Challenge 28

Hey Doodlers! And Happy Thanksgiving to all our friends in the US!

Well, another busy week at Doodle Towers, we're on Ideal World next week so we're currently up to our neck in CD's and artwork and packing and..and...and...stress! It's always a bit manic the 2 weeks prior to a show and then the week after (funny, in a month that means there's only one week which isn't!? hmm) but this time is worse due to the swine flu taking me out for a week and being way way behind..never mind, soon be Christmas and there is a brand new CD launch next week so that more than makes up for it! If you look closely at the Design Team entries and blogs this week I'm sure you'll see some sneaky peeks at the new stash! The show is Thurs 3rd Dec on Ideal World at 2pm.

I also have to just mention that myself and the fabulous Kirsty Wiseman will be holding a joint workshop in York on Saturday 5th December 10.15 - 1.15pm - craft fun and mince pies galore if you can join us, we have a couple of places left so if you want further info please click here.

Right, winners of Challenge 26...we asked you to use this sketch and use a Male theme...
in 3rd place...Teri
in 2nd place...Cornish Mist
and in First place is the lovely Little Ted - well done!
So email me for your stash and blinkies girls please!

Don't forget! Closing date for Design Team applications is Fri 27th (today!) so you'd better be quick if you want to join us! We're looking for a couple of new teamies so don't be scared, we're all very friendly!Email me here with your details. We've had lots of entries so it will take a while to plough through them all so give us a couple of weeks for the results! :D

Before I go any further I have to give a massive thanks to the very fabulous Dolly, our Guest Designer for November, my that's flown! It's Dolly's last week with us but we have all loved her projects and we hope she'll be back soon, I am LOVIN' her card this week!

So on with the show as they say...No sketch this week, but to make it easy you need to use 3 different papers and a Rubber Stamp - the rest is up to you! I think the Doodle Dollies enjoyed this one and we have some fab cards this week...

November Guest Designer, Dolly...

Dolly's doing a Crimbo take on all the challenges so here is her lovely lovely card, I adore this, think it's because of my 2 favest things - green and dots!! Just adorable this Dolly and thanks again for all your efforts during the last few weeks...

Made by Kerry..."I've been making Christmas cards from non Christmas papers, so decided to do the same for this challenge. The background paper came from Candy Doodles, the papers for the trees and center strip came from Sugar Birdies. I embossed stamped snowflakes and glittered the trees. Added a few gems and stamped the sentiment across the paper ribbon also from Sugar Birdies."...just fab!

Made by Ruth...Ruth's given us a cheeky little peek at something new from the new CD Back To Nature here and this card is just lush..."I've used one of the images and all the papers are from Sugar Birdies. I made the flowers myself by roughly following the flowers on her hat. Stamps (around the flowers and sentiments) are the Candy Doodle ones."

made by Enfys...I just adore En's style and this week is no different...En says "Got to use up all my scraps of jingly papers for this one! Happy thanksgiving to our American doodlers!" En's used the snowflake stamp here and papers from the Crimbley Doodles download and Jingle Jangles...

Created by Claire...Easel cards seem to be a big new trend and Claire took this great fold as her inspiration this week...Here she's used the Not For Girls CD...

Created by Kris...Another sneaky peek at the new CD here...tut tut those naught girls..."Well not only did I manage the 3 papers (plain green from Sugar Doodles, Presents and Hugs from Jingle Jangle) and the stamp (present); I also snuck in one of the fabulous new images from the new CD. I think the look on her face is very sexy. I used a circle card and also cut some additional hearts and popped them on." Not sure she's meant to be sexy, think it's Kris's colouring! lol!...

Created by Sue...Sue lives in flooded Cumbria so it's a miracle she managed to create anything in the floods! Typical crafter, I bet she made sure all her stash was on high ground! Here she's used the Jingle Jangles CD...

Made by Boni...Boni's done a totally different look this week and it's lovely...she's used the Not For Girls CD and actually created the pink backing paper with the flourish stamp from the Daisy Doodles set, such a very versatile stamp and one of my all time faves ever. Love how she's made that cute flower by punching circles and stamping into the middle of each one, very creative and a great idea...

So, that's our offerings for this week - don't forget you have till Sunday 6th December to enter this one, leave your links in the comments below. You can still enter last week's challenge until Sunday 29th at noon so make sure you get your entries in!
In the meantime I will see you all (hopefully) for the show next Thursday 3rd Dec, which is on Ideal World at 2pm. ttfn!

A spooktacular week of treats...

