Tantalising Tessellations

Another Friday and another challenge from the Daring Cardmakers - but before I get on to the card I've made for that, I'm going to have myself a little rant.....

What do you reckon to the new Captcha word verification widget on Blogger?  I've seen the same thing in other places too - Facebook have it for some posts for instance.  Up till now I've been happy enough to leave comments and fill in the word verification if required, even though some of the fonts were quite difficult to read on occasion.  But now, these new ones are just impossible to read - I swear the one I was asked to read earlier this morning was more like an ink blot than any letters I've ever seen.  I gave up and tried another...and another before I finally got something that actually resembled letters I might have a stab at typing correctly. 

I know I've been rubbish at blog-hopping lately, but it is something I like to do, and I love to catch up on what my friends are up to via their blogs - and \I like to leave a message to say I've popped by.  But thanks to these atrocious Captcha WVs I've decided that on blogs which still have them, I'll only leave a comment if I can figure out the WV at first try - life really is too short for clicking and clicking just trying to make sense of these infuriating things.

I don't have WV on here but I do have comment moderation switched on - there are a lot of Assorted Twits out there and I don't want them posting here - but I do want to hear from my blog-mates, and this way although comments aren't there till I click publish, at least you won't get eye-strain from trying to leave me a message.

Please - if you're reading this and still have the WV switched on, think about changing your settings

 - it's not difficult to do and if you don't know how, just let me know and I'll try to help.

Right - rant over, and back to some Daring Cardmakers crafting

 This week it's Leo here to bring you your next dare.......

'Tessellation'

I'd like you to create a card featuring a tessellating pattern. You c
an probably remember doing tessellation in maths class at school right? Basically all you're doing is making a pretty pattern with shapes that fit together perfectly on all sides, like tiling. It's up to you how you interpret the dare so it could be a pattern on a paper already made or even a pattern you make yourself

Well....I thought, and thought and thought about this challenge without a glimmer of an idea for what to do!  Finally I remembered the Tumbling Blocks design you see a lot on patchwork quilts and thought it would be perfect for a New Baby card.

I had to do a bit of research on the diamond shape used to make the blocks - maths is not my strong point, to say the least!  

Quite quickly I discovered that just any old diamond shape doesn't work hehe.  It has to be made from 2 equilateral triangles joined together - then the next problem - how to make one to cut on my Craft Robo.  I tried in Robo itself and then in Paintshop Pro and couldn't work it out - thought I might have to wait for the Resident Expert to do it for me when he got home.  But then I did a bit of googling around the patchwork quilt sites and found a template I could use.

The joins aren't perfect, I admit, but you can't have it all!

Materials:

All Papers MME Fine and Dandy "True Blue" 6x6 pad

Yellow Seam Binding, White lace

Tiny silver teddy bear charm

large spotty button, Stickles glitter glue

Tools:

Craft Robo for cutting diamonds, plain circle and letters

Spellbinders Lacy Scalloped Circles, Spellbinders plain Circle to cut the "head hole" (I'm sure there's a proper word...), Inks for edging

 As usual the team have come up with some fab ideas for using tessellating designs on their cards, so please go and check them out HERE.  Don't forget our new FB page too - it would be great if you'd pop along and join us there too.

On the Building front it's been a quiet week - as in nothing has happened!  It's all got to the point where it's a lot of little things need to be done - we are waiting for the glass for the kitchen splash-backs to get here - apparently it's made and should be here in the middle of next week.  As should the internal fittings we've chosen so far for the drawers, and also the closing mechanism for the glass doors on the  top wall cupboards.  And then there's the drawer fronts and doors that need replacing as the Swiss aren't actually as perfect in their manufacturing processes as we've all been led to believe.....

We need blinds and maybe some pictures for the cloakroom which is pretty much finished.

The new "broom cupboard" still needs shelves and hooks for hanging stuff on.

The pew is here, but the cupboarding for coats and shoes etc. hasn't been built around it yet.

Once that's done we're getting new carpets for the whole hall/inner hall/stairs and landing areas - at that point everything will look so much better!  I'm getting a bit tired of living in this Building Work Limbo, to be honest.

Jeepers, I do go on, don't I?  If you got through to the end, well done - and thank you - it was lovely that you made the effort!

We're supposed to be having some good weather this weekend - I hope the sun shines on you wherever you are.

Thanks for visiting