CongRats!

Hi there! It's Kathi and I'm here with my second post as Topflight's September Guest Designer! It's a retirement card for my husband, who retired last week. When I first saw Katzelkraft's Les Rats des Villes - City Rats Unmounted Red Rubber Stamp Set, I knew that eventually I'd be making this card.

Here my card with Katzelkraft's Les Rats des Villes - City Rats and Les Drôles Accessoires-Funny Accessories  Unmounted Red Rubber Stamp sets.

Three rats from the Les Rats des Villes - City Rats Unmounted Red Rubber Stamp Set were stamped with Tuxedo Black Memento ink onto white cardstock, fussy-cut, colored with Copic markers, then edged with a dark marker to get rid of those nasty white edges. The rats' eyes and teeth were coated with several layers of Clear Glaze® 3D Glossy Gel Pen to add dimension and shine.

The winners' podium from Katzelkraft's Les Drôles Accessoires-Funny Accessories Red Rubber Stamp set was stamped with Tuxedo Black Memento ink onto white cardstock. It also was fussy cut, colored with Copic markers, and edged with a dark marker.

The rats and the podium were set aside while I worked on the background.

I googled track and field race tracks, found a suitable free photo, downloaded it, then used PhotoElements to change it from color to a black and white charcoal background, which was lightened quite a bit before being printed onto Copic friendly cardstock using my laser printer. The background image was colored with Copic markers, softened even more with the colorless blender, then trimmed.

The banner was stamped with Memento ink, colored, fussy-cut, edged, then adhered to the background card front. Glittery letter stickers were added to spell out "CongRats". The card front was edged with Black Soot Distress ink. Then matted with black cardstock.

Light blue cardstock was die-cut with a small speech bubble die and the tiny sentiments were stamped with Onyx Black VersaFine ink onto them. VersaFine ink always gives a wonderful clean impression when stamping small and/or detailed stamps.

The winners podium and the rats were adhered to the card front and the tiny speech bubbles were added. The card front was then mounted onto a 5x7 blue card.

Here are the Topflight Stamps Products I used on this card.

Katzelkraft's Les Rats des Villes - City Rats 

Les Drôles Accessoires-Funny Accessories  Unmounted Red Rubber Stamp sets.

Onyx Black VersaFine Ink by Tsukineko

For more information about my card, visit my blog, where you'll find detailed instructions and suchlike.