Hey Chick!

I've had a brand new stamp set, called Hey Chick!, from Kitchen Sink Stamps for a few days now and I've been busy playing around with different color combinations for the 4 step chick image. I think I've finally come up with something that resembles the chicks that I'm familiar with. And why am I familiar with chicks, you may ask? Because my mother, the preschool teacher, has hatched them in her classroom a few times over the years. One of my "fondest" memories was taking one of the tiniest ones from one of the hatches to the vet (the same one who's saved my dear dog Cosmo many times also cares for farm variety animals). My mother was concerned that the chick was lonely, having been removed from its family, and asked me to put my hand in the box with it during the drive to the vet. That thing was mean! It was pecking and pecking at me with its sharp little beak. Needless to say, my hand didn't stay in the box too long . . .

Anyway, back to the card. This set is one of 4 new sets releasing this week at Kitchen Sink Stamps. Be sure to stop by to check out the other new stuff. Maria continues to amaze me with the details on the images she creates. There's nothing else like her four-step stamp images. I used a card from this week's featured stamper's gallery for inspiration here. You can find that card here. The original version was a square card and I changed the layout to make it a standard sized card. I also made a few other changes, including the shape of the main image and the colors of the card.

The chick image is stamped with 4 different colors of SU! dye inks: Barely Banana, Summer Sun, So Saffron, and Close to Cocoa. I smudged some chalks under the chick to make a little "ground" for it, too. I used Nestabilities dies to cut out the stamped image and to create the mats for the image. I used two different colors and patterns of Prints Series paper here. I picked So Saffron since it was one of the colors that I used for the chick and Bashful Blue to complement it. I liked the ribbon tab element on the original card, but I didn't have ribbon in my collection to match the colors of my card. I cut a piece of white grosgrain ribbon and turned to my Copic markers. I used one of the markers to quickly color a piece of ribbon to match. I love how well the marker coats the ribbon, how fast it dries, and that the color doesn't rub off on my fingers.

In the original card, the sentiment was stamped directly under the image. In my version I used a word window punch piece for the sentiment. I added a matching Dew Drop to one end of the sentiment, too.

Now, some technology housekeeping stuff: If you're a Feedblitz subscriber, please disregard the message you received on Sunday morning saying 403 Error: Forbidden. It is not a virus and will not damage your computer. Blogger was apparently having some errors with Feedblitz this morning. I went in to Feedblitz and sent today's updates out to subscribers manually and if this continues to be an issue, I will continue to do that.

Materials Used:

Hey Chick! stamp set, Flame Dew Drops (Kitchen Sink Stamps); Barely Banana, Summer Sun, So Saffron, and Close to Cocoa Classic inks, So Saffron Bashful Blue, Brocade Blue, and Whisper White cardstock, So Saffron and Bashful Blue Prints Series designer paper, Stampin' Pastels, word window punch, mat pack and paper piercing tool, white gel pen, dimensionals, Crystal Effects (Stampin' Up!); circle and scalloped circle dies (Nestabilities); white grosgrain ribbon (Michaels); marker (Copic Ciao)