Mixing up Heidi Swapp!

Good morning Magpies and welcome to August! I chose to work with one of my favourite manufacturers this month, Heidi Swapp. I am a long time Heidi fan and I’ve always found her collections really easy to work with. I chose to mix up all three collections that are in the shop this time, Emerson Lane, Color Fresh and Wolf Pack. I found all 3 mixed well together and I have mixed them up. Wolf Pack I found slightly harder to work with because I’m much more drawn towards brighter colours but the layouts I made using it have turned out to be some of my favourites, maybe because they’re a bit different than my usual look?

So I’ll start with my first Wolf Pack LO for the month. I used the sketch for the monthly challenge on our FB group set by Caroline for this LO. Pop on over to the FB Chat & Inspiration Group and check out the challenge, if you enter you are in with a chance of winning 1000 Magpie points to spend in the shop, that’s worth £10! Definitely check out Caroline’s sketch, it’s very versatile.

So I just followed the sketch and layered up papers from the Wolf Pack collection. I liked the pop of light and dark colours and I did add in the black & white stripe which is a super old Maggie Holmes paper which I loved so much, I bought like 20 sheets of it! When you find a good stripe paper, buy multiples of it! I also loved the woodgrain on the reverse of the Spotted Paper, this is a great paper.

For my title I used a couple of the Wolf Pack Embossed Stickers and wow, I gotta say I was really impressed with these stickers. For a start the pack is so much bigger than I was expecting, I thought it would be a small pack like usual puffy stickers but no, the pack is 6×12″ and the stickers are big! They’re also embossed as well, so they’re not made of the rubbery stuff I was expecting but they’re sort of harder and embossed. I was pleasantly surprised by them. So I used two of them as a sort of title and then added in the ‘spread your wings’ sticker from the 6×12″ Cardstock Sticker sheet. I also used a couple more stickers from that sheet and I didn’t think I needed to add more stuff because my paper layers are quite busy.

I was surprised by the Wolf Pack collection. I really wanted to love it because I do love Heidi and she created this collection in memory of her son Cory, who loved wolves. I wasn’t really drawn to it because I usually do prefer bright colours but I found it quite easy to work with and the collection definitely mixes in with others well.

My next LO I used the Color Fresh collection but I also mixed in a little of the Simple Stories Oh Happy Day collection too. This is another super colourful collection, I have only just discovered it and I have no idea how I missed it and didn’t choose to use it for my blog posts! Color Fresh is another collection I never chose to use on a blog post but I did buy it up earlier this year and used it a whole lot. It’s a bit of me for sure, bright colours and cool bits, it’s awesome!

I started with the Die Cut Ephemera pack for this LO and just laid out a few bits across the page. It worked so I stuck them down, couldn’t be simpler! Next time you’re a bit stuck for a LO idea, why not try just laying down a few bits from an Ephemera pack, sometimes magic happens!

See the black & white striped ‘arrow’ on the left and right hand sides of the LO? There’s a couple of those in the Ephemera pack. I loved them so much – I assume they’re meant to be photo corners but I love them as arrows! I actually found some similar paper in my stash, made a stencil and cut my own out so I’ll never run out! They’re the best.

My title and that cool ice cream sundae is from the Simple Stories Die Cuts Ephemera pack and I think that collection mixes real well with Color Fresh. My final touch was do do a swirly line in Nuvo Drops. I needed a little something to finish off the LO and my go-to for a finishing touch is always Nuvo Drops, usually in a straight line. This time a straight line wouldn’t work so I went outside the box and freehanded a swirly line. Scary but effective!

This time I worked with the Emerson Lane collection which is a much more muted colour palate but it’s very pretty in soft pink & yellow with pops of green too. I concentrated on the yellow paper for this LO and this yellow Sweet Nothings paper has become one of my favourites. I used it on a few of this months LO’s and it is great to just pop a little strip in behind a photo mat for a pop of colour. It’s a really versatile paper, you need some in your stash! The black and white paper I also used is actually from Wolf Pack and is the Woodsy Paper. I also added in one of the Die Cut Stencils behind my photo and also cut up the floral one in the pack to use as embellishments. My title is super old Thickers from my stash and some old Making Memories Alphabet stickers, remember those?!! I also dotted around some of the Emerson Lane 6×12″ Cardstock Stickers and some of the gold Puffy Word Stickers from Color Fresh.

Last LO for this post and I concentrated on using Color Fresh again this time. I decided to add in a pop of turquoise cause it goes so well with the colours! I love the 6×6 Paper Pad and I used a sheet of that behind my photo and some scraps tucked behind that. Some Nuvo Dots as well, they added some texture. My title was made using the Chipboard Alphabet Thickers and one of the gold Puffy Word Stickers, both which add some great texture too. I popped on some of the Die Cut Ephemera and some washi tape across the bottom of the LO. I had to do this because I had put everything too close to the bottom and it wasn’t balanced so I sliced some off the top and added it to the bottom, but the join was really obvious…. so I covered it lol!

I also used some stamps on this LO. Don’t be alarmed, I don’t stamp much (I’m lazy) but I spotted some new stamps in the shop by Ink Road and there’s an awesome set called Bazinga which I had to have. I loved Big Bang Theory and these stamps are all about that! So on this LO I used the sofa and ‘you’re in my spot’ which I repeated across the bottom under the photo block. I love this stamp set and will endeavor to use it more. I have left it on my desk to try and make me use it and not be so lazy!

I hope this gives you Magpies some inspiration to use Heidi Swapp and maybe buy some bits of the collections if you haven’t tried her before. I know some bits are sold out and I’m sorry for that but if you’ve already bought some bits I hope you get inspiration to use them or maybe even mix them all up. I will be back again later in the month with some more ideas too. Have a great August Magpies!