Rick St. Dennis Steam Punk II

     OK, here I am trying my hand at another steam punk card (something I do very rarely and not very well) but at least I'm far enough away that I can't hear you laughing at my attempt.  Of course, the card does have a wry humor so maybe that's why you're laughing.  The image is a progressive freebie to all who used an Rick St. Dennis image and played in the first part of the steam punk challenge last month.

     This is the card folded flat and ready for the envelope but I did a new-to-me fancy fold technique called Dutch Fold or Dutch Door.  Here's a photo of the card opened and standing.

     OK, a few card details and then I have a close up to show you.  I colored this fun little monster, called "Nyner," with my ProMarkers.  While Rick's images are very detailed and can be somewhat intimidating to color (especially when you see the gorgeous coloring done by his entire DT!), his shading already drawn onto the image gives you great direction for getting shadows and high lights in all the right places.  As I was working with this image, I grew to love this creepy character more and more, and by the time I finished coloring him, I was truly in love.  :-D

     I still wasn't sure exactly what to do with him but his "Winner" sash made me think of a prize winner and the sentiment (printed on my computer) just popped into my head.  I die cut the image and did the card base (following tutorial instructions which I now can't find or I'd give you the link.)  The papers are from the "Loolah" stack by Iron Orchard.  Then I began searching through my embellishment stash for some steam punk appropriate cogs or gears.  Sigh... Those were seriously lacking because I do so little steam punk but I did find the two metal cogs you see above the image.

     Now, the great part of the story -- On his hat are drawn a few tiny cogs and gears.  I tried coloring them with silver and gold markers but they just didn't show up.  OK, let's go back a couple of weeks.  I was a challenge winner and the sponsor was 7 Kids College Fund.  I used my voucher to order a couple of Elisabeth Bell stamps (you'll be seeing those next week probably) and some little charms in a package called "Watch Parts."  I had no idea of the sizes but it was a collection of metal goodies that would work on steam punk cards.  Those just happened to arrive as I was finishing up the card and voila, perfection!  Let me show you what I mean --

     All those tiny embellies on his top hat came from the bag of Watch Parts.  Aren't they fabulous?  There are other items in the bag which are larger but I just love these tiny ones because they work on the actual images, not just the card.  Scroll back up to see the full card and compare the size with the larger metal embellies.  I'm already doing another card where I'm making a whole pile of the tiny ones to look like a single embellishment.

     Challenges:
Country View Crafts -- Only men allowed
Crafting at the Weekend -- A/G
Crafty Hazelnut's Patterned Paper -- A/G w/ dp
Ditzie Digi Designs -- A/G
Ladybug Crafts -- Something for the boys or die cuts
Outlawz PAM -- Junk in he Trunk (use metal)
Rick St. Dennis Progressive -- Use freebie digi provided
The Squirrel & the Fox -- Use metal

     I hope by now you've fallen in love with Nyner, too.  Personally, I'm going to train him to be the watchman around the house when I'm gone.  Happy Stamping.  NanaConnie