Hippest Hippos for The Paper Players 751

Thank you for all the beautiful entries in Claire's colour challenge last week. I enjoyed seeing the rich autumnal colours used in such pretty ways. Our hostess at The Paper Players this week is Elizabeth and she has given us the Clean and Simple theme of 'Critters'.

Sometimes, I overthink things. I came to work on this challenge and realised that while I was very clear on what Clean-and-Simple meant (lots of white space, minimal layers and embellishments) I was much less clear on what a critter was.

I can remember Ellie-May Clampett talking about her critters on The Beverly Hillbillies way back when I was child. So maybe a critter could be any animal? A dictionary search told me that it was a word derived from 'creature' originating as a dialectal pronunciation and often used in informal way. It also told me that in American usage it is often used to refer to domesticated animals.

None of this was really helping me decide whether I could use my Beautiful Butterflies stamp set in the challenge as it was my only current set that contained a creature of any kind. Part of me felt like this was going in the wrong direction.

By chance, while looking through a box of old children's books in the garage, I came across some of  Mercer Mayer's Little Critter series. This led me to conclude that critters are cutesy, anthropomorphised animals. This I could work with!

It was off to the retired shelves to find Hippest Hippos, an old Sale-a-bration bundle. I started by stamping the dancing hippo in Tuxedo Black then colouring it with Smoky Slate, Strawberry Slush and Pretty in Pink Stampin' Blends. I die cut it out. I paper pieced the skirt using a pattern from the 2025-2027 6x6 In Color DSP stack. I also used that to paper piece the umbrella from the dies and to create the love hearts.

The sentiment is also from Hippest Hippo. To texture the background, I used one of the folders from the Glass & Gardens pair of embossing folders. 

 Although the trio of hearts were acting like embellishments, I couldn't resist adding in a trio of Strawberry Slush gems too. 

So, how do you see critters? We'd love you to show us this week at The Paper Players - and remember to keep it CAS. You can see what the team have done and link up your entry on The Paper Players page. 

Here's a quick recap of our challenge rules:

1. Create a new paper-craft project specifically for this challenge.
2. Upload your creation to your blog with a link back to us.
3. Please provide a direct link to the post featuring your challenge entry.
4. Please link your card to no more than four challenges, TOTAL, including ours
5. Have fun, and thank you for playing with us!

Don't forget to check out the great inspiration from the rest of the design team.

Jaydee

LeAnne Pugliese

Claire Broadwater

Joanne James

Anne Marie Hile (on leave)

Ann Schach

Jan Clothier - You are here

Stef Perry

Eliz Stewart

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