Challenge 5, Week Four

Hello everyone, welcome back to the Chocolate Baroque challenge blog. As Christmas approaches, we would like to thank you for your continued support for our blog. For those of you who have entered into the challenge, Thank You so much for finding the time amongst your busy preparations.

This week we are taking a look at some of your entries into the current challenge, and as always, we are really impressed with the artwork that you continue to produce for the challenges. Our first entry is Janny, who has used some of our newest stamps to create an underwater scene on her card:

Our next entrant is Rachel, with her beautiful Christmas card, the background is really lovely:

Kristiina has created some beautiful ATCs combining music paper and floral stamps:

Finally Barbara has made a card using a white embossed butterfly, which is layered simply on a plain background, the butterfly is decoupaged and really stunning:

Thank you to everyone who has entered this month, and we hope to see lots more entries from you before the challenge deadline next week. There is still plenty of time to enter, and you can find the link in this post. Remember, you stand a chance of winning a £15 voucher, details of which can be found on the How it Works tab at the top of the page.

We have two free downloads from Lesley for you this week, they will be so useful in your crafting stash. Please do not pass them on to others, but send them back here to collect the freebies for themselves.

To obtain your free downloads, please click on the images below. Once you have enlarged the images on your screen, right click the images, choose the option 'Save As', and save the images to your computer. You can now print the images onto a variety of surfaces for your crafting projects.

The Design Team have been making some projects with the downloads for your inspiration. Here are a couple of projects from Florence, a lovely card showcasing the image beautifully against a white background:

Secondly a fabulous mixed media piece with clever embellishments to add detail:

Here is a lovely card from Shirley with thoughts of Valentine's Day ahead:

Finally a card from me, using some of the lovely Autumn themed stamps available on the website:

Thank you girls for your projects, we hope that they have inspired you to have a go at making something with them yourselves. Why not upload what you have made to our Facebook Page? We would really love to see your projects.

We will be back next week with a new challenge, if you have any questions and you can't find the answers on the blog, please send us a private message using the contact form located at the very end of this post; you will see it after the comments section.

Challenge 5, Week Three - Butterfly Inspiration

Hello everyone, welcome back to another week on the Chocolate Baroque challenge blog. Thank you for your entries so far for the current challenge, we really appreciate your continued support.

For those of you who are visiting our blog for the first time, here is the inspirational photo and colour swatch that we are using for our current challenge:

You can find the link to our current challenge here.

Our challenges are monthly, based on an inspirational photo and a colour swatch. A new challenge is launched on the third Wednesday of every month and you can use any medium to create your projects; paints, inks, pencils, pens, etc, as long as you keep to the colours from the colour swatch in your project. We offer a monthly prize of £15 and the winner is drawn by Random.org from those entries that have used Chocolate Baroque stamps currently available on the website. We welcome entries from anyone however, and all entries will be considered by the DT members for a slot in the Top Three each month.

This week, we have some more inspiration from the DT. Our first project is a fabulous butterfly tag from Debbie:

 Our second project is a card, also using butterflies as the theme, from Miranda:

Miranda has very kindly written a tutorial for her project that you can use for your own creativity:

Follow Your Passion (by Miranda)

You will need:

Watercolour paper
Water based inks -purple/ultramarine
Versafine onyx black ink
Memento Grape Jelly ink
Poppy Edges stamp sheet, Tangled Butterfly clear stamp, Butterfly Dreams for the sentiment
Colour pencils
White gelly pen
Crafter's Workshop stencil Garden Gate
Water spray
Pan Pastel White
Sofft Knife and cover no 4. (sponge with point)
Craft sheet and heat tool
Paint brush
Kitchen towel

Step by step instructions:

1. Mist your paper before applying inks.
2. Apply the inks with a brush.
3. Hold your paper vertically and mist with the water so that the inks will start to move and you can decide in which direction you want them to go.
4. Clean your craft sheet and put the paper on it.
5. Position the stencil on one of the top corners and pull out some of the colour with a kitchen towel. Repeat on the opposite bottom corner.
6. Dry with a heat tool.
7. Stamp the poppy border and butterflies with Memento Grape Jelly ink.
8. Colour the seed pods with three shades of green colour pencils and a white pencil for highlights. Use a purple pencil for shading.
9. Colour the butterflies with the colour challenge colours and use a white gelly pen for the white accents.
10. Take the white Pan Pastel and put some on the top of your tool, apply around the butterflies, and fade with a clean sponge tool.
11. Stamp the sentiment with Versafine onyx black ink.

Enjoy the creative process! Miranda.

Thank you so much Debbie and Miranda for your inspiration this week. We will be back next week with another post, and more projects for you. We look forward to seeing more of your entries, and hope that you can find time amongst your Christmas preparations to join in with our challenge.

You can add your entries to the Inlinkz link here. In the meantime, don't forget if you have any questions, and you cannot find the answers on the blog pages, please send us a private message using the contact form located at the very end of this blog post; you will see it after the comments section.

Challenge 5, Week Two- Time to announce our Winners

Hello everyone, welcome to our second week of Challenge Five on the Chocolate Baroque challenge Blog. This week, we are announcing the winners of Challenge Four.

The winner of our £15 prize to spend at Chocolate Baroque is Kate whose lovely Mackintosh inspired card was drawn by Random.org as the overall winner. Congratulations Kate, we hope that you will have fun spending your voucher.

You can also display our Winner's badge, details of how to obtain the badge can be found on the FAQ tab at the top of the page. Please email Lesley on lesley@chocolatebaroque.com so that she can organise your voucher.

Our Top Three has been chosen by the Design Team. As always, we had a really hard time, as the entries were just amazing. Our Top Three winners in no particular order are:

Penny

Lesley

Julie

Congratulations Girls, you can display the Top Three badge on your blog. Details of how to obtain the badge may be found on the FAQ tab at the top of the page. Well done to everyone who entered, and we hope that you will enter our current challenge, the colours are gorgeous. You can find the details here.

We have some more Design Team inspiration for you this week. Our first card is from Shirley, a stunning Christmas creation:

The next card is from Asha, a light and airy floral card, suitable for so many occasions:

Finally another gorgeous Christmas card from Claire, lots of snowflakes and a beautiful bow:

Thank you girls for your inspiration, they are all so different. Hopefully they will give you some ideas and inspire you to enter the challenge.

We will be back next week with more projects from the Design Team, but until then, we look forward to seeing more of your crafty projects. If you have any questions and you cannot find the answers on the blog, please send us a private message using the contact form located at the very end of this blog post; you will see it after the comments section.

Challenge Five

Hello everyone, welcome to a brand new challenge on the Chocolate Baroque challenge blog. Thank you for all of your entries into last month's challenge. We will be announcing the winner next week, both here and on our Facebook page, so be sure to check out the announcement, it could be you!

As a reminder to those of you who have visited our blog before, and for anyone who is new to the blog, our challenges are monthly, based on an inspirational photo and a colour swatch. A new challenge is posted on the third Wednesday of every month and you can use any medium to create your projects; paints, inks, pencils, pens, etc., as long as you keep to the colours from the colour swatch in your project.

We are offering a monthly prize of £15 to spend on Chocolate Baroque stamps to one lucky winner, who will be selected by Random.org from all of the entrants who have used Chocolate Baroque stamps that are currently available on the website. We welcome entries incorporating any other stamps, but they will not be eligible to win the prize. All entrants will have a chance to be selected as one of our Top Three and can then display our 'I made the Top Three at Chocolate Baroque' badge on their blog.

Now onto this month's challenge, which has been inspired by a piece of original artwork created by Shirley:

The challenge will close at 12.00 p.m. on Tuesday 16th December 2014, and the winner will be announced on Wednesday 24th December 2014. Here are some inspirational projects from our Design Team for you:

Maria:

Judith:

Doreen:

Florence:

If you have any questions at all, please don't hesitate to contact our challenge blog team You can get in touch by sending us a private message. Details are at the end of the blog.

We look forward to seeing what you create using the colours provided and hope that you enjoy the challenge.

An InLinkz Link-up