Day 2: "Basket Buddies" and "Heartfelt"

Good morning, and welcome back to Day 2 of our Inspiration Hop! Extra long post today because I've missed blogging and creating for you, and finally got some time to play, and I mean PLAY, with these new little pets, I mean, stamps! I haven't enjoyed a set as much as the new "Basket Buddies" in awhile, can't resist baby animals! The poses really lend themselves to a lot of possibilities and the greetings are terrific for all sorts of cards, gifts and scrapbook pages.

Here is my favorite card from the party the other night, I cut out just one of the puppies, stamped on white and colored with E50 and E51 (to look like a yellow lab) and then popped him up inside this scrap of Chocolate Brown die cut with a Square Nestabilites to look like he's peeping out a window. Embossing dots around the base and frame with a Scor-Bug and Scor-buddy add a lot of interest. I stamped the little name plate in Memento London Fog on white and colored with a gray Copic. I love this little guy's panting grin, so this is the perfect sentiment to use when he's on his own! The final touch which I think makes the card is punching out a few scalloped bites to the sides, very easy detail to add to doggy cards!
I also stamped some little puppy tracks inside the card and across the envelope, these paw prints are terrific for making easy and eye-catching animal patterns!
And of course the set is called "Basket Buddies" so all those cutie patooties can hunker down into the "Spring Basket"!
Here I put the cat and dog together, I angled the cat a little to look like he is nuzzling his buddy! purrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
The basket is stamped on Kraft CS and sponged on the sides and bottom with Frayed Burlap Distressing ink. DPs are from Echo Park "Walk in the Park", I pieced the basket liner (which can also be a cushion)
Last I have this simple pet sympathy card, so often friends we know are grieving the illness or loss of beloved pets who are truly members of the family, and I haven't really had any appropriate stamp to make a card for them. The images and sentiments I've created for this set I feel honor the animal's life, and comfort the recipient with memories of happier times.* Here I just die cut one little paw print out of white cardstock and matted and popped it up on a sponged Tumbled Glass background for sky. Then I stamped a row of faithful dogs with bones and playful kitties swatting at butterflies in the same color ink for subtle but sentimental border.

The next set we have today is "Heartfelt" by Theresa Momber. In addition to lots of outdoor images, what pretty flowers! Depending on the colors you use, these flowers don't really make me think " autumn" at all, so I'll be using them year round, in Texas we have flowers that look like this in about every color I can think of! I love using white on white sometimes, the embossed frame and die cut Fancy Tag Three add a lot of interest and the greenery really pops. I used G93 and G99 for the leaves, E13 and E77 for the centers and just a touch of R00 to the petals near the center.
Now, I am just having too much fun mixing today's two sets! Here you see I did an easy modification to the fence from "Heartfelt", perfect for perching some pets! (full card in this post)

...and when you start looking, what can't you dangle these little guys over?? (pumpkins from Heartfelt, we'll assume these are those cute mini pumpkins, not monster dogs LOL!)
There was a request for a "beagle" stamp the other night at the party, so I just colored to look that way! (because really don't all puppies look like roly polies when they are little, no matter what breed?) ;)

And then, you can get really silly...!
For the pumpkin caps I just colored the top halves of a second set of pumpkins and cut them off, isn't that cute? (And how about black cats with the pumpkin for Halloween...?) Love it!! Stay tuned for more simple layout-but-super sweet ideas like these in the weeks to come, I just can't stop!!

Don't forget to leave comments here and all along the hop, the more you leave, the more chances you have to win a stamp set of your choice from Gina K Designs! Thanks for visiting today!

• Gina K
• Melanie Muenchinger - Illustrator Basket Buddies
• Theresa Momber - Illustrator Heartfelt
• Giovana Smith
• Janice Whiting
• Jennie Harper
• Lee Murphy
• Michelle Woerner
• Sharon Harnist
• Suzanne Dean
• Tina Gilliland
• Vicki Dutcher
• AJ Otto
• Carolina Buchting
• Cathy Tidwell
• Deb Felts
• Donna Baker
• Emily Giovanni