Yikes, I almost forgot to do the post, Ruth will be gunning for me - the first week I've posted for yonks and I'm back to my old slack self, so sorry Ruthie!!! haha!  I'm still out of synch after the clocks going back last weekend and for some reason all day I've been thinking it was Wednesday. Still, remembered last minute (actually gave my tongue freezer burn off my Cornetto because of the shock) so all is not lost! I'm in Halloween mode and have been carving my mini pumpkin today but it looks a bit forlorn all by itself, so am on a quest to get a bigger more impressive beast tomorrow! oooerrr Mrs!! LOL!  I made some Toffee Apples the other day - they were SOOO scrumptious - at least if we'd been able to eat them they would have been!! Unforch I didn't quite cook the toffee long enough and although it did harden it didn't get to that break-off crispy brittleness so all that happened was my teef literally got stuck together!! I thought I was gonna die from toffee asphyxiation! Honestly! I had a bunged up nose and I couldnt breathe through my mouth my molars were welded that tight!!! And we are both in need of a dentist at the moment so I didn't even let the other half near them! If I could've bared my teeth long enough to laugh I would've believe me, and I only had a piece about an inch big. I was gutted cos I'd used all the apples and was really lookign forward to them, hahahaha. They did taste lush I have to say! I daren't give it another go now though having wasted 8 apples and a whole pound of sugar! hmm maybe I should've taken them to the post office picket lines - one of those babies would soon send them all off to the dentist for a few  hours and long enough for our post to get through - maybe I will send the recipe to the Postmaster General!

So talking of Halloween, last week we challenged you all to make Halloween stuff and those of you who posted haven't let us down with your awesome creations, but you can still enter up to lunchtime on Sunday so if you've made any great Halloweeny stuff for the day itself you still have time to enter.


I need to announce the previous challenge winners which had to follow this sketch and the Top 3 Winners will receive a Polkadoodles Halloween Download Bundle - I'm sure you can make use of it just in time for the occasion girls!  We had some fantastic entries and the 3 Lucky winners are...


Ribena Ruby, CJ's Mom and Dolly


Well done girls, please email me for your lovely Downloads!


Right, onto the task at hand. Last week we knew every challenge blog in the world must have done Halloween, but PLEASE!! Some of you are entering 32 or more challenges with ONE card!! I MEAN?? Whassat all about???!!! 32!!!! I think someone even had 35, good on you for keeping track and actually typing them all out, personally I would have lost the will to live!
So as some of you are obviously finding it hard to keep to the rules, we have decided to increase the number of challenges you can enter up to 10. 


Ok, for the next challenge I'm going to ask you to make a MALE project! Oh no I hear you all cry! Oh yes! I LOVE doing men's stuff, maybe because green and blue are 2 of my fave colours.  As a tip for anyone who does struggle with stuff for guys - they always like strong colours! And don't feel you HAVE to put a fancy embellishment on, quite often a good man's card is really plain and simple.  So you need to make a MALE project and you have to use 3 brads. That's it! It can be anything and you can use anything you like! Easy! You have until Sunday 8th November at lunchtime (GMT) to enter so get your thinking caps on!


The Winner of this challenge will receive a free Candy Doodles CD worth £14.99 so come on - get entering now!


So for this week's challenge I asked the fabulous Doodle Dollies to use the new Not For Girls CD which is a fabulous resource for all those Men's cards and projects you want to make. I'm quite proud of this collection because I think it offers something a bit different to all the other male stuff out there, particularly where cards are concerned.  When we launched this on Create and Craft I demo'd a "Burger and Chips" card - sounds weird, huh? But it is pretty cool and I can't believe how many of you have actually made your own versions of that project - I think there are men all over the world getting burgers through the post as we speak, LOL!  Anyway, enough waffling, onto the wonderful creations from the team this week.  So they had to use Not For Girls, a Rubber Stamp and they also had to do a bit of a doodle too (must've been feeling mean that day, haha!)  so here you go...




made by Ruth....I LOVE this fab card from Ruth, this is what I mean by simple but perfect, lovin' that string girl!...

made by Kerry...as a Scooter Girl myself she won me over with this one, LOL!...

 

created by Saskia...Very cute! Saskia has used one of the Brick Lane papers and combined the Tweets with 'Tude with stamps from our Daisy Doodles collection, I love thos floaty little leaves, they're fab...

created by Kath....the Tweets with 'Tude sure are popular! Love how Kath has turned this into a crimbo card and the use of the music paper is lovely...it does rock, Kath!...

made by Kris...Here Kris has taken one of the cool toppers and combined it with buttons and alphabets from the CD, her doodling is all those stripes in the background...great card Kris...

created by Claire...Claire sure loves to doodle! I think she is addicted to these fab robots! A great gatefold card and she's made her brads look like screws. I really like the way Claire does this kind of doodling by using both black and white pens, it looks great and I WILL be stealing it! lol!...

