August Stamp of the Month Blog Hop: Floral Celebration

Close To My Heart has a pretty floral set for August's stamp of the month, called Floral Celebrations.  Join me and fellow consultants on this hop featuring this set.  (If you're already hopping, you've probably arrived from Colleen's blog.  From here, you'll click on her name to go to Krista's blog next.)

Since we have eight colors retiring this month, I wanted to pair some of them with this fun stamp set.  (The retiring colors are the color of the year, Julep, and Ruby, Pixie, Thistle, Eggplant, Sweet Leaf, Saffron, and Goldrush.)  All of my cards use different sketches from Make It From Your Heart, Vol. 4.

My first card features retiring Pixie, paired with Sweet Leaf (also retiring) and Pewter (as suggested in the Love of Color guidebook).  I random stamped the White Daisy panel with Pixie and fussy cut the big Pixie flower.  I added Pink Taffeta stickles and white enamel dots to finish this card.

For my second card, I random stamped the background flower in retiring Saffron and the leaves in first and second generation Fern.  For the pretty central "sunflower", I stamped and fussy cut the flower in Saffron and then stamped the flower in Espresso and then fussy cut the center only.  The patterned paper is from the current Mix In paper pack.  I used New England Ivy for the stem and leaves on the banner and then added a simple white ribbon bow to finish this card.  Not only was the color comb inspired by Love of Color, but this same sketch is featured on the Saffron pages.

The third card is a fun, funky one!  I random stamped the background with retiring Thistle, Nectarine, Peacock, and Glacier (another Love of Color combo).  I used White Daisy & Thistle card stock, the Glacier gingham from the Mix In pack, and the Nectarine stripe from the Summer Vibes collection.  A few more white enamel dots finished this off.

My final card uses the Timber collection (retiring Ruby, Sapphire, and New England Ivy).  I knew that I wanted to use that big, fun outline stamp with some of our threads (gold and Sapphire).  To help the center mat pop off the plaid background, I scissor-distressed the edges.  I added gold stickles to the flower centers.

Isn't this a pretty set?  I used most but not all of the stamps on my cards.  I'm looking forward to making lots more this month with this great set.  I hope I've been able to inspire you with my cards.  Please leave a comment before hopping on to Krista's blog next!

{Click HERE for all the hop participants and their blogs.}