Space Monkeys

Ingredients:

Card/Paper: Bazzill Bling Handsome, SU Basic Black and Whisper White, water colour paper
Ink: Versamark, Stazon Black, Whispers Permanent markers in red, blue and orange, SU Chocolate Chip, Green Galore, Brocade Blue, Cameo Coral, Night of Navy, Bashful Blue
Stamps: Stampendous Changito in Space, Inca Dot Birthday
Other: SU Silver Embossing powder, Acetate, red and orange gems, aluminium drink can
Card Size: 13.5cm x 12cm (approx 5" x 4.5")

Method:

My son's birthday has come around for the second time since I started my blog, so those who saw his card last year may remember the comment about monkeys on cards. For the curious the post is here. As you can see - monkeys this year too!

I designed the card base using a font called Pagoda SF, and Serif Draw, then cut it with my Silhouette (Robo). The stars and swooshes are from the Changito in Space set, and were stamped with Versamark and embossed in silver. The inside white part of the card is sponged around the edges with Bashful Blue, and stamped with the stars. It also has the happy birthday stamp in Night of Navy.

I stamped the rocket images in Stazon onto water colour card, cut them out, and just coloured in the monkey/cockpit parts using an aquabrush and the SU markers scribbled onto my Stamp-a-ma-jig sheet. I then cut out pieces of acetate to cover over the cockpit part, and extend a little below the cockpit. The part that extends below is the part that I stuck onto the coloured in image, so the glue won't show through the cockpit. I then stamped the images again with Stazon onto the back of an aluminium drink can, and cut them out - including cutting away the cockpit part. I coloured the rockets with the permanent markers, shaped them a little with a large embossing tool, and glued them on top of the coloured image with silicone. Then fixed them onto the card base. Finished off with little orange gems for the alien monkey ufo, and a red one on the top left space ship.

And I bet most of you will spend longer looking at it than he will! But at least I had fun making it . . .

Changuito Birthday

Revisiting the Changuitos for another male birthday. I stamped the image with my new Versafine Onyx Black pad, and used watercolour pencils and an aquabrush to colour them. Chalked a little green around the edge, and hand doodled over the top of that. Slightly distressed the edges with my scissor blade. Mounted on a strip of brown Bazzill card, also lightly distressed. Background is Pebbles Inc. Zoo Fun Animal/Wave.
The leaves are a 1" Woodware punch - Monstera - which I chalked with green at the edges, and scored a crease down the middle. Couple of brads to finish and echo the orange in the image.

Ninja Monkeys

As you can see, this is for a 21st birthday. The birthday boy is a big ninja fan -so I played dressing up with two of my Changuitos.
I used Beate's Weekend Sketch Challenge #51 for the layout, but instead of doing it in layers of paper and card, I took the sketch into Photoshop and replaced each greyscale area on the sketch with a colour. I also stretched the length of the card to accommodate the monkeys. Then added the wording, the shurikens in the corner and the 21, before printing out on to white hammered finish card stock.
I made the 21 in Photoshop using three different weapon images, copied and arranged to form the numerals. The font for the wording is Last Ninja by Freaky Fonts, which is a free download.
The monkey with the sword is Changuito Solo, and the other is Changuito Swing - by Stampendous. On the stamp, Swing Changuito is hanging from a branch. I masked off the leaves, leaving him holding a stick to use as the handle for me to draw in the blades at each end. For the other monkey, I just drew a sword in his hand. They are stamped directly on to the background, but as I wanted white around the eyes, I stamped again on white card, to paper piece the heads and bodies after colouring in with a black marker. The marker colour that I used for the weapon blades combined quite well with the blue of the printer ink to make a good colour for them - more grey than they look in the picture. The blade that overlaps the 21 box is also paper pieced.
As the card is largely computer generated, I have also added it to the Splitcoaststampers WT156 Computer Challenge gallery.

Monkeys on Blocks

A quick card for a 1st birthday. I experimented with chalking a background - need more practice, but am fairly happy with the results. I just streaked on horizontal bands of different colours, and then polished over the whole piece with a wad of cotton wool to blend. After that I ran the card through the printer to print on the block wording. This is a free download font called LMS Lance's Letter Blocks which I printed out in a dark blue, and then coloured in with a lighter blue marker. Added a little bit of shading with a grey marker to ground the blocks, and then stamped on the monkeys (Stampendous - Changuito B'day). I also stamped them on white card and coloured with water colour pencils, cut out the heads, bodies and sign, and glued them flat on the background. I masked off the original message on the sign, and then hand wrote the 1. Matted onto orange and blue card.

Monkeys and Drumsticks

Recently I read on a couple of blogs that while the papers and stamps etc are out for one card, that it is a good idea to make another using those same papers and stamps. (I'm sorry that I can't remember which blogs they were though.) So while everything was out for the 17th card I posted a couple of days ago, I took the advice and made a smaller, simpler card for another male relative. I just used the one stamp, with the same papers, punch and techniques as before. A great time saver all round - especially as coming up with the ideas and how to achieve them is usually what takes the longest for me.

This second card was also made for my son, but for my in-laws to give him. He plays the drums, and is an Iron Maiden fan - hence the font which is a free download here. The backing paper on this card was from a set that came with a magazine, and I chalked brown and grey around the edges for shading. The drumsticks holding up the words are made from Bazzil card with brown and grey chalk to shade. I then scored down the middle of the stick on the back and folded them slightly to give a bit of dimension. They are mounted on the card with foam pads.
I used my drawing program to break apart the two layers of the font, and then exported the shapes to my cutter software so that I could use the machine to cut them out. They were cut out of two different shades of brown Bazzill, and then glued together with pva. The thread that they are hung on is DMC Precious Metal Effects embroidery thread. This was one of those cards that I got to the point where I thought 'why am I doing this?' - and that point came right around tying the threads around the drumsticks! Initially my idea was to have the letters hang freely, but I had to use a tiny snippet of foam pad at the bottom of each one to stop them pinging up all over the place.

Little Monkeys

Over the last few months, when I have had a teenage boy's card to make, I have asked my teenage son for help with ideas. His stock answer is 'monkeys are always good on cards'. So guess what he has on his birthday card for tomorrow?!

The number 17 filling up the card is taken from a font called Jungle Leaves which is a free download. I used my drawing program to separate the two layers in each number and convert them to a dxf file to take into my Silhouette software to cut out of dark green card stock and the mosaic patterned paper. But they're pretty simple shapes if I'd had to cut them by hand. The edges of the resulting shapes were chalked before gluing together. I glued them flat on the page with pva glue.


I love the little Stampendous Changuito monkeys, so treated myself to three of those stamps to use on his card. The three I used are: Changuito B'day, Changuito Solo and Changuito Swing. Once I had worked out my arrangement, and chalked the edges of the spotted background paper, I used a stamp positioner to stamp the monkeys directly on the backing paper. The hands and feet were densly coloured enough to cover up the backing paper, but the bodies, faces and happy birthday sign were cut out from additional images stamped onto thin white card and coloured in with water colour pencils and a water brush. Then cut out and glued on with pva.
I used a Woodware Monstera leaf punch to make the leaves. Punched out of light green bazzill basics card, with the edges chalked in brown. Then shaped them with a needle tool.