Critters Happy Birthday Card

My mom's 78th birthday is this month, so I decided to make her a few cards: from me, my brother & his wife, and our cats. (Yes, our cats deserve the opportunity to give cards, too!) I got my inspiration for my card from this card by Darlene Devries.

I began by cutting a piece of dark brown cardstock to 4.25x5.5". I stamped on that with Hero Arts' "Designer Woodgrain" background, using Hero Arts Cup o' Joe mid-tone shadow ink, to create a tone-on-tone effect. I determined how large to make the little windows, and cut the "doors" with my craft knife, scoring the left side of each flap. I used my Basic Grey Notch & Die tool to create the half-circle cut-out in each flap, to make it easier (& more obvious) to open them.

For the critters in the windows, I used Hero Arts' "Woodland Creatures" stamp set, adding in Stampabilities' "Ollie Owl" stamp. I stamped the owl, raccoon, & squirrel onto white cardstock using Memento Tuxedo Black ink. I colored them with colored pencils, blending the colors with Gamsol on a paper stump. I cut the cardstock to fit behind the windows, and glued them to the back of the brown cardstock piece.

Inside of card

For the inside of the card, I used the same critters, adding in the skunk & ladybug. I stamped the squirrel, and masked it off so I could stamp the skunk to appear it was behind the squirrel. Finally, I stamped the raccoon and positioned the owl on his head. I stamped the balloon from Technique Tuesday's "Turn 29" stamp set, using Tuxedo Black for the string and Versamark for the balloon. I heat embossed the balloon with Zing! "Blue" embossing powder. I colored everything with colored pencils and Gamsol. Finally, I added some grass with 2 green colored pencils. I matted that with another piece of brown cardstock, and adhered it inside the card base.

To finish the card front, I stamped some of the leaves from Paper Smooches' "Botanicals 2" set in Versamark. I heat embossed them with Zing! "Leaf" embossing powder. I hand wrote the greeting, with one word in each window, and the "you!" inside. Finally, I adhered the brown panel onto the front of the card base.

I'm entering this card in the following challenges:

Simon Says Stamp's Monday "Anything Goes"
a2z Scrapbooking's October challenge: Use 2 "hard" Hero Arts products