Hip Hippo Hooray

I recently won as a Guest Designer Star at Traumfabrik (for this card).  Traumfabrik (The Dream Factory) chooses a movie each month as a source of inspiration and this month they have chosen the movie Inside Out or its German title Alles Steht Kopf (which Google translates as Everything is Upside Down).

Here is the movie poster (both English and German versions) and they would like us to create something Upside Down or perhaps be inspired by the colours and layout of the poster(s).  Traumfabrik welcomes any kind of handmade projects - card, art journal page, ATC, canvas or 3D project!  

When I recently asked my youngest son Simon what he wanted for his upcoming birthday, he jokingly replied "a hippo"!  He loves Christmas and spends much of the year listening to Christmas music and he especially loves that corny old Christmas song "I want a hippopotamus for Christmas (look it up on Youtube but I'm warning you it's both very corny and very catchy)!   Well a hippo may be out of the question, but a hippo birthday card was definitely within the realms of possibility.  So I was already planning a hippo birthday card when Rosi invited me to join Traumfabrik as a guest!  And the upside down prompt gave me just the inspiration I needed - a spinning hippo card - and slowly this design evolved.

I coloured my tumbling hippo (Poppy Stamps Happy Hippo) with alcohol markers and then liberally coated him with Glossy Accents so he'd be nice and plump and blubbery!  I cut a blue lagoon for my hippo to frolic in (Memory Box Underwater Collage) which caused a problem as it's only meant to be an aperture die so there were two unattractive spots on the lagoon shoreline.   But I managed to hide those with a life preserver ring (from the 2024 Gummiapan Advent Calendar) and a younger smaller hippo (Poppy Stamps Whittle Floating Hippo which came with its own life preserver).  

I stamped the two sentiments on the front panel (Poppy Stamps Whittle Wild Animal Sentiments), worked out where I wanted my lagoon to go, I cut a track in the lagoon and the front panel and added the lagoon to the panel (lining up the track) and added the panel to the card base with foam tape.   I've devised a mechanism for my spinner cards that utilises magnets.  I find the magnet system is sturdier and the spinner element can be easily added to or removed from the card - if you're interested, you can see how this system works in this blog post.

Here's the hippo in action

and the right way up!

As I was about to pack everything away, I suddenly had yet another idea ... based on the English title of the movie - Inside Out! 

For this card I made an aperture card so that the inside was on the outside!  I cut an aperture (Poppy Stamps Whittle Wave) from the card front and coloured this blue and added some waves with a white Posca Pen.  I then added it to the inside of the card so it lined up with the aperture.  I used the hippos again though the smaller one is now wading while his mama looks on from the edge of the lagoon.  I used the same life ring I used on the first card but also added a beach umbrella and a palm tree from the same set (Gummiapan Advent Calendar 2023 Day 5).

Here's the inside

 I do hope you will be inspired by Traumfabrik's movie title this month and I do look forward to seeing your upturned creations in Traumfabrik's gallery!

I'd like to enter the following fabulous challenges

NBUS Challenge #63 - NBUS Happy Hippo, Floating Hippo, Underwater Collage and Gummiapan Advent Calendar Day 5;

Crafty Animals Challenge #84 - Anything with an animal;

Four Seasons June 2024 Challenge - Anything Summer Goes;

Seize the Birthday #284 - no topping;

Thanks for stopping by - your visits and comments are always a joy and always appreciated!  And if you leave a comment, I’ll know you were here and will (hopefully) be able to find and visit you!

Kate