I started by going to youtube to see if I could find some how-to videos, which turned out to be too much of a success as there were way too many videos to choose from. I settled on a video by Jennifer McGuire, my go-to card making guru, and found a video in which she showed the process in an understandable and clear way. https://youtu.be/0N7XzA5uf3I
I didn't watch the whole video right away, but watched as I tried to follow along. I had cheated a bit and precut a few of the card bases and stamped them already, so when I saw how Jennifer stamped her card and then masked what she had stamped in order to create a background for her image, I got lost as I don't have masking paper. I realized much much later that I do indeed have some masking paper I could have used. Oh well, I can use that on a later card😌.
So now I had stamped my images on the card fronts, and was faced with the problem of creating backgrounds on the cards. I decided to use some of my watercolor pencils to simply creating a blue sky and a green grass backdrop, not worrying too much that my paper would get warped. I created three really cute porcupine motif card bases.
Then I colored in my simple backgrounds, added water and warped the paper. I used "Perfect Colouring Paper" as I was going to color in my critters with Copic Markers and this is paper that is designed to withstand the alcohol markers without bleeding. This does, however, not mean that it doesn't buckle when you put water on it. Ultimately I don't think it will matter, as I can straighten them out by either weighing them down or even use an iron on them.
After doing the backgrounds I colored them in.
I then started to assemble the cards. I had created the back for the cards by putting the wheel on with a small brad.
Using the tip of how you should not see any of the indented lines in your little reveal window and in the cut-out where the turning of the wheel happens, I was able to assemble the mechanism quite easily. It was when I went to stamp in my little reveal sentiments on the wheel I started having issues. Jennifer McGuire shared a tip she had learnt of marking the wheel at 12, 3, 6 and 9 o'clock, and then drawing in the shape of the window with pencil in the opening of the wheel, a tip I did not have too much success with, and I actually ended up ruining my first couple of wheels because I stamped in the wrong places. I went ahead and assembled the top part of my card to the backing anyway, and realized that the front REALLY needs to be flattened out before being adhered to the back part of the card. The result is that I have my little sentiments either too high up, too much to the left or too much to the right in the window. I will probably end up trying to force my card apart to try and salvage the front.
Anyway, I decided to put the porcupine cards to the side and start a completely new card using a different technique for the background. So I went ahead and used distress oxide inks and a stencil to daub in the sky and some ground. Then I just slayed out my stamps in the places that I wanted to have the image.
This was when I understood why Jennifer McGuire stamped and then masked her image BEFORE making the background. Although I wasn't faced with too much of a problem, as the solution of course was to die cut the motives and then adhering them to the background after I had colored them in. If I hadn't used a stamps I had coordinating dies to, I could have fussy-cut the motives out.
I was able to stamp the sentiments on in an acceptable way, and assembled the card to finish it. I added some purple Wink of Stella on the butterflies and some clear Wink of Stella on the deer.
After all that work and brain twisting, I was rather happy with how the card came out. Although I have to mention that I wasn't able to assemble the card totally without mishaps!! (I have realized that I am an expert at ruining my cards with tiny mishaps like stamping mistakes or fingerprints, or crooked assembly....if there is something that can go wrong with a card, you can be sure that it has happened to me!) This time I managed to be a bit impatient and put my thumb nail onto the arrow I had just printed to show which way to turn the wheel, and of course I managed to get an imprint of my nail on a white part of my card. I tried to erase it, but my erasers aren't ment for erasing ink, so I ended up removing it another way.
This is the finished card:
