BBTB2 Easter Chick Challenge

Morning peeps! This week our challenge at BBTB2 was chosen by our dear sister Penny and she's chosen the adorable chick from the Easter 2010 cartridge. My chickie is decked out in an Easter bonnet from Heritage with a sentiment from Songbird, all welded together in Design Studio with an egg and grass from Easter 2010 as well. I flocked her by running her through my Xyron right side down and sprinkling on the Doodlebug flock to get her all fuzzy. If you're careful, you can sort of rub off the sticky from her beak so she doesn't get feathers in her mouth and color it with Copics. She actually has an additional layer behind her in orange for her feet and she's off set from the cream layer slightly (as is the grass) which is what I do when an image lacks a shadow on the cartridge and I'm unable to successfully create one in DS.

The whole kit and kaboodle was welded to a rounded rectangle from George (big surprise, LOL) to make a shaped front card. I seriously hope you all don't get tired of these because they're my absolute favorites to make. Although I didn't plan on it, it ended up being an A2 size card which almost never happens. Of course it doesn't fit in a regular A2 envie, though, because it's FAT! But it will go in the smaller size padded one for a change so WooHoo!

I happened upon a little tip while constructing the card which I'm gonna pass along because it was an "aha!" moment (and because I like to hear myself talk :) After I'd glued the egg to the card base I noticed I'd forgotten to ink it. It looked so FLAT to me! It bugged me...REALLY bugged me. I tried to peel it off but it was a no go. Laying on my table was the piece of DP I'd cut the egg out of (the negative). Obviously it fit perfectly around the attached egg and I was able to ink the cut without messing up my card. Brilliant! (Or so I thought, but I'm easily impressed.) The difference was really subtle, but it made ALL the difference to me. I don't feel compelled to ink everything, but inking and doodling are those extra touches that I think make a card more finished and professional looking.

Here are the dimensional shots. I said it was FAT! The majority of DP's are from the DCWV Nana's Nursery (Baby Girl) stack and the bonnet is from the Flower Shower Spring stack from last year. For the egg I used the Baby Girl mat stack because the scale of the print was smaller and more proportional. Originally I had planned to use the cut out floral layer of the egg cut, but even that seemed out of scale with the chick.

Now that I could see the end in sight I actually even finished the inside! (Gosh, this one might actually get sent! LOL) One thing to keep in mind when designing a shaped front card is planning to have enough solidity to the front to hide the inside sentiment. You can size your sentiment in DS by trying it on the card front page first and copy and pasting it to another to cut. "Happy Easter" is also from the Easter 2010 cartridge. Now go be inspired at BBTB2 by the rest of the team's fabulous takes on this challenge and remember, you have 2 weeks to complete our challenges for a chance to win our coveted blinkie. As always, if you don't own the featured cartridge, any chick or duck will do.