Created by Boni...Boni's gone for a more classic look here using the Jazz and distressed piano papers, 2 of our faves. The message is also on the CD too and she's added a little embellie for some metallic...love this...

Created by Enfys...You can tell an En card a mile off ,I think! I love this card, it's so funny - those little Tweet Dudes have deffo been the most popular collection with the Team I think, and putting her brads on the tree is just plain clever...but then our En is always a very clever girl isnt she...just love it...

made by Sue...here Sue has used the fab tickets from the CD together with a great text backing paper and topper. For her doodling she's used one of the doodle stamps from the Daisy Doodles collection (if you don't have these yet I think they're a must-have, they are SO versatile) and her 3 little stars are brads...fab card...

So as the saying goes, that's it Folks! another week over and another challenge for you to get your teeth into - that's if you have any teeth left after all that trick or treating!   Don't forget there's a free CD on offer for the winner!!

See  you next week xxx

izzy wizzy lets get busy!...

Well I finally managed to relieve Ruth from bloggy doo-tays for this week at least, bless her for helping out so much lately, I really don't know what I would do without ALL my lovely designer gals, they are absolute treasures. I just never seem to have a minute these days between designing and travelling to Create and Craft, the weeks are flashing by and I can't believe it's the middle of October already, this has been a whirlwind year for sure. This month we've launched a new double CD "Not for GIrls" which has gone down a storm and kept us extremely busy shipping and packing, we have literally sent the last batch of the pre-orders off today, it takes us over a week to plough through them all. So after all the craziness my mojo seems to have got up and bogged off , maybe I'm just tired out - eekk what if it doesnt come back!?! Horror! I couldn't live without making something for more than a couple of days though - could you?? Stranded on a desert island I would be the one trying to draw with a stick and making a raft using all the twirliest twigs and the prettiest leaves, with a sail made from flowers and a trail of lotus petals following us home!! Seriously! Not to mench having first built a deep hole and trying to melt sand to make glass so I could sip my cocktails!...right, quick slap round the chops and it's back to the reality and drudgery! Talking of drudgery I actually CLEANED, slap, whack, ouch, yes I did THAT word to the house this week! Necessity of course, we had a plumber coming and it involved moving lots of boxes of stash from where he wanted to be and the shame of the cat fluff just caught up with me quite honestly. Still it's over now, won't have to do it again till Crimbo, hahaha! No we have vowed to try and do IT once a week at least from now on. hmmm, WHATeva!

So without further ado, for Week 20 we challenged you to follow a sketch and we had some lovely entries as always, you peeps sure do us proud every week. I know all the Doodlers love mooching around your blogs looking to see what you did and

we do try and leave comments although sometimes time does prevent but it doesnt mean we don't see them because we do!

So the winning entries were...

3rd place: Allison

2nd place: Dolly

and big congratulations to Shirley who snaffled the Winners Accolade this week!

Well done to all 3 of you, please email me for your blinkies and goodies.

Before I forget you still have time to enter last week's challenge which is

open until lunchtime on Sunday so make sure you get your entries in!

Right, onto this week's challenge....

...we have another sketch this week so please follow the sketch - you can rotate it or flip it, as long as the sketch is recognisable.

Also, please remember that you can only combine your Polkadoodles card with 3 other challenges - the limit is 4 including Polkadoodles. Follow these little rules and you could be in with a chance of winning some fab Polkadoodles products! As we're coming up to Halloween the Top 3 entries will each receive the Polly Polkadoodles Halloween Download Bundle as a little prize for their troubles. Closing date for your entries is Sunday 25th Oct at noon GMT. As it's close to Halloween we'll vote for our winners early so you can get your prizes in time to be making Halloween-y stuff! So come on, get cracking!

As always the fantastic Design Team have come up with some great ideas for this sketch, I asked them to use Polkadoodles stamps with any CD collection - they never fail to disappoint do they, so grab your coffee and the biggest piece of cake you've got and take a look at these gorgie offerings...

Created by Kris...I absolutely LOVE this card, the colours on this are lovely. Kris has used the Crimbley Doodles download collection and she's copied the doodles from the holly stamp and doodled freehand around a scallop frame - I think this looks just like lace and it gives a fantastic look to the card, really pulls it all together...

Created by Enfys...En used her fave tree papers on this fab Crimbo card - these are from the Candy Doodles collection. She's then stamped the tree (SO versatile) and added buttons which I think are just adorable. She loves that little Fudgey dog too doesn't she! Fab, fab, fab!...think he's waiting for a bone parcel...

