Studio Calico Starlight - the Spetember Release

Oh man, it was totally time I dusted off my layout-making skills and put something big on a 12x12" piece of paper again! The September scrapbook kit from Studio Calico was exactly what I needed to inspire me. The colours and designs in this kit are totally me!
But thinking I might be a little rusty I decided not to go too crazy. I used a 8x12" photo to dominate the page and then just added some clusters of cute things, and highlighted the colours of the photo with some paper strips.

Everything on this page is from the Main Kit Only, with the exception of the alpha stamps I used to create the title. They're called Blocked Alpha and Numbers and are available as a separate purchase.

I love the combination of this bold graphic alpha with a handrawn feel to it because of the scribbly shadow. I stamped my title onto watercolour paper with black embossing powder, then coloured them with Color Theory Inks to match Bethany's shirt in the photo. Oh... and then I ended up adding Stickles over the top for some glitter. Couldn't help it!

But new layouts aside, it was the new release stamps Studio Calico specifically asked me to play with, and I couldn't be happier to agree to that! They asked me for 3 cards... I 'accidentally' made 6!
(Yes, I know I'm only sharing 5 here, but the last card I'm not overly happy with so I'm not sharing it! LOL!)

I first started with the Thanksgiving stamp set with it's grassy frame type of stamp, and a million options for sentiments to pop inside. I had this idea for how I wanted the finished card to look, but I wasn't sure if it would work, so I did a mock-up version first with a blue and yellow background. It seemed like it would turn out ok so I did my 'good' version in the yellow-pink-red-blue spectrum. I finished it off with some puffy asterix from the Scrapbook Kit.
But I kept looking back at my mock up version and couldn't bear to throw it away. It's not perfectly stamped but I figured I would finish the card anyway, and try to cover up the defects with buttons! LOL!
And now I have a set!

I fell in love with the Fall Plants set. I think it's my favourite! It has a great mixture of flowers and vegetables (of all things!) and my 'failed' card featured the carrots. But then I had an idea to just take one of the flowers - the layered pansy - and stamp a whole field of them in rainbow colours. I wanted it to represent reproduction and growth and fertility to match the sentiment from the same set. I'm always in need of new baby cards so this is perfect.

Another delicate and elegant stamp set from this release is the Floral Thank You set. It's got a mixture of detailed floral images and bold graphic sentiments. They work together really well, so on this card I decided just to let them shine by themselves. This is about as CAS as I can get!

And lastly I took the Everyday Magic stamp set and whipped up this final card. There are lots of great images and funky sentiments in this set, but I stuck with just a couple. I was inspired by the 'heart of gold' phrase and had this idea to stamp a grid design of the hearts in gold. Pretty obvious right?! To kick it up a notch I also took the same heart stamp, inked it up with Color Theory inks, spritz it with water and then slammed it down on the paper to create the splatters behind each one. Messy but fun!

The Studio Calico September kits are called Starlight and they're now available.
You can find all the stamp sets I've worked with as add-ons in the shop here. Which one is your favourite?