Happy Birthday from the Circus Animals

Hello Blogger Friends! Thanks for taking the time to stop and visit with The Charmed Life Blog today.

It was a beautiful Saturday here in Pittsburgh. We have been having warm weather all week and we even had to turn our air conditioner on mid week. Sometimes that bothers me to go from having the heat running and then a few days later the air. But for some reason this year it doesn't seem to matter. 

We are having friends over for dinner tomorrow. I am so looking forward to it. We plan on having friends over at least twice a month all summer. It's been too long that we have been shut up in our home and not seeing friends. 

I decided on Lasagna, meat balls and salad for the main course. We will start off with some appetizers.  For that I am preparing a charcuterie board with Calabrese Salame, Prosciutto, olives, grapes and 3 different kinds of cheeses. 

I made the sauce for the lasagna and meatballs today. In fact it's on the stove simmering as I type this post. I like to make it the day before so the flavors have a chance to meld together. I don't usually add meat to the sauce but for this one I added sweet Italian sausage. I thought that would work well for the lasagna. 

Well enough about food, let's move onto my post for today. This card I created for my weekly DT post on the CottageCutz Blog. Today for your viewing pleasure I have a slimline birthday card using the Circus Train Animal dies + the Scalloped Stitched Rectangle Slimline die.

 
I have a lot of nieces and nephews with young ones and I always seem to need a kids birthday card. These animals are perfect for a kids card. So let's get started on some details of how I created my card.

Design Steps:
I started my card this week with the layout. I saw this sketch #854 on Splitcoaststampers and I thought the layout would work well for the dies I am using.

Next, I selected the background designer paper. I wanted something fun and found this bright dotted paper.
I cut it with the largest Scalloped Stitched Rectangle Slimline (3 1/4" x 8 1/4") die. The card base is at 6 1/2" x 8 1/4" and then scored at 3 1/4". I used pacific point cardstock (royal blue) cardstock.

Then, I cut my animal images. The designer paper colors of blue, rose red and yellow would work for the hats and neck scarves the circus animals are wearing. I used different colors of cardstock to cut the animals. You could also cut in white and color with any medium you like i.e. Copic markers, Prismacolors pencils or distress inks. I forgot to take a photo of this step (lol)!

For element 3 of the sketch I used the largest Scalloped Circle die and then cut a portion off the bottom to give it a straight edge. I stamped my sentiment in pacific point ink. It's a long one line sentiment but with the help of my MISTI, I stamped on 2 lines.

I started the assembly of my card. For element 2 of the sketch I cut another piece of pacific point designer paper 1" x 8", I attached the circle with double sided tape and then secured to the designer paper panel.

Then I attached three of the Circus Animals in the circle using dimensional adhesive. The seal is attached in the corner for element 4 of the sketch. Instead of him balancing a ball, I have him holding a balloon. It's cut from the Clown with Balloons die.

To finish off my card, I attached the image panel to the card base with double sided tape. For the 2nd instance of element 4, I cut a spray of stars from the Circus Side Show die and attached to the right corner. I thought the middle looked empty so I added some rose red enamel dots.

Well that's it for me for this post. So until next time......God bless.

Dies I used to create card:

I am also entering:

1.  Allsorts has an anything goes with happy, bright and sunny colors. 

2.  2 Crafty Critter Crazies has an anything goes with a critter. 

3.  Animal Friends has a bear challenge. 

4.  Crafty Animals has an anything goes challenge. 

5.  Sweet Stampers has an animals, critters or birds challenge.

6.  Crafty Catz has an anything goes with optional as cute as you like.