Counterfeit Kit Challenge July kit reveal blog hop

Welcome to July and to a month full of changes round here. I'm curious to see what comes my way but in the meantime, I'd like to share my Counterfeit Kit Challenge July kit with you!

If you've arrived here via Lesley (here), who no doubt had an amazing kit to share with you, you're on the right lines. But if you're here directly, why not pop back to the Counterfeit Kit Challenge blog (here) to make sure you don't miss out on any of the fun.

Our Guest Designer this month is Jane - make sure you go say hi to her here - and we are over the moon to have Susanne back in the team - happy dance in this part of the blogosphere for sure!

We were given a gorgeous kit this month for our inspiration in the form of Noel Mignon's Balboa Kit.

Look at this incredible selection of goodies...

I was really inspired by the items in the kit and ended up making up two kits if you can believe it. I didn't have any of the original items so I started by jotting down some of the elements and colours you can see in the kit - lots of aqua, pinks, orange and brights then spots, diagonal stripes, chevrons, raindrops, hexagons and speech bubbles. I can see frames, labels, clips, veneer, die cuts, thickers as well as mini alphas, enamels, tape and pins. Looked like exactly my kind of kit.

When I started creating my version, I found that BasicGrey Fresh Cut and plenty of papers from Echo Park had similar patterns and tones, helping my Sunshine kit come together really easily. Oh yes, it's huge (as always) but I really liked how the colours and designs reminded me of the original Balboa.

Still fighting with lack of computer so sorry for the low-tech photo presentation!

I couldn't resist adding in the gold hexagon vellum that is really new but beyond gorgeous!

I have lots of the Fresh Cut collection in here with the sticker, the alphas and the die-cuts

You know how I love my frames at the moment and decided to challenge myself to use up some flowers which hardly feature on any layout at the moment

However, when I looked at the finished selection, I noticed that it was full of relatively new items and it's always my aim to get older, forgotten stash into my kits too.

So I decided to have another go and see if I could come up with a similar kit using some of these neglected pieces. Relax is full of somewhat older, "vintage" items.

I tried to match up all those types of colours and designs I'd used in the first kit as well as the embellishments item by item.

Die cuts, pins, veneer, speech bubbles and words

Can I really find a way to use up rub-ons? I'm always terrible at getting them onto my project correctly. We'll see

Such an ecclectic mix of products here

Now, two kits may seem like a lot - especially when I've still got my June kit unfinished on the shelf but I love the variety this offers me and have already made a layout from each one. And of course, the next LOAD only 3 months away when these kits really come into their own. It's never a problem to have a few lying around ;-)

Off you go now to check out Leslie's blue box full of goodies and if you get lost along the way, you can find the full blog hop list over at the Counterfeit Kit Challenge blog (here)

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you'll leave a message for me to let me know you were here and have a guess at which of my two kits will get more use in the weeks to come!