Southern Girls ~ Anything Goes

Hi crafty pals, it's time for a new challenge at Southern Girls. Our awesome blog mamas have worked hard this year to score some stellar sponsors for our challenges and pretty much every challenge has two wonderful sponsors. This week, we are being sponsored by a New Zealand company called Paper Arts and also by the lovely Lacy Sunshine Stamps, so two awesome reasons to enter the challenge this week. Our theme is 'Anything Goes' so we're expecting lots of wonderful entries this week as that's always a popular theme. 

I chose a gorgeous wistful image to create with this week, called Harper's Moon. My daughter has started harp lessons this year, so when I saw this image of Heather's with the sweet harp, I really wanted to have a go colouring it up for Georgie. I tried to make the sky as inky and dark as possible, but think I have a gap too big in my copic blues, so will have to try again at a later date once I've filled that gap. 

I went for a very soft palette to colour the flowers and her dress, to allow the inky sky the depth and strength of colour without overly swamping the image with lots of other bright colours. Close up the flowers and dress are really pretty and very softly coloured. I think that worked out to be my favourite part of this colouring. 

I very much wanted to keep the card design very CAS as I wanted the image to be the feature, but I have to confess I'm not at all happy with how this turned out. I may yet pull it apart and try again, as the image is so lovely, but I feel the card design let's it down. I have no solution in mind right now and tried lots of different layouts and cardstock colours before settling on this. So I'll have to leave it sitting on my desk awhile and see if anything comes to me. I have a lot of 'half finished' designs laying around, LOL. We're always our own worst critic aren't we?! But I do occasionally rework designs when I'm not 100% happy with them. I'll show you if I do.

Do come and play along with us this week for our 'Anything Goes' challenge. It really doesn't get any easier than that! Stop by the challenge blog to check out what my awesomely talented teamies got up to this week too, they're a talented bunch and you're sure to be inspired by what you see. I'll be back again later tonight with my Whimsy Stamps Inspiration post. I usually post on a Wednesday, but each 14th of the month, you can find me over on the main Whimsy Stamps Inspiration blog with an extra inspiration post there, so I delayed the matching post on my blog by a day to sync up with that. So pop back in again soon to see that. Hugs and happy crafting until then, Wends xoxo

Challenge Entries:

Dragonfly Journeys: #120 ~ Rose Garden

Lemon Shortbread: #69 ~ Anything Goes

Stamping Sensations: June ~ Anything Goes

Colour Crazy Challenge: #23 ~ Anything Goes

4 Crafty Chicks: #407 ~ ATG + Birds & Blooms

Addicted to Stamps & More: #296 ~ Anything Goes

Simon Says Wednesday Challenge: Frame It (Framed by mats)

Cupcake Inspirations: #448 ~ Colour Challenge ~ Pink, Yellow, Green