SK071809 Birthday Foxy

Stamps: Snag’em by Imaginisce “Foxy,” Stampendous “Everything Happy,” Clear Dollar Stamps “Argyle Factory”
Paper: Taken with Teal, More Mustard, white, chocolate brown
Ink: Chocolate Chip, More Mustard, Taken With Teal ink pads & markers
Accessories: sponge, notched corner punch, colored pencils, blending stump, baby oil, craft knife, dimensionals, Fastenator
Technique: sponging, “Gamsol Magic,” 3-dimensional

I came across this adorable fox stamp at a scrapbooking store in a town about an hour away from here a few weeks ago. At 99 cents, I HAD to have him, and I knew he would be perfect for Gamsol! Last week I registered over at Paper Craft Planet and came across an awesome sketch challenge on Saturday. When I saw it, the first stamp that came to mind was “Foxy!” Also, I was lucky to score the Stampendous set with my 50% off at Michael’s coupon last week. I love deals!

I had a different sort of inspiration for the color combination I chose for this card. At the horse show on Saturday (see post below for more info on that), one lady that I competed against in Trail had the most GORGEOUS Hawaiian-type floral top, which was a mix of warm chocolate, bold teal, and tropical mustard. It looked AWESOME, especially with the color of horse she was riding!

Once I had my colors in mind and sketch in hand, I sat down to start creating and things just evolved from there.

One thing I wanted to incorporate into this card was making Foxy as three-dimensional as possible to make him really come to life. To do this, I stamped him three times in chocolate chip ink and used the gamsol magic technique (I use plain ol’ Crayola colored pencils and generic Baby Oil rather than the hard-to-find and rather pricey Gamsol and special colored pencils) to color each image. Then, I cut out each piece with a craft knife, cutting the second layer by leaving out the tail and the third layer by leaving out the ears and the hind legs. The result makes him really pop off of the card at you, and I’m please with how it turned out! For the circle that Foxy is mounted on, I sponged More Mustard ink on plain white cardstock. That by itself didn’t seem to stand out enough off of the chocolate panel, so I added another layer of white cardstock behind it.

I also sponged the brown and Taken with Teal panels in matching ink. I do that to a lot of my cards, but I think it is an important step for a lot of cards to make them look more finished. Granted, it doesn’t look great on EVERY card but I find it works well for many of the cards I create! The sentiment was stamped on white cardstock and I used a notched corner punch to take the semi-circle off of the edge to add interest. I also used our Fastenator for the first time to add the two silver embellishments on the lower edge of the teal/mustard panel. When I originally “finished” this card yesterday I had left it at that. However, when I came back later to photograph it, it looked like something was just missing, and I couldn’t think of what that was. This morning I remembered my fun “Argyle Factory” set I purchased from Clear Dollar Stamps several years ago and haven’t had the opportunity to use much. PERFECT! I got a little goofy with my spacing when I stamped it the 2nd time so I tried to repeat that mistake with the 3rd stamping to make it look intentional. Hopefully it doesn’t look too sloppy!