Cat On Fence: Another Halloween Card

I have good intentions. I really do work on cards almost every night, and I intend to post something every night. Keyword: intend. But sometimes the old mojo is not flowing, or I get stuck. Mostly I get stuck. I made a pretty cool card last night and tonight, but since it took me 2 DAYS to do it, I thought I'd subject you to some of my trauma.

Let me show you the finished product, then we'll do some deconstructing.

Here is the finished card. Looks pretty okay, I think! Now let's take a look at some of those parts, k? K!

This started with me wanting to use that cat stamp (A Muse). I went looking for some white scraps (did not have to go far - like the other side of the table!), then I thought it would be too stark on white. So I brayered the white piece! I used So Saffron, More Mustard and Crushed Curry. I think. I used a scrap of Mulberry paper that was just lying there as my divider between colors.

I mis-cut the BG papers (not on purpose), so I took a fab piece of Mike's ribbon and tied it over the gap. Too bad the brayered piece covered most of it. ;-(

The real trauma started when I decided I did not want this to say Happy Halloween, so I tweeted for suggestions, and Mary Dawn (I think she may be BR #1, not sure) tossed out "boo!" as a suggestion. Well, I have no 'boo' stamp, so I kept tweeting, mostly to waste time and get to bed late.

THEN Mary Dawn posted on her blog about how the smallest die in the Nestabilities Labels 4 set is so small it cannot possibly be used for anything. *ding ding ding* Sounded like a challenge to me! So off I went into The Other Room to grab my retired Brushstroke Letters, stamped them, then I took out the littlest die and looked at it.

Here it is next to the lower-case B.

Here it is next to the upper-case B. This was going to be a tight fit.

(Please ignore all that brayer mess. I'm creating here!)

Taking a cue from Mary Dawn, I lined up the pieces with a ruler to give you an idea of how really small these are. I agree - what were they thinking?!

I played and played with these letters until I ended up with this. What was *I* thinking?! In theory this seemed like a good idea, but in actual execution? Not so much. I ripped it off and went to bed.

(NOW do you see why it took me 2 days to make this card? And we are not done yet!)

Tonight I decided I hated the white and went with orange - actually it is Dusty Durango. I like this A LOT!

See that ribbon? There was a big empty on that side of the card, and some of the yellow needed to be covered, so I punched a hole in the brayered piece of card stock and tied a piece of the ribbon through it. Is that not really pretty ribbon? I am so glad I figured out a way to have some of it show (not be hidden under the yellow layer).

Here, again, is the finished card.

And no, I am not trying to be artsy-fartsy and 'stage' this card. I wanted to show you the stamp I used and how I switched it up!

I stamped the image on white and cut it out to get the white fence. By doing so I (1) had to cut off the poor kitty's whiskers and (2) got a separate moon image! I drew the whiskers back on after I stuck the cat to the yellow layer, and I got to put the moon where I wanted it! Sweet!

I cannot believe it took me two evenings to make two cards (I made two of these). Such is my devotion to my craft. Two cards - two days. Eh, whatever!

Tomorrow I think I'll make ... dunno yet. We'll all be surprised!

Thanks for stopping by!