Long Time No Blogging!

We'll call my total lack of blogging over the last couple weeks a Christmas Holiday I think! 

With the DCM taking a couple of weeks break over the festive season, I didn't even have that to push me to updating my blog at least once a week.  I have still been doing the odd bit of crafting and have Christmas photos to share too, but what with one thing and another blogging was way down the to-do list - so there's a bit of catching up to do. 

Our next lot of building work starts on Monday so I'll be hiding away in the study for a few weeks - so my blogging (and my crafting) output should improve!  This is the big one - remodelling the downstairs areas of the extension added by previous owners - so it includes an inner hallway, utility room, shower/cloak room and the kitchen!  As soon as our visitors left on New Year's Day it was a case of clearing their rooms, clearing away "Christmas" and making a start on emptying those rooms affected by the work.  We're getting there slowly, but there's still a way to go and only a couple of days left before Keith and his merry band of builders move in!

Keep tuned for updates.......

Anyway, the Daring Cardmakers are back after our Christmas break which gave me the push I needed not only to do some crafting, but also to blog it! 

We have a fab new year-long series which we hope everyone will enjoy and feel inspired to join in with.  This year, the first dare of each month will feature a Colour Combo Challenge, with each of the DT taking a turn at choosing the colour palette we use.  January's colour palette  has been chosen by Fran - her choice of colours is indicated by the photo and shown below it

Aquas and teal shades are often quite "cool" colours - but the gorgeous creams and creamy-browns really take away that chilliness and make them feel much warmer and cosier, don't they?

Having sorted out a great big pile of possible papers that might work, I ended up finding that pretty much everything I needed was in the gorgeous "Breeze" 6x6 pad from MME's Lost and Found series.

Materials:

Brown 14cm sq card blank, light beige dots textured cardstock, 

Mid-shade teal Bazzill,

Patterned papers and Sentiment; MME's Breeze 6x6 pad 

(from Lost and Found collection),

Cream and teal papers for rosette are textured handmade Lokta paper,

Cream lace, Cream velvet ric-rac, Aqua satin ribbon,

Prima sequin flower centre

Tools:

Memory Box rosette die, Spellbinders "Floral Doily Motifs"

*I made the rosette by cutting the shape in the two Lokta papers, then sticking one on top of the other, I didn't want my rosette to be as wide as this die cuts, so once the two papers were suck together I cut the strip down to about 3cms wide, then made the folds and formed the rosette.

*Ribbon flower centre is made by twisting and coiling a length of satin ribbon fairly loosely around from the centre of a card circle.  I use bookbinding glue for this, but Cosmo Cricket make "Gloobers" (I think that's what they're called) if you want the "ready-to-use" option!

Sometimes it's hard to find the mojo after all that intensive Christmas Crafting, isn't it? Well there are some gorgeous cards using these colours to see on The Daring Cardmakers Blog this week - please pop over and have a look - hopefully it'll be just the thing to  inspired you to join in and get started on a brand new creative year.

Thanks for looking