Flower Sketched on Watercolor Backgrounds

I find so much inspiration online.

Fell in love with Tracee Murphy's Poppies Watercolor and Ink.

Saw it first on Pinterest, but the pin was bad. 

So I searched for the correct image and pinned it here.

On the watercolor base I tested Portfolio Binny Smith watercolors that Lynette gave me.

She found them at a garage sale!

After the watercolors dried, I used sequin waste as a stencil and sponged with broken china ink.

Added white acrylic paint to the top portion using a paint brush.

Wasn't happy with the look, so I placed sequin waste over the wet paint, 

then rubbed with a cloth to remove some white paint. 

I drew the flowers with a Sakura fine tip marker. 

Used Jane Davenport Mermaid Markers to outline them.

Stamped the Happy Birthday sentiment with Versafine black onyx ink.

Here is another background layer. I like to make multiples when I have the watercolors out. Notice the warping of the paper.

In the card above, I tried Jennifer McGuire's method to attach the watercolor layer to the card base. I cut a piece of craft foam slightly smaller than the  watercolor layer. The craft foam is about 2 mm thick. I was happy with the way the craft foam layer helped to flatten the warped watercolor layer.

Click here to see Jennifer's YouTube tutorial showing how she uses craft foam instead of foam tape to attach large layers to cards. She demonstrates how the mail processing machines added wrinkles to the large layer that had been adhered with strips of foam tape.

I used Scrapbook Adhesives super high-tack tape on both sides of the foam to attach it between the watercolor layer and the card base. Jennifer advises that any strong double sided adhesive will work. She shows a couple of methods to attach the craft foam in her video.

Materials used:

Portfolio watercolors: 620 cadmium yellow, 136 phthalo blue, 375 sap green

Distress inks: broken china, Versafine black onyx

White acrylic paint

Sequin waste

Jane Davenport mermaid markers: pirate's gold and seaweed

Sakura microperm ultra fine 05 pen

Hero Arts stamp

Craft foam, 2 mm thick

Scrapbook Adhesives super high-tack adhesive tape

Thanks for visiting! 

Wishing you love and peace!

Card of the day-Wednesday

Happy Wednesday!

Today's card of the day for the Enjoy Michael Strong Stamps Yahoo group

was inspired by a Hawaiian shirt I saw at Summerfest music festival last Wednesday.

As I was sitting waiting for the show to begin,

I pulled out a post it from my purse and made this sketch:

I thought Mike's mini flowers,  leaves and little fish from the mini creatures stamps

would be fun to use for my water scene.

I used colored pencils to draw the mountains, palm trees, shore and the water ripples.

The flowers, leaves and fish were stamped then fussy cut and attached with dimensional foam.

Added some gemstones to jazz up my simple card.

Stamps: Michael Strong

Inks: distress dried marigold, abandoned coral, shaded lilac and broken china.

SU certainly celery ink.

I'm not claiming to be an artist. 

I just had a lot of fun trying to sketch the scene and make a card later.

Maybe my feeble attempt will inspire someone else! 

If you do something like this, I'd love to hear about it and see your creations!

Thanks for visiting!

Lady Face Cards

After seeing Dina Wakley's YouTube, Learn to Draw Artistic Faces
and borrowing Jane Davenport's book,
Drawing and Painting Beautiful Faces from the public library
I started sketching faces...
on the back of envelopes, on scrap paper, everywhere.

For these cards, I made a few sketches on white cardstock,
added some color with colored pencils and markers, then cut them out.

 I used Lynette's Stampin' Up! Notably Ornate Set
and added some of my own stamps to create some simple vintage, shabby-chic cards.

 

Used wrinkle free distress backgrounds from my stash
sponging additional color on them.

Stamps:

Stampin' Up! Notably Ornate, Friendship's Journey, Antique Collectibles, Letters from Friends,

Hero Arts
Dawn Houser

Distress Inks
mowed lawn, festive berries, spiced marmalade,  fossilized amber, wild honey, pumice stone, brushed corduroy

Colored pencils & Distress markers

July-August 2015 Sketch

I made this card for the July-August Sketch 

at the Enjoy Michael Strong Stamps Yahoo Group

You can see the sketch here on Hetty's blog.

I'm just having so much fun with watercolors.

Just wanted to mention that my friend gave me my set of 28 watercolor "cakes".

I think they are made by Simbalion.

I cut a scalloped circle from my "faux" watercolor paper with a Nestabilities die.

Then cut a square slightly larger than the circle

and embossed it with Cuttlebug's Tiny Bubbles.

Cut a "paper ribbon" and sponged it with distress squeezed lemonade.

Stamped  Michael Strong's Mini Cloisonne Creatures on cardstock,

fussy cut and sponged all with distress inks:

shell-abandoned coral

starfish-wild honey

gecko-mowed lawn.

Used Versafine Black Onyx to stamp:

Stampscapes Gulls and Spear Fisher stamps

and the Hero Arts sentiment.

Thanks so much for visiting my blog!

EMS group Oct.-Nov. 2014 Sketch

This is the October-November sketch from the Enjoy Michael Strong Stamps Yahoo Group

My card measures 4-1/4 x 5-1/2 inches.
I stamped Mike's Cloisonne Mosaic Frame on 3 white pieces measuring 1 x 3-1/2 inches each,
placing them "together" and stamping Mike's Frame stamp on them.
It would have been better to leave the piece "whole" before stamping.

The word stamp is from PrintWorks.

INKS

Stampin' Up!-old olive, so saffron

Distress-shabby shutters

EMS group July 2014 Sketch

Here is my July Sketch card for the Enjoy Michael Strong Stamps Yahoo Group.

Stamped Mike's large Cloisonne Cat in Onyx Black Versafine instant dry pigment ink, coloring in the spaces with colored pencils, and fussy cutting the edge. Adhered to a "paper banner" that was dry embossed with Swiss Dots then edged in salty ocean distress ink. Under that is a layer of black paper.

The next layer is dry embossed in a star design. I use this embossing folder stamping technique

 with distress inks-salty ocean and festive berries instead of acrylic paint.

I found a neutral pearl ex powder and sprinkled it on top of the wet paper after removing it from embossing folder. Then I realized that pearl ex powder wouldn't stick to the water based ink. Dried the paper with a heat tool then brushed gloss gel medium on top. 

Since the star embossing folder was wet I decided to run a second sheet of paper through it, adding more ink and spritzing first. 

I brushed Perfect Paper Adhesive-matte on top of this.  The label of Perfect Paper Adhesive said it could be used as a dry pigment medium.  The "medium" makes the pearl ex powders stick. Otherwise, it just falls off the paper.  Both mediums worked well.

Butterfly and Dragonfly

In addition to being a birthday card, this card will be submitted to the Enjoy Michael Strong Stamps Yahoo Group for the May Challenge and it will also be shared on Hetty Sanders' Craft Chaos blog. Hetty is offering a chance to win Michael Strong's new Cloisonne Pony stamp to those who submit an entry with at least one Michael Strong Stamp. Check out the details on her blog.

Here is my "interpretation" of it. I did not follow the sketch exactly.

I used Mike's Cloisonne Mosaic Frame, Mini Cloissone Wings. 

...and the flower from Mini Cloisonne Shapes on the inside.

Materials Used:

Distress, Stampin' Up! and Versafine Inks

Hero Arts, Michael Strong and PrintWorks Stamps

Clear embossing powder on the butterfly and dragonfly.