Hello Sunsplash,
for what it is worth, here is my take on it.
Firstly, I think the placement on the upper ribcage is great. Your tattooist will be able to place it just right ( not too far around to the side ) and it will look nice.
Secondly, for a splash of color, I would suggest that the “xoxo” is done with the paw prints as you originally wanted. I would, however, do them in a muddy black. I would then use a pastel orange behind it in the shape of a heart or a cross ( your preference ) and would, of course, NOT outline the background color. Just have it simply fade out where the outline would normally be.
Orange works well on the majority of people and you wouldn’t want it a solid orange anyway. Keep it soft and pastel and those who see it will probably need to look twice to recognize the heart (?) in the background. I believe this concept would suit your purpose and still look feminine.
Food for thought.

@KnightHawk 62804 wrote:

You do realize “scratcher” is a pejorative term used to describe worthless mother fuckers like you who want all the glory of being a tattoo artist, but want to do none of the work, right? Getting on at a shop for an apprenticeship is hard because tattooing is a serious business. Done wrong, it can scar you, maim you, or even god damn kill you.

So, seriously, fuck you with a chainsaw, you ignorant, white trash piece of shit. You don’t deserve to be a tattoo artist.

LMAO – TOO RIGHT!
Smutly

Just a thought, if you have a copy of Photoshop and a few ideas, you could design the major part of it yourself. This would be the best way to have yourself and your tattooist on the same page. Free tattoo design tutorial at http://colinfbrennan.wordpress.com/2010/02/16/lower-back-tattoos-placement-and-content/
This tutorial was written for a lower back tattoo but can be easily adapted to design a tattoo for almost any body part.
Hope I am not breaking any Forum rules by supplying this link to one of my blogs but I am not selling anything, merely giving away instructions that should help you.

Bdubbs has some good advice there – even if it takes 5 years to find something you like, you need to be proud to wear it FOREVER. You could spend days going through Google Image Results but you should find something you like and then perhaps you could expand on it, make a few changes to better suit your taste. This will also make the tattoo unique to YOU.
Smutly