Playing with Watercolour

Like many of the crafters I know, I'm taking part in the current Watercolour classes at Online Card Classes.   It's not a strong medium for me - I find the free form nature of it too loose - I like control!  However I have had a bit of a go.......

Firstly I used a quick and easy technique to enter this weeks's LIM challenge - I've not played in a while due to being busy with the store but I really miss it so will try harder to participate.

The challenge this week was a one-layer thank you.  I used PTI stamps and distress inks and softened the stamping for a faux watercolour look.   Not earth shattering, but not bad for a first attempt.

For my second attempt I used my newly arrived Clearly Besotted blossom stamps and the same technique with a little splattering over top to suggest the blossom drifting off in the wind.

I thought I'd enter this into the current watercolour challenge at KIS  http://kis-challenge.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/keep-it-simple-39-watercolor.html

Colour Wheel

This week's challenge at Less is More is to use opposite colours on the colour wheel http://simplylessismoore.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/week-118-colour.html

I didn't get time to take part yesterday as I was out in Leeds for the day with my friend - 8 hours of shopping and we barely bought a thing (not enough craft shops for my liking lol!)  So now I'm playing catch up and I went with yellow and violet - so NOT my go to colours, but I love the results which is why I love these challenges as they make you make cards you'd never create alone.

I used a freebie set from PTI ink and stamped the sunburst shaped flowers in dandelion and grape momento inks.  The sentiment is from another PTI set stamped in grape also.  I finished with a purple gem in each centre and a matching purple mat to make it all pop.

Time for dinner, then back to browse this weeks entrants.

Wedding Card

Mum asked for me for a wedding card this week to send to a wedding she can't get to - she asked for it in black and grey (the invite was in that colour combo) and I was bit stumped until I spotted this great inspiration photo at this week's For Your Inspiration Challenge http://foryourinspirationchallenges.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/fyi-challenge-32.html

I decided that the addition of white would make the card feel much more weddingy and I took inspiration from the frosty trees and the texture they give to the image to use a textured background.  The bridge then made me thing of my lovely PTI die which has a sort of bridge shape.  Those two together were my main elements for the card which came out like this:

I used a gorgeous spellbinders EF with really textured hearts on it as my background and matted it onto black so it had a really thin black border.  I die cut the the scallops from grey card stock twice to make a border for the sentiment which is by Waltzingmouse.  I embossed that in black for a glossy finish and tinted some large clear gems with a black copic marker to match and set those in the centres of each scallop.

I'm also going to enter this into this weeks Allsorts Challenge which is to use a die http://allsortschallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/week-160-any-die-will-do.html


I decided to decorate tthe inside to match (sorry about the poor photo, forgot to switch the daylight bulb on when I took the shot so the colours are off).  I used a PTI stamp which matches the die using London Fog Momento ink to mirror the outside border and stamped another sentiment from the same Waltzingmouse set as the greeting.

I must remember to decorate the insides more often!

Wishful thinking.....

I think I was wishing for a return to warm weather last night as I decided to play along in the Paperplayers current summer themed challenge  http://thepaperplayers.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/challenge-98-jaydees-theme-challenge.html as we are in for a wet and windy day today and not much of an improvement for the weekend either.........

I decided to combine the theme with a sketch and colour challenge - Retro Sketches  http://retrosketches.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/retrosketches-14.html  (whoops missed the deadline...)  and Play Date Cafe as I LOVE the shades they've chosen this week http://theplaydatecafe.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/play-date-cafe-pdcc135.html

See, it's definitely NOT flip flop weather in the UK today but these flip flops made with my new PTI die really make me happy despite the rain.   The border die is cut from a wave patterned sheet of DP using the tessatina die from memory box and the sentiment is Kraftin Kimmie.

Keep your fingers crossed for a drier day tomorrow as I'm doing the Summer Fair for St Luke's and I'm outside :(

Centenary Sketch

The Jubilee may be everywhere this weekend, but it's not all about the Queen's 60th - yesterday, Waltzingmouse launched their updated sketch challenge website with their 100th sketch - so that's a kind of Centenary right?  Here's the sketch:

I have a card commission to make "something nice" for a lady in her 70's so I decided to use the sketch as a springboard for inspiration and this