Hello crafters! Hope you are all well and having a great week.
Another year older for me this week and in true craftmaker form, all my presents took the form of new crafty products, and I am going to try very hard to use them all over the next few months. I don’t want any going into the “box of unused stuff”! We shall see….
Over the past few days I have been playing with my new Altenew Botanical Garden stamps. I think these may become one of my most favourite stamp sets, particularly for watercolouring.
As part of Kathy Racoosin’s 30-day colouring challenge I have been trying to improve my watercolouring, and this time I went back to my trusty old Distress Inks to create this card for my Mum. Whilst chatting to my sister in law a few nights ago, I was reminded of Mother’s Day and although I have a stack of cards I could choose from to send to her, I thought, why not make another! Particularly as I bought this set from the birthday money she sent me and I would like to tell her this when I send it.
I actually had two attempts at this card (only two I hear you say?!). I didn’t quite get the design right on the first panel, it was very heavy on one side. So… I tried again, picking some different stamps and trying to organise them on the panel so that they felt more balanced (I had to think about the colours too at this point). Once I was happy (this took a while!), I stamped them with Versamark ink and heat embossed with white embossing powder.
I picked out Peeled Paint, Shabby Shutters, Worn Lipstick and Barn Door inks and set about colouring. It’s difficult to describe the colouring process as I mostly just make it up as I go along! But I start with light colours, let them dry naturally and then add touches of the darker colour over the top along with a bit of water so that they blend. In the larger sections of the flowers, I probably did 3 layers in total. It doesn’t take long and I personally find it really relaxing.
I don’t have a suitable Mother’s Day sentiment, but thought the sentiment from WPlus9’s Doodle Buds was perfect for this card and for the occasion. Again I stamped it using Versamark and added Ranger Liquid Platinum embossing powder. I wanted it to feel quite light and this powder is great for giving a bit of shine but not overpowering the project. Happy days!
Once everything had dried I added some craft foam to the back of the card and mounted it onto a white base.
I hope you like the card, always happy to receive your comments and feedback.
Thanks for visiting and have a lovely weekend. Only a few more days left to play along in the colouring challenge so let’s make the most of it!
Supplies used: Altenew Botanical Garden; WPlus9 Doodle Buds; Peeled Paint Distress Ink; Shabby Shutters Distress Ink; Worn Lipstick Distress Ink; Barn Door Distress Ink; Versamark; Ranger Liquid Platinum Embossing Powder; white cardstock.