Saturday, September 8, 2012

September Challenge #1 + meet our Guest Designer *NATHALIE KALBACH*

Well the time is finally here!!! I am SO excited to announce to you that we have teamed up with Color Stories Inspiration (CSI) for the month of September, just like a few of you guessed already. 

Debbi Tehrani, owner of CSI and my self have worked pretty hard behind the scenes to coordinate everything so we can provide you with cool challenges and PLENTY of inspiration through out September. We have invited members of CSI as well as our main sponsor 7 Dots Studio to also be our guests at Once Upon A..Sketch this month. 

First of all , there will be FOUR challenges here at Once Upon A..Sketch for September instead of our usual 1 challenge . This is because CSI has 4 challenges each month. Each challenge will be revealed on Saturday morning (Australian time) to coincide with the challenge reveals at CSI in the USA and you MUST remember that you will have just 9 days per challenge to enter your layouts here on our side bar. As you know usually our challenges are month long. 

Now, we know that Once Upon A..Sketch is not a colour challenge site like CSI but...we thought we would give you something different and something more exciting to try. Why not right? 

Our winners here at Once Upon A..Sketch will be announced at the beginning of October and our Design Team will look at ALL the entries from ALL the challenges. So the more challenges you play along at, the more chances you have of being one of our challenge/prize winners or Top 5 Featured layouts. This is a little different to CSI who announce their "featured" layouts on a weekly basis. 

Lastly, everything will go back to normal in October and we will have a reveal October 1st as usual. So I hope you guys have fun and enjoy what we have planned for you. Don't forget that the entries for this challenge are due by 2:00pm Monday 17th of September Australian Eastern Standard Time






For this challenge, you must use :
*the SKETCH provided
* all the colours in the SCHEME
* at least 2 elements from the EVIDENCE 
* at least 1 element from the TESTIMONY!






It is with GREAT pleasure that I introduce to you one of my fave artists out there that has agreed to be our invited Guest Designer in September. Please help me welcome the super sweet and super talented ...

Nathalie Kalbach (Germany)
Nathalie Kalbach is a European Mixed Media Scrapbooker. Her layered work is an explosion of texture, dimension and jewel tone colors. In Nathalie’s workshops she shares her secrets for using paint and ink products to reveal texture, tips and tricks for embedding found objects and embellishments and how to unlock your personal creativity.She has taught workshops in the U.S., Canada, Australia, Israel, Germany, France, Belgium, Greece, Spain, Denmark, The Netherlands and Norway. Also her Online Workshops are very well visited and a big hit. Nathalie works closely with several manufacturers as of now with Prima Marketing, PanPastel and Scrapbook Adhesives by 3L. She has been published in many Stampington Publications including her own column „Nathalie’s Studio“ with Somerset Memories as well as in numerous magazines from around the world and several idea books.  You can read more about Nathalie and find her work on the n*Studio blog: http://nathaliesstudio.com/


Here is Nathalie's take on our challenge. 


Now here is how the team from Color Stories Inspiration interpreted this challenge..






Heather Jacob (Australia)




Color Stories Inspiration special investigator Elaine Forum Shmidt 


We also have the team from our main sponsor at 7 Dots Studio who played along with our challenge this month. 

Tara Orr (Canada)

Anna Zaprzelska (Poland) 

Hege Lundquist (Norway) 









And here is some inspiration from our own team here at Once Upon A...Sketch..


 **Imaginarium Designs chipboard title, border and frame. Scrapbook Fantasies ribbon.


Cathy Cafun (Australia)
**Imaginarium Designs chipboard cogs. Scrapbook Fantasies ribbon.


Georgia Heald (Australia) 
**Imaginarium Designs chipboard alphas and leaves.


***Imaginarium Designs chipboard border


Romy Veul (The Netherlands) 
**Imaginarium Designs chipboard border


We are so incredibly happy to welcome a brand new sponsor to our blog this month, one that is a fave amongst many of our designers including my self. Please help me welcome the incredibly stunning paper company 7 Dots Studio


7 Dots Studio is a polish scrapbooking company. It was created by a mom of 2 little children, who loves scrapbooking and cannot sit in one place for longer than a while :) Dream could come true, because of two friends - Finnabair (Anna DÄ…browska-PÄ™kocka) and Anai (Anna Iwanowska-Pietkiewicz). Wonderful women, scrapbookers and designers, who love creating. We launched our first two lines in Autumn 2011 - they were extremely warm welcomed by scrapbookers from all over the world. 
We always choose best possible materials – we are also scrapbookers and we know, how important is the quality of products, which we use to make our memories live forever! We love working with many kinds of media and all our products are media friendly.

