Stamped Gorjuss Girl

In a previous post, I shared some photos of some 'Gorjuss Girls' cards that I had made using a couple of cheap calendars picked up earlier in the year. Well, always one for a bargain, a couple of weeks ago when I went to my local Hobbycraft store, I could be found rummaging through their bargain boxes! Much to my delight, I found some Gorjuss Girl stamps that were around half their RRP. Woo-Hoo! I picked up 3 different designs, 1 of which I have used so far. The card below is made using the 'Purrfect Friend' stamp which is available on www.bubblyfunk.co.uk (although my set had other smaller images as well as the large girl design).

As well as the 'Gorjuss Girl' stamp, I have also used a multi-layered star stamp that is part of a range relatively new to Hobbycraft of their own small acrylic stamps. There are lots of different designs available and they are all just £1 each- they are particularly great for creating your own backgrounds.

I actually started this card by cutting down some white card to stamp the topper onto by measuring the stamp design and then adding a border all the way around. I stamped the design with a Versamark inkpad and then embossed it with a black 'Heat it up' powder. I did this as I wanted to watercolour my design so needed a permanent image and I find that if the image is embossed, then the watercolour does not run quite as much. I used my Anita's/Papermania watercolour pens, putting some of the ink onto an acrylic block and then using my waterbrush to transfer this to the image. This method stops you getting lines on your design as you would if you applied the ink directly to the paper and then tried to watercolour it.

When the image was dry, I used some Stickles glitter glue just to highlight the heart in the girls hair (you can't really see it in the photo though). After more drying time, I then used my 'Dusty Concord' distress ink to change the card from white to purple, while still leaving a white border around the stamped image. The purple stars were then stamped using a Hobbycraft stamp and a 'Grape Jelly' memento ink. I then mounted my topper onto some black glitter paper, using my scissors to scrape away some of the glitter so that my topper would stick more strongly.

The base card is an A4 white card, folded in half and then, again, inked with the 'Dusty Concord' distress ink. I used the same Hobbycraft star stamp to create a background design but this time used a black memento ink for a slight contrast. The card is finished with a small black bow that was originally white and I coloured using my black promarker. I used my heat gun to speed up the drying time of the ink and found that this did shrink and harden the ribbon slightly but it was still ok (could be a nice future effect though!). It just finished the card nicely. I have, however, recently managed to get some small black bows from the Marks & Spencer outlet at the Springfields shopping centre in Spalding, Lincolnshire. They were reduced to £1 for about 25- they are supposed to be as a wedding table decoration but are the perfect size for cards and saves you from spending ages trying to tie a very fiddly bow!