Balloon Animals Stamp of the Month Australasian Blog Hop

Hello and welcome aboard our Close To My Heart February 2016 Balloon Animals Stamp of the Month Australasian Blog Hop. If you have arrived here from Lauren Moore's CTMH Craftings, you are in the right place. If you landed here by accident, no problem, please join in by following the link at the end of this post. 

Today, I would like to share with you a few projects that I have created featuring the February Stamp of the Month, Balloon Animals. This stamp set is available only in February 2016 for $27, or for just $7.50 when you spend $75 or more. 

Could this Balloon Animals stamp set be more adorable? Seriously! It is such a fun, super-cute stamp set that is just perfect for birthday cards, page layouts and of course, for decorating your Planner!  It features 6 balloon animals, 5 sentiments, a little frame for your sentiments as well as some fun dots to decorate your pages and cards! 

I could not wait to start creating with this darling stamp set. I began by looking for inspiration on page 42 of the Seasonal Expressions Idea Book. I just loved the cute page and card created by the CTMH Art Department featuring the Balloon Animals (scroll down to see them at the bottom of this post), so I decided to replicate the page (with some artistic license)!

You'll notice that in my version I have used Crystal Blue Cardstock as the base (instead of Glacier), a strip of Georgie B&T Paper down the side of the page (instead of Penelope) and I have added some Thick Twine to the balloons for a little bit of extra texture as well as doodling around my title and photo mat.  This page really is so fun and easy to recreate.  The title is cut at 1" (relative size) from Poppy Cardstock using the Artistry Cricut Cartridge and is stuck down using our awesome Bonding Memories Glue Pen, which is just perfect for adhering little letters like these.

I also decided to add a second page to create a double-page layout as that is how I like to scrapbook (I very rarely use just a single page layout in my albums).  To make the second page, I cut a sheet of Georgie B&T Paper down to 11.5" x 11.5" and mounted it on a sheet of Crystal Blue Cardstock and then added 4 pieces of 4.5" x 6.5" White Daisy Cardstock for photo mats (so that I can add 4 standard-size photos to this second page later).  A bit of doodling, another cute Balloon Animal adhered to the page with 3-D Foam Tape and some more White Enamel Stars, and this super-fast page was complete! I like the simplicity of this page against the decorative look of the first page- I think they work well together. What do you think?

Other products used to create this page include Adventure and Enchantment Fundamental Stickers, White Shimmer Trim and Penelope Complements. 

So while I was at it, I decided I would also have a go at re-creating the cute card from page 42 of the Seasonal Expressions Idea Book.  Below, you can see my version:

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I have pretty much replicated it exactly as it appears in the Idea Book.  I thought that stamping those little dots across the front of the card to create the striped background was going to be really tedious, but it was actually a lot easier, faster and so much more fun than I thought it would be!  The dots make a huge difference to the finished card too. I loved it so much, I decided (well actually it was Perrin's idea to be honest) to create a landscape version of the same design.

I changed up some of the papers and colours from the original card design (don't you just love that cute Thistle Balloon Elephant) to create this version of the card.  

So by now I was on a roll. Can you tell that I LOVE creating projects based on ideas from our Idea Books!  The card from page 19 of the Seasonal Expressions Idea Book was the inspiration for the next card design. 

I swapped out the spotted Penelope B&T Paper for this striped paper from the Penelope Paper Packet and added a Balloon Horse stamped in Pear, the Happy Birthday sentiment as well a cute heart from the Penelope Complements to complete this card.

Then I remembered how much I love using up scraps, so I found my few Penelope leftovers from the Penelope Workshops Your Way Scrapbooking Kit and created the following two card designs, basing them loosely on the card design above.

So a few Penelope B&T Paper strips of varying widths cut to 4.25" in length, a Balloon Horse stamped in Crystal Blue ink, the It's Your Day sentiment as well as some White Enamel Stars and this card came together in about 5 minutes.  The card below came together really quickly as well.

For the final card design below, I used the cute Penelope flowery PML Card from the Penelope Workshops Your Way Scrapbooking Kit as the central focus and designed the entire card around it! 

I cut the PML Card down and adhered to it in 3-D Foam Tape a Balloon Elephant stamped in Thistle.  I then assembled the card using a dovetailed strip of stripy Penelope B&T Paper, the Let's Celebrate sentiment on White Daisy Cardstock and a cute heart from the Penelope Complements.  Not a complicated card my any means, but I am so happy with how cute and colourful it looks!

I hope you can tell how much fun I had creating with this gorgeous new stamp set.  Thank you for visiting my Blog to check out my special page layout and cards featuring the February Stamp of the Month, Balloon Animals.  I would love it if you could leave a comment below before you hop to the next stop on our Australasian Blog Hop, Doris Taylor's Creative Inspirations.

Remember, the February Stamp of the Month, Balloon Animals is only available throughout February 2016 from your Close To My Heart Independent Consultant for $27, or for just $7.50 when you spend $75 or more.

  

Warmest crafting wishes,

Denise :)