Our products are sold in many shops across the Europe and also in Australia and USA. You can find constantly updated list of our retailers on our website in section "where to buy".



We are delighted to also have one of our Design Team member's sponsor our challenge this month. Our super talented Evgenia Petzer has an awesome  Etsy Shop right HERE called Little Things For Cute Creations. 


Now here are our permanent sponsors for 2012. For more information please see our sidebar. 









How would you like to be our Guest Designer for the month of November?  The winner of the September challenges with the most points, as voted by the Design Team will be invited to be our Guest Designer in November and create along side our Design Team. 

This person will also win this fabulous prize from 7 Dots Studio...

2 complete collections from 7 Dots Studio - All I Ever.. and Domestic Goddess 



The next 4 winning entries will win..

Complete Hopefully collection from 7 Dots Studio

This stunning kit from Cést Magnifique kit club, shipped to you FREE of charge together with any other purchases from their store. 




A US$15.00 voucher to use at Little Things For Cute Creations


Our RANDOMLY CHOSEN winners will win the following prizes..

Scrapbooking Fantasies has donated ONE ribbon pack for each week in September. Each prize is valued at over $10AUS each and contains between 21 and 24 half metre lengths of ribbons, trims and lace in colours that co-ordinate with that weeks challenge from quality brands, plus FREE international postage!!









** The deadline for this challenge (FOR THIS MONTH ONLY )is 2:00pm Monday 17th of September Australian Eastern Standard Time . The Design Team will vote and the Top 5 layouts PLUS Top 5 featured layouts will be announced soon after the challenge has finished.
** To be eligible for a prize or a feature at BOTH Once Upon A...Sketch and Color Stories Inspiration you must enter both challenges by the due date. It is NOT compulsory to play along at both challenges. 
**This is an international blog, so anyone can enter
**You are free to combine Once Upon A..Sketch challenges with other challenges. We don't mind at all!!!
**You are allowed to enter only layouts  for our challenges
**You are also allowed to flip or rotate the sketch or alter it to suit your needs, but please make sure its still recognisable.
**Post your creation on your blog or an online gallery and link it on the right hand side of this blog using the Link tool. Please provide a direct link to your post, not your entire blog.If the link tool is down, please leave a comment on the comments section and link your layout there.
**You may enter as many times as you like
**Also, please consider turning off word verification for comments on your blog.


For a complete list of the rules please see the top of this page.

Monday, September 3, 2012

August Challenge **WINNERS**

WOW talk about an efficient Design Team we have here. Didn't take them long to vote on ALL 128 entries for August. 

Thank you ALL so so much for the support you show us here at Once Upon A ...Sketch. Thanks so much for entering our challenges! Welcome to all our new followers and we hope to see you play along too..

So the votes are in, and it was a very tight finish between 1st and 2nd. In fact, just 5 points separating the Top 2. Without further delay, here are the entries the Design Team voted for.

Top 5 Winners
(in winning order) 

(can all winners please email Patti at phamil@live.com with their full name and address and prize they won within 7 days!!. Also can the Top 5 winners please get their winners badge from the sidebar of our blog :) Thank you ) 



Out of 128 entries, the person with the most points is..

*hidden journalling behind pictures

From the different textures, to the colours and the picture, this is one winning layout. The shabby look combined with an artistic touch here and there make for a wonderful combination and Miranda this is simply a perfect layout to look at! Congratulations Miranda, you are our winner for August and you are invited to come back in October to be our Guest Designer!Please contact our Guest Designer coordinator Georgia Heald ( hericarusempire@bigpond.com )  You have also won a beautiful kit from The Flying Unicorn.

Zanka (Sweden)  
*Journalling is on the ticket, tucked under the photo. 

What a magnificent layout! What perfect matching of those lovely colours in the garden and those on the flowers. There is something so beautiful in this layout and the picture you have used is just so pretty. We love the way you created your background and just love what you created out of the sketch. WELL DONE!! Zanka you have also won a beautiful kit from The Flying Unicorn. 

