"For Your Little Monkey" Shaped Card

PROJECT #1 of 30

I created this Monkey shaped Baby Shower card for my dear friend Rebecca. She has chosen not to find out what gender her new baby is, so keeping with neutrals and her nursery "jungle" theme, I thought this Monkey cut from Everyday Paper Dolls would make the perfect card!
To begin with, I wanted my monkey to be fuzzy so I decided to use felt. Mind you, I've never used felt with my Cricut before so this was definitely a learning process! To make the felt less flexible and easier to cut, I adhered felt to card stock using a spray adhesive. I cut the monkey from dark brown felt first then light brown felt (for accents). I cut two more monkeys using dark brown card stock to create the card background. I cut one more monkey in white card stock for the inside.
After drawing on my monkey's accents with a black fine-tipped Sharpie, I assembled the rest of his accents using hot glue. I added a heart shaped felt nose and googly eyes. I also outlined the whole felt monkey using a regular tipped black Sharpie and blotted red Sharpie in his mouth for added color. When assembling was finished, I used a wire brush to "rough" up the felt to make the monkey appear more fuzzy. I used small circular movements to get the felt to "fuzz up".
Once the background card was assembled, I adhered the white monkey cut to the inside bottom portion of the card. I added a little ribbon to the top for a seamless fold. The phrase "For your little monkey" was penned using a Creative Memories fine-tip brown pen as well as the border around the monkey shape. After finishing both sections of the card (the felt piece and the card background/inside) I adhered the felt section to the front of the card using hot glue for a permanent bond. One last look to make sure all my pieces matched and the monkey was still fuzzy and (ta-DA!) he was ready to go!
This picture is taken as a side view to try to capture the "fuzz factor"! The pictures do not do this little monkey justice!

The monkey is now in his new home and waiting eagerly for the new arrival!

Phoenix's Howl-O-Ween Costume!

Since adopting Phoenix earlier this month he has been very protective of his new mommy! Having lived out on a farm for several months, he's getting used to the apartment life with all it's "new" noises! So what better costume for him than a "Watch Dog"?! All it took was some felt, puffy paint, pipe cleaners, velcro and hot glue!

He even won "Most Thought-Provoking" at PetCo's Howl-O-Ween Costume Contest and "Most Creative Dogstume" at our community Halloween Party!

I have to admit, though, I did borrow the idea from a costume for sale online but knowing I could easily make the same thing (much cheaper!), I refused to buy it and went to Michael's instead!