We are Neet and Wendy and we would like to welcome you to our fortnightly challenge, ‘Artful Times’, where we are offering a variety of challenges to inspire you to create in whichever style or medium of crafting you enjoy. You never know, we might even inspire you to create something out of your comfort zone and try out something new.

Yes like all challenge sites we have rules and guidelines. We hope you will read and follow them, we have Oyster Stamps as our sponsor, and of course, a winner and runner up will be chosen each month. We may also have the occasional guest designer.



Friday 29 August 2014

Challenge 63 - Use a House Shape - and Great News!

Well, do I have news for you.  Today we are joined by a Guest Designer and it is non other than our friend Sam.

Sam, as many of you might know was one of the three of us who started this blog and Sam did all the work for the actual setting up of it, the header, the various pages etc so we have a lot to say 'Thanks' to her for.  It's nice to welcome her back for a Guest Designer spot and this is what Sam made for us for this particular challenge


This is from Wendy and she finds this really useful in her craft room.  Why?  Visit her blog and find out.


And Neet did this card for a friend who is moving house


So what are you going to make in the shape of a house?  A card, a tag, a book - or something so different you will have us guessing.

Pop along to the various blogs to see how they made them and then join in, we would love to have you work alongside us - a challenge is not a challenge if it does not challenge you.  Follow that?

Thanks to those of you who joined in with our sewing theme last week - lovely entries ladies and all much appreciated.  Any that didn't get visited with it being BH weekend rest assured we will visit you all.


Friday 22 August 2014

Winner Challenges 60 & 61

Sorry for this edition being a bit late in getting to the Press.

As we had so many entries in the tag challenge we were really stuck as to whose work to choose as a winner so in the end the winner and the runner up both came from this challenge.  Want to know who won?

Well, we finally decided our winner this time was to be Crafty Creations with her lovely bird tag and the runner up was Joan W.

Can both you ladies contact Neet (addie on the RH side of her blog) and she will send you your blinkies to display on your blog.  In the case of Crafty Creations she will send you instructions for claiming you £10 gift voucher from our lovely sponsors, Oyster Stamps.

Thank you to everyone who entered either or both of these challenges we love to see your work and hop you are joining in with the sewing theme this week.

Here are the two tags







Friday 15 August 2014

Challenge 62 - Sewing

*Entries must fully comply with the fortnightly theme (this means your creation must follow the rules of the theme set).

*Please link directly to your entry and not just to your blog (this means only link the address for your post to the challenge and not the general address of your blog).  For instructions on how to do this please see page 'Making a Direct Link'.
*Please ensure you make a link back to this challenge blog in your post (this means you need to include a link to Artful Times Challenge blog when writing up your post).  For instructions on how to do this please see page 'Linking Back'.
*Please write a brief description of how you created your entry and some of the materials used, even if it's only a brief list at the end of your posting, as it's nice to know what was used and how it's been done.
*Please do not back link to previous posts prior to the date of the challenge.
*A maximum of 5 challenges may be combined.
*You may enter the challenge several times as long as each entry is with a different creation.
*We encourage you to visit each other's blogs and leave a comment, even ours, it means a lot!

*If you have 'Word Verification' may we ask that you please turn it off, as this makes commenting easier for everyone, especially with the new blogger words which are difficult to read at times.  The comment moderation seems to be a more successful way of avoiding unwanted comments.
*Link your entry before 17.55 on the following Thursday.
*Any entries which do not follow the above challenge guidelines may not be commented on by the DT and will not be entered into the prize draw.

Thank you to all you brave people who joined in with our Kinetic Challenge.  We were both surprised at how many entries we actually got.  Well done!

Sewing is the new Challenge:

For this challenge we ask you to make anything with the theme of "sewing".  This can be a book page, journal, tag, card etc or can be a pincushion, napkin, bag and so on.  Easy Peasy what!

To set you off in the mood here is what we did:

Wendy made a page for a book




Neet did a page in her journal



Looks like we both had the same idea again - coincidence or what?  Now what will you do?  Hope you join in with the fun but don't forget to read the rules and guidelines above please.


Friday 1 August 2014

Challenge 61 - Kinetic??

*Entries must fully comply with the fortnightly theme (this means your creation must follow the rules of the theme set).

*Please link directly to your entry and not just to your blog (this means only link the address for your post to the challenge and not the general address of your blog).  For instructions on how to do this please see page 'Making a Direct Link'.
*Please ensure you make a link back to this challenge blog in your post (this means you need to include a link to Artful Times Challenge blog when writing up your post).  For instructions on how to do this please see page 'Linking Back'.
*Please write a brief description of how you created your entry and some of the materials used, even if it's only a brief list at the end of your posting, as it's nice to know what was used and how it's been done.
*Please do not back link to previous posts prior to the date of the challenge.
*A maximum of 5 challenges may be combined.
*You may enter the challenge several times as long as each entry is with a different creation.
*We encourage you to visit each other's blogs and leave a comment, even ours, it means a lot!

*If you have 'Word Verification' may we ask that you please turn it off, as this makes commenting easier for everyone, especially with the new blogger words which are difficult to read at times.  The comment moderation seems to be a more successful way of avoiding unwanted comments.
*Link your entry before 17.55 on the following Thursday.
*Any entries which do not follow the above challenge guidelines may not be commented on by the DT and will not be entered into the prize draw.

Thank you for all the Tag entries last challenge.  What a lot of contrasting styles we have and how exciting to see them all.  Now for the new Challenge which is all about motion.

Kinetic

This challenge may prove a difficult one - wonder how many of you will attempt to make something that has motion/movement within it.  To try to get you thinking here are a few samples:

Neet




A Quad Easel Card - I think this has a bit of a loose connection to 'kinetic' and maybe I should have made something like a Waterfall Card but this does move from being flat to being flat to being stood up. Doesn't it?

This is a card I made with Spellbinders way back when the company was fairly new and this is the inside of it.



It's a Secret Message Card but instead of being cut into rectangles this is cut on a curve - I think I like this idea Kim.

                                                          Wendy's unfinished box

The cogs on the box fit together and move like real cogs 



Now what will you make?  Will you join us or is it too much of a challenge for you?  Want some ideas - and step by step instructions?  Visit this website for lots of ideas on kinetic and other cards.

We would love you to join in, what is a challenge if it does not challenge us?  Go on, pop over to Artful Times and enter.