Kim Price (Australia)
* journalling on a hidden tag (the red tab at the top of the photograph)

WOW Kim! I don't know just how I will describe how beautiful your layout is. You have combines the serenity of the picture, together with an overall softness on your layout that is just amazing to see. Absolutely gorgeous layering and placement. This is incredible! Well done! Kim, you have also won a kit from The Flying Unicorn. 

Yuko Tanaka (Japan) 
Yuko this is such a beautiful layout. The picture you have used makes us feel as though we are right there in the moment and the simplicity of this layout, together with the layering and clustering is definitely eye catching! WELL DONE Yuko! You have won a $20.00 gift card from C'est Magnifique kit club. 

Jodi Cent (Australia)

* Journaling is under the zigzag heart and also tucked behind the raised cream cutout to the left



Jodi...WOW! I wonder..how long did it take you to put together this masterpiece? I am running out of adjectives to describe this month's winners, and now I seriously have no words for your layout. SO much to look at and SO much prettiness and depth. Incredible creation here Jodi and it is not hard to see why this one made it to out Top 5! Congratulations. You have also won a chipboard pack from Imaginarium Designs.


Now here are our Top 5 Featured Layouts followed by some more that caught the Design Team's eye...

Lene Neby (Norway) 

Elena Olinevich (Belarus) 

Anupama Choudary (India) 

Rikka Kovasin (Finland)

Rachelle Sigurdson (Canada)

Lizzy Hill (Australia) 

Marjorie Billet (France ) 

Photobucket

Shell Carman (Australia) 

Congratulations to all the featured layouts! Well done. Please remember to grab a featured badge from the sidebar of our blog. 

Lastly we have some randomly chosen winners (using random.org) to send some prizes to. 

The four people that win a ribbon pack from Scrapbooking Fantasies are : Drea Slee, Anne Pennington , Linda Eggleton and Keren Tamir

The person that wins the paper collection from Julia Cotrim Scrapbooking is Luciana Machado 

The person that wins the handmade tag by Berry71Bleu is despina 

The person that wins the $10 gift voucher from The Scrap Locker is Teresa Manchas

(can all winners please email Patti at phamil@live.com with their full name and address and prize they won within 7 days!!. )

Congratulations everyone :) Thank you always for playing along with us. 


Saturday, September 1, 2012

September at Once Upon A..Sketch..

..is going to be very different. For this month only we are teaming up with a very well known challenge site and we will do things a little differently here.

All will be revealed next Saturday morning , the 8th of September (Australian Time) so there will be no reveal today here at Once Upon A..Sketch. 

We have been working pretty hard behind the scenes to set everything up , and have a plethora of Guest Designers from a few places to inspire you. 

I will give you a hint..There will be 4 weekly challenges in September and here is a picture clue ..


See you all next Saturday :)

In the next few days our August winners will be announced and that's a HUGE ask in itself with 127 entries! But stay tuned! We will have the results any day now. 


Wednesday, August 29, 2012

September kit reveal from C'est Magnifique!!

Hi everyone!

One of our ongoing sponsors for 2012 is C'est Magnifique kit club, which each month donates a generous prize for our participants and winners. 

Sponsors are very important to us here at Once Upon A...Sketch, and so one way to thank them for their support is by doing a spotlight feature and spreading the word about them. C'est Magnifique reveals the coming month's kit around this time and I thought I would share it with you here. 

The stunning September kit includes amazing papers from Riddersholm Design called  Huntington Garden

Here is what the kit looks like..




Here are some close ups of the kit contents..

And here is a list of the contents

Paper Collection: Riddersholm Design Huntington Garden
Day Dream
Pavillion
Summerfield
Huntington
Tea Room
Songbird
Balloon
Sky Blue
Friends

Kit Embellishments:
Lindy's Stamp Gang: Moonshadow Mist: Smoky Sapphire
KaiserCraft: Rub-Ons: Timeless: Dress Forms
Leaky Shed: Ornate Corner
Prima: Say it In Pearls: Black Flourish
Dusty Attic: Compass Rose
Wrights: Ruffled Lace: Natural
American Crafts: Thickers: Dear Lizzy: Splendid
Green Tara: Gardenias: Peach
Prima: Flutter Bits: Nature's Garden
Manor House Creations: Rosettes: Lilac


To add to this, Leslie also put together 2 stunning add ons..

