*Video* Gerda Steiner’s Meerkats on the Lookout

Hello everyone, I’m back with one of my most favourite stamp sets ever!  It’s “Meerkats on the Lookout”  from Gerda Steiner Designs and I’ve had no end of fun with them this last week! I love that these can easily be used for masculine cards because we all know how hard those can be to make.

If you would like to see an HD video on YouTube of how I made this card, please CLICK HERE. Otherwise, you can click on the video below.

To start this card, I created a horizon line in light pencil. I made sure that there was enough room for my meerkat to hide below the horizon behind some rocks. Once I had the horizon, I decided on the placement of my group of meerkats. I stamped the front two meerkats in copic friendly ink and then masked them while I finished stamping the back row of meerkats. I coloured in the meerkats with W3, W1, E31, E53, E40, E27, C2 and C0. I also used a black glaze pen to fill in the eyes and noses. I also stamped and coloured the lone meerkat who comes up, after masking off his arms and adding a cupcake to his hands. I also coloured a couple of the rocks that are in the set and cut them out.

Masking off sky line. 

I then cut a strip (the width of my card) of post it note paper in half lengthwise to create my true horizon. I masked off the meerkats and added one of the strips to make the sky line. I ink blended the sand with Tea Dye Distress oxide ink. Then I removed the post it note paper and lined up the other half over the sand to now colour in the sky. I used MFT’S cloud stencil and Mermaid Lagoon Distress oxide ink to make the sky. Once this was done, I stamped on my sentiments in Versamark ink.

Pencil mark widest point of meerkat. 

I adhered a strip of clear acetate to the back of the lone meerkat. After positioning him where I wanted him to pop up, I pencilled in the width of his ears (his widest part) where I wanted him to come up. I used a T ruler and craft knife to cut a slit here. I inserted the acetate through this slit and worked it up and down a few times to be sure it was wide enough. Then I attached a small strip of cardstock to the bottom of the meerkat to act as a stopper so he wouldn’t pull out through the slit. Finally, I pulled him up through the slit as far as he would go to determine where the top slit needed to go (just above his head). This slit only needs to be as wide as the acetate strip.

Adding a stopper to the bottom of the meerkat. 

I covered over the bottom slit with the rocks, being sure to not glue the middle portion down where the meerkat would pop up. I also die cut a few cloud shapes and placed one of these over the upper slit, again being sure to not glue down the middle portion.

I added part of an African tree die I have from Elizabeth Craft, and a few more clouds to complete my scene. I then adhered my card front to the base, being careful to not adhere any of the moving mechanisms. I also added 2 die cut cloud shapes to the front and back of the top of the acetate to act as a pull mechanism. I had glued in the word “Pull” on the front cloud.

Finally, I added some accents to the sand with copic markers E35, W5 and YG17 for grass. I also used a sparkle pen from Gelly Roll to add a little sparkle to the sand.

I hope you can give this card a try - it’s such a fun card to make and receive - and perfect for the men in our lives!