... and more Christmas!! :)

Hello again!! :)

It’s the first Thursday of the Month which means but one thing... we have a new Monthly Challenge for you over at the Forever Friends challenge blog!! :) But before I tell you what it is (okay, my post title probably renders that redundant but still!! ;) ) I have a couple of bits of FF news to share with you as some changes happened while I was MIA at the start of the last challenge: firstly, we have a new name and are now the Forever Friends and Co. Challenge Blog; and, secondly, you can now enter our challenge using any animal image not just a FF bear... although we wouldn’t be on the DT if we didn’t love to see those little cuties, but this should make it easier for some of you to enter!! :)

Right, formalities out of the way and it’s time for the fun bit... Our challenge for July is to include ‘Stripes’ in your creation- which is a lovely easy challenge!! :) We are sponsored this month by Di’s Digi Downloads-

and it was a trip to her fab blog to choose my DT image which sparked off my recent and rather unexpected Christmassy mood as I just couldn’t resist this lovely Santa image... after a lot of looking around and oohing and ahhing over the rest!! :) I could just picture my little bear sending off his Christmas List to the North Pole for Santa to read!!lol

I kept the rest of the card fairly simple again and used some of the lovely Dovecraft Noel papers I got for a bargain price a few weeks ago- really quite wanted them last year but no way was I paying full price so when I saw both collections on offer together for half the price of one normally I leapt at it!! :) I cut the shapes freehand and then distressed and inked the edges :)

I coloured Santa with Prismas with a little Poppy PM on his suit first to get the depth of colour it needed. I’m 

learning that while with PMs it’s best to leave the lighter areas ‘til last, with Prismas it’s the other way around as I keep smudging the darker colours when I try to blend out the lights :S I used fun flock on his collar, hat and cuffs for a bit of fun and love the effect!! :)

The FF bear is coloured with PMs as usual as I haven’t had chance to play to find out which pencils will give the right colour tones yet and the FFs have to look right for me, I’m afraid!!lol This green is the reverse of the stripy paper- how nice to be able to change my mind at the last minute and not have wasted anything!! :)

The sentiment is one of the (quite a few!!) gorgeous new ones I treated myself to by Cat’s Life Press from the fab Crafty Emma’s Store when they had a summer sale last week, and I love it!! :) It and the LOTV corners were stamped in the same DI as I used for the paper edges :)

The List:

• Images: Letter for Santa Digi from Di’s Digi Downloads, coloured with Prismas and OMS; Forever Friends bear wooden stamp, stamped in Memento and coloured with PMs: Ivory all over to help the blending, Oatmeal for the shaded areas and Vanilla all over to blend together, then a few touches of Sunkissed Pink for cheeks and ears
• White Fun Flock
• Dovecraft Premium Noel Papers
• Tim Holtz Paper Distresser
• Vintage Photo Distress Ink
• MS Cherish PATP set
• Cat’s Life Press sentiment stamp
• LOTV Additions corner stamp
• Platinum Stickles

I’d like to enter this in the following challenges: Allsorts – Free and Easy :) ; Papertake Weekly – Anything Goes :) ; CES - Woodland Creatures :) ; Divas by Design – Die cuts or Punches :) ; Color Throwdown – Red, Green and Cream/Beige :) ; Christmas Card Challenge – ‘Twas the Night before Christmas :) ; Sentimental Sundays – Anything Goes (plus a sentiment) :)

My next project is a Diamond Wedding Anniversary card for my Grandparents- which I should sooo have started by now!! :S – so you probably won’t have to see another Xmas card here for a while... shame really, I feel like I’m on a roll and if I stop I probably won’t get another one made ‘til October like last year!!lol I am glad to hear from the comments on my last card that I'm not the only one whose good intentions to keep on making Xmas cards all through the year rarely works out, though!!lol Anyway, hope you liked this one!! :) Please pop over to the FF blog to see the fab cards from the rest of the DT, too!! :)

Hope you enjoy the rest of the week and your weekend- where does the time disappear to!?!?!!