Taheerah Atchia

Hey everyone!

Happy Monday! I know, I know, Mondays are tough. We all need a little tonic to help us get through the day. Luckily there’s a new challenge in town to help us do just that – the Cure For The Monday Blues Challenge!!

This is a challenge which I’ve created myself, yay me! Every Monday I will bring you a photo inspiration challenge, with images that focus on lifting us out of those Monday doldrums and all inspired to create!! I’ll be asking you to play along as well and linking up your creations! At the end of each week I’ll pick a Top 3 who’ll be my Cures For The Monday Blues and receive a special badge to add to your blog!!

This challenge is in its thirteenth week now – over 3 months old!! Wow! Thank you to everyone who has given it love and support and helped it to grow!

In case you missed last week’s post, please read on for some of the recent changes made to the Challenge!

Today’s challenge is a very special one as I get to introduce my very first Guest Designer!!

She’s a regular participant (and winner!) of this challenge, and is a fantastic talent with fun, fresh designs! I’m sure you’ll not be at all surprised as to who this month’s Guest Designer is!

Here’s a little about Amy in her own words:

Source	Source	Source

I will pick one designer a month to join me in a Cure For The Monday Blues Challenge. The Guest Designer will create a project for one of the weeks in that month and be showcased on my blog when that challenge plays out!  The first Guest Designer will be announced next week!!

• The Guest Designer will receive a special badge to promote themselves on their blog and social media channels, where appropriate. I will also give you a shout-out on my FB, promote your work, and add your project to a special new Pinterest Board reserved just for Guest Designers!
• In addition to this, as a special ‘Thank You’ for their efforts, the Guest Designer will be gifted with a $15 gift certificate to an online crafting store of their choice!

Right then. Back to business, lol!

Before we get to this week’s challenge I want to thank all of you that submitted entries for the last challenge. They were all truly beautiful entries and you did not make my life easy when choosing the winners!! I really wanted to pick you all!! Here are my Top 3 Cures For The Monday Blues:

Winners please contact me to be sent your challenge winner’s badges!

Yet again I had some absolute stunners for entries, oh how I truly *agonised* this week picking out only a Top 3! All of you have really been putting in some amazing designs and it makes me so happy when you play, so please keep playing along!

So are you excited to get this week’s challenge under way?! Let’s see what’s up for this week’s inspiration:

I could not love this more!! I wanted to do Easter, but ‘different’! I was so happy to find this *amazing* image, chock full of eggs, bunnies and NEON! So very me!!!

Here’s what my Guest Designer Amy came up with!

Awesome right?! Didn’t I tell you about this girl?! Amy was inspired by the white ceramic bunnies, the gold foil wrap on the chocolate bunny, the neon colours (particularly the pink), and the cupcake wrappers! I love how she took all those aspects and elements and translated them into this funky design! Love her doily and splashes of neon, and that gold hello! You really must check out her blog where she’s given more details on her card!! Thank you so much for your amazing project and being such an awesome guest Amy!!

Amy now joins my special Pinterest ‘Guest Designers’ Board! I’m really looking forward to filling up this board with future Guest Designers too!

And now, here’s my take on the inspiration:

*squeals* I am so very happy with how this turned out!!!

I bet you’re thinking that with such a bright inspiration piece that options and details are limited huh? Nope! See right at the back of the image? There are some letters that spell ‘Happy’ and have neon edges! That’s where my inspiration came from!!

I started by die cutting the letters several times from Pure White cardstock using the Papertrey Block Alphabet Upper dies. Each letter was cut out 5 times. I kept one of each letter aside then used Hero Arts Neon Yellow Paint Dauber and Hero Arts ink in Neon Red to ink the die cuts and their edges to give that neon effect! I adhered all the layers together using Glossy Accents then added the white top layer on too! 

I then took to my Pure White card base and stamped the supporting sentiment from Avery Elle’s Oh Happy Day set using Versafine Onyx Black ink before adhering my letters in place. I love the neon ‘halo’ that emanates from each letter!!

So now it’s your turn to cure the Monday Blues! Here’s how to participate in the challenge!

The Rules

• Create a brand new project using the photo inspiration
• Post on your blog or to an online photo album. Ensure you link up to this challenge post in your blog post and include the inspiration photo
• If it is not obvious how the image inspired you then please explain your process in your post
• Link up your creations to this post using the Inlinkz below. Please use the link to your actual post rather than the link to your blog
• You can enter as many times as you like!
• The deadline for linking submissions is Sunday 20th April at 11pm BST/6pm EST

Supplies:

Pure White Cardstock

Oh Happy Day Stamp Set (Avery Elle)

Hero Arts Ink – Neon Red

Versafine Onyx Black Ink

Hero Arts Paint Dauber – Neon Yellow

Block Alphabet Upper Die Collection

Glossy Accents

InLinkz.com