Created by Krista...another stunner! Krista has made a PRE-crimbo card - what a FAB idea! remind Santa it's Crimbo and send him your list, great idea if you have kids or grandkids, with half term coming you could get them to do one and use it as blackmail ALL the way up to Xmas!! Anyway she's used Polly from Jingle Jangles and I wonder if she coloured this black cos she's been a baad girl??...
Created by Lou...this is such a soft, lovely card...Lou has used the Snowmen papers from Jingle Jangles CD and again has used the tree stamp and overstamped that big bauble - I love that it's oversized, it looks fab!...
created by Ruth...I always love the way Ruth just uses simplicity, I'm in a busy phase at the moment and I love seeing the crisp clean look on Ruth's cards. Here she's made a gorgeous flower and then used the doodle stamp from the Daisy Doodles stamp collection around the edges. Bootiful...Created by Claire...Claire is always so creative! Here she has used the funky robots from the brand new Not For Girls CD and the way she's added them around that circle is FAB. She's made a doodley ribbon using the same stamp as Ruth and then added doodling around the frame and double edged it in white and black for definition, this girl really IS a doodler at heart!...
Created by Saskia...another lovely creation by Saskia...She's used Jingle Jangles elements with the papers and the cute Robin, then stamped Holly using the Crimbo Doodles stamps. Love that flower touch behind the Robin, reminds me of a green pepper for some reason but I love it!...


Created by Kerry...Kerry had made this fun card using Not For Girls CD - those tweets with 'tood are proving popular with everyone!! All elements are from the CD and then she's stamped the buttons and the doodles aorund the edges - a great men's card, think we all have at least one poseur in the family dont we!...

Created by Boni...Here Boni has used the Halloween collection to make this fab spooky card, those little bats are SO cute!She's added lots of distressing to make it look even grungier...
Created by Kath...lovely use of the sketch here. Kath has stamped snowflakes (wouldnt have thought of doing red ones) onto a plain paper and then Stamped the lovely tree onto the Jingle Jangles paper (think it's Gumdrops that one), added her sentiment stamp and some lovely doodling and embellies - simple but gorgeous...
Well, it's a bumper crop this week so I hope you liked what we have to offer and hopefully you will all be feeling inspired to join in this week...can't wait to see what you do! Remember there is a free download bundle for 3, yes, 3, lucky peeps for this one! Don't forget, you have till Sunday 25th to enter! Gotta be in it to win it girls! (and boys!)

ttfn xx

7 busy busy days and we have a winner...

WoW! We would all just like to say a massive thanks to everyone for their mega fab comments on the last sketch, we're all bowled over by the amazing response we've had to the site and how many of you have loved what we're doing - we knew we were onto a winner and you've all proved it, so a HUUUGE thanks to you all. So, our first challenge was last week and you gave us a hard time choosing from the fab entries - there were sooo many it kept us all busy for most of the week. I got blog dizzy at one point, I was flipping around t'interweb like a spider on acid. I've also been told off by DH for spending too much time a la blogger.com instead of work, but he can go twizzle on a sharp stick.
Anyway, Team Doodle has selected our Top 3 winners from the long list of lush creations and comments and it really was very difficult, there is a wealth of talent out there ladies (and men, none of you could be bothered to enter so why should you get a mentch!) We also considered the entries which were a titchy bit late too, seeing as it was the first one ;)

So without further ado, tadaaaahhhh drum roll pleeeeeeese..............
our Top 3 doodlers this week are....
Our No 1 Winner is:
Lou at ...........Loopy Lou
Our No 2 Winner is:
Lynda at........Lynda Loves Crafting
and our No 3 Winner is:
Linda at.........Slice of Life

A massive congrats to the 3 ladies involved who all made fabulous cards, they are now awarded our special, coveted Polka Doodle award blinkies which are only given to challenge winners,

plus they will receive a fab prize too.

(Ladies, please email me at sales@polkadoodles.co.uk for your prizes and blinkies!)

So, if you want to get some spesh blog bling for yourself then you need to get cracking with our next sketch, and here it is (of course you are welcome to use our general blinkie in the sidebar) ...

Now, it amazes me how things are interpreted differently and this week's DT are a great example of that. My loverly girls have excelled this week as I'm sure you'll agree. So, get making and we look forward to seeing your creations. You need to follow the sketch and can use whatever you wish for this one but please link back to the sketch here. Please see the general rules in the sidebar for submissions. To submit your entries please leave a comment under this post with your link to your entry - closing date is Wednesday so come on, get posting!!!

Team Doodle have all been using the Sugar Birdies CD which is still available for pre-order at a super bargain price so make sure you get yours...

Created by Freddie FooFoo...Well I hate to ruin my rep for being a last minute Annie (who?) & in time honoured tradition this was made during BGT as I'm trying to upload the challenge! Every room in our house is seriously like Mr Trebus' house at the mo so it's a case of use what's to hand. So it was just paper from theSugar Birdies CD and a little stash of buttons I came across on the shelf. I don't think I like this card much I have to say, something's missing but time and the inability to sift through a million boxes for an embellie restricted me. I got a bit carried away with the distressing and ink, tore the flower petals and added a few doodles to the papers to show anyone can doodle - this is dead scruffy as you can see! I cut three paper buttons up and concertina'd them into a circle for the centre of the flower, this works really well with patterned paper too. As a quick fix tip for buttons, instead of faffing arbout trying to thread them up, just snip tiny strands of paper and push it through the buttonholes - MUCH quicker & you always have a matching colour.

created by Krista....This is such a cute card, Krista's interpretation of the sketch is cool and she always uses such bright "poppy" colours - the cake is good enough to eat!Created by Michelle...A fab colourful card - sunshine indeed! Like the way Michelle has used her brads and gems here...

Created by Kath...

Adoring the scrummy colour combination here, this is totally my bag. The little circles are great, just goes to show how simple embellies can be totally fab, just get your punches out girls. Also love the little letter circles too which are also from the Sugar Birdies CD...and to quote a line from Enfys this week, Kath's cards always leave her thinking "now why didn't I think of that" - and I'll ditto that!...

Created by Maggie...

This is a really pastel-y soft card - love the double scallop and the yummy ricrac, with lots of glitter....

Created by Lulu...

All things pink and delish with this stunning beauty from our Lou - we all loved the layering here on the cupcake that's added a fab effect and real dimension, need to cardlift this idea for the future methinks! Also, note rotation of the little squares, it reminds me of a little dinky noticeboard...

Created by Saskia, our little Belgian Choc...

Well, Saskia's pulled this inspired creation out of the bag this week and we all love it...an adorable gift for anyone, so much thought and effort has gone into this and really love how she turned the sketch totally around...she's actually made this with Flower Labels for a budding gardener and the little label is flower seeds - how CUTE!...


Created by Enfys...

She never lets you down, our En! A truly scrumptious card, that cake looks good enough to eat right now. En's used the scallop from the CD templates and cut it in black with a white centre for drama, then glittered the cake icing by running it through her Xyron first. The cherries have been topped with Glossy Accents/Diamond Glaze/Anita's (whichever floats your boat) and they are glistening away tempting me to eat them. Wonder if they smell like Maroschino cherries! Hmm, shaken not stirred please barman!...

Created by Sue...

Now our Sue is a new blogger and she ain't half bad is she!...apparently she doesn't normally do girly cards but this is a little cracker we think, who doesn't like that pink and black combo?...here she's used the swirly text paper from the CD and has mounted the "HI" alphabet onto some black card for a bit of contrast, with a gem for the dot. Faberooni, Sue...

Created by Jozza...

As always, J thinks out of the box although she's waay too modest and we all love this stunner of a father's day card with her 2 little poppets smiling away. Jo's a fellow doodler like yours truly and we are on a joint mish to get the world doodling on their cards so we demand you have a go! Liking the scallop edged card here too - don't forget if you don't have any nestabilities etc you can always get those scallop edged scissors out that you bought years ago and have never used!


Created by Lakul...

Another scrummy cherry-fest this week, at one point we thought everyone had popped a cherry card out (mwahhahah) ooer... great colours here too using the cherry papers and Stampies from the CD and look at that funky hand stitching, it looks VERY creative! My tip is when doing hand stitching or faux stitching - just don't even TRY to make it straight as it will look wonky when you're done. If you leave it wonky it looks intentional anyway and just looks arty instead. Not that Kerry's stitching is wonky, she did this on purpoise...also note the way she's attached the ribbon to the frame as well, very subtle but a fab detail...

Created by Ruth
And what a little belter she has made for us! Love the bright colours on this card and Ruth's great use of the flowers. The addition of glitter on the wings of the little birdies is a gorgeous finishing touch.

So dear bloggers, these are our creations for this week and Sketch 2 and I think you will agree that Team Doodle outdid itself! I think the girls need to watch it here, looking at these lovelies we might be peaking a bit too soon, we need to keep some ideas in reserve!!! So we hope you're going to join in with this sketch, there are huge possibilities with this one and we can't wait to see what you do with it!

And if you don't want to join in the sketch don't forget to find the post for the blog candy and leave us a comment to be in with a chance of winning some stash.

ttfn doodlers! xx