The Power of Advertising

Well, its lovely and sunny this morning - or at least it is as I write this. Its been all "sunshine & showers" this week - every time I've had the very nerve to stick a toe out of the door its started to rain. It's a Bank Holiday weekend here in England so we get Monday "off", well I get every Monday off (and Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, ........), but it means Hubby will be home for an extra long weekend which will be lovely. Now, what jobs can I think up for him to do???? hmmmm

BUT, before the weekend comes Friday aka Daring Cardmakers Day, and this week its been the wonderful Lythan's turn to think up a dare for us:

Hello peeps! Lythan here. We are loving all the card creations that you have been sharing with us this week. It is good to see so many people as addicted to challenges as we are!
The next Dare is all about being
AD-dicted
I want you to browse the tv and magazines for advertisments and use them as inspiration. It might be the format, the colours, the products, the slogan - whatever floats your boat. Remember you can do this anytime, any place, anywhere as long as you link it to this blog in the usual way!

This was trickier than I first thought. Most ads just pass me by (although my inner antenna always perks up and prods me if the words "craft shop" or "nice crafty stash" or the like is detected. We hardly ever watch any "live" tv so we whizz past the advert breaks with a click of the button. We don't get a daily newspaper, and I really can't say I've noticed any ads that have grabbed my attention eleswhere. So it got to yesterday morning before so much as a germ of an idea came my way. That's when I remembered the little drawer full of "interesting odds and
ends that might come in useful one day" In there are odd playing cards, interesting stamps, pages from old books and magazines, tickets,....you get the picture.

In there I found a few possibities; a couple of old cigarette cards, a couple of similar little cards you used to get in packets of tea-bags, that sort of thing plus a few torn out pages from old newspapers and magazines. Among which was this one - there's no date on there but it looks 1950s to me.
I decided to use the hairdryer bit of the ad to make my card. The one directly below is probably more interesting, but perhaps the connotations associated with the word "vibrator" have changed since this ad. was used - you can click for a bigger version!


So here's my card, it's not the most complicated card I've ever made - the hardest thing this time was coming up with an idea for the dare in the first place.
I scanned the whole page, then cropped out the bit I wanted. I resized, brightened and sharpened it in PSP before printing out onto plain card. The little verse is by the ever scribbling "Anon" and I inked up the card before printing it so that it matched the aged shading of the advert piece. Papers are from an old SA Kit, flowers, eyelets, spotty brad and ribbon from stash. The three little "brads" in the top right are actually faux brads because I couldn't find a good enough colour match in my Brad Pot (as opposed to Brad Pitt haha). They are made by sticking scraps of the paper onto cereal box "chipboard" then using the centre circle of one of the Cuttlebug flower dies to cut the "brad". Its a great way to always have the perfect brad to match your work, and of course you can make them in any size you've got a die for!

We've bade a fond farewell to Michelle, who has been a fab first month-long Guest Designer for us, and today we welcome the wonderfully talented, and funkily names Ellepiggo - otherwise known as Vanessa, to the team. She's very kindly agreed to be our Guest Designer for May, and I'm sure that anyone who's ever visited her blog will know why we're thrilled that she's agreed to come and play with us for a few weeks. Welcome aboard, Vanessa!

Please pop along and have a look at the cards on the DCM blog, and also visit the DTs personal blogs to fidcover more about the ads that inspired the cards we've made. We'd love you to join in and play, so if you make a card remember to leave a link on the DCM blog so that we can come and see your cards.