Flower Add On 
 
Flower Add-on contents
Manor House Creations: Imagine: Cocoa
Prima: Celyon: Attic
Prima: Charme Rose: Nature's Garden
KaiserCraft: Paper Blooms: Misty
Prima: Coventry: Tranquil
Maya Road: Vintage Lace Daisies: Milk



Embellishments Add On 
 
Embellishment Add-on contents
Heidi Swapp: Color Magic: Banner Delights
Prima: Wood Embellishments: Birds
Bo Bunny: Rub-Ons: Weekend Market
Zva: Pearl Flourish
Want2Scrap: Bonnie's Birdcage
American Crafts: Dear Lizzy: Letter Stickers
Lindy's Stamp Gang: Starbursts: Canna Lily Burnt Orange



This kit , together with the add ons and some individual items are all available at the store right now!! You just go HERE and you will find everything you see here. 

If you're interested in subscribing to the kits and be assured to receive one each month, visit the Join Page for all the details.  You can subscribe to the monthly add-ons, as well.

C'est Magnifique also has a very active blog HERE where you can get inspiration from the Design Team, as well as play along at challenges!!

Thank you C'est Magnifique for your generous donation each month!

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

More Inspiration for our August challenge from The Flying Unicorn!

As mentioned earlier in the month our featured sponsor this month is a fabulous online store and kit club The Flying Unicorn. SO I have invited their Design Team to be our Guests this month and create with our August challenge. But first, here is a little about The Flying Unicorn. 


The Flying Unicorn.. it’s about One of a Kind. We offer an incredible selection of products for all paper crafting artists. Our Kit of the Month if filled with the latest and greatest and includes an off the page project to keep your creative muse flowing! Our forums, a hot and happening place which includes monthly challenges, tips, techniques and friendships that last! Website : http://www.flyingunicornstore.com



The Flying Unicorn has been SO generous and donated 3 prizes for us in July! Just check them out below...

 Theme: Season (Summer, Autumn, Winter, Spring)

We would like you to create a layout and interpret the theme "Season" however you like based on the following sketch. You can journal as little or as much as you like, but your layout must incorporate this theme and the sketch below. Please make sure that we see some sort of journalling on your layouts and please tell us where your journalling is . Hidden journalling is perfectly fine.

Ideas for journalling: current season in your part of the world, favourite season, seasonal traditions on your part of the word, a childhood memory, a summer romance, what summer/autumn/winter/spring brings for you, baby it's cold outside, summer loving, spring is in the air, autumn breeze, summer holidays, seasonal changes, etc etc. Anything goes .. 



Now here is some wonderful inspiration from the Design Team at The Flying Unicorn.

Tracey Gregory
*journaling is in the lower left side


Kelly Foster






 **some journaling using the quote on front and a smaller hidden tag behind the photo


 **journaling is in the top left corner in white Sharpie.


 **the journaling is under the photo


**journaling down the right side




How would you like to be our Guest Designer for the month of October?  The winner of this challenge with the most points, as voted by the Design Team will be invited to be our GUEST DESIGNER in September and create along side our Design Team. This person will also win this fabulous prize from The Flying Unicorn ..


The next four winning entries will win the following prizes

Kit from The Flying Unicorn

Kit from The Flying Unicorn



A US$20.00 store gift card from C'est Magnifique Kit Club + FREE postage to anywhere in the world + add any other item in the store at NO extra postage cost from C'est Magnifique kit club. 




Of course we do not forget our random winners. These are the prizes up for grabs for our RANDOMLY drawn entries..


Scrapbooking Fantasies has donated FOUR ribbon packs (for 4 winners) from Scrapbooking Fantasies . Each prize is valued at over $10AUS each and contains over 23 half metre lengths of ribbons, trims and lace in shades of one of the four seasons from quality brands, plus FREE international postage!!











**This is an international blog, so anyone can enter
**You are free to combine Once Upon A..Sketch challenges with other challenges. We don't mind at all!!!
**You are allowed to enter only layouts  for our challenges
**You are also allowed to flip or rotate the sketch or alter it to suit your needs, but please make sure its still recognisable.
**Post your creation on your blog or an online gallery and link it on the right hand side of this blog using the Link tool. Please provide a direct link to your post, not your entire blog.If the link tool is down, please leave a comment on the comments section and link your layout there.
** The deadline for this challenge is midnight August 31stAustralian Eastern Standard Time . The Design Team will vote and the Top 5 layouts PLUS Top 5 featured layouts will be announced soon after the challenge has finished.
**You may enter as many times as you like
**Also, please consider turning off word verification for comments on your blog.
For a complete list of the rules please see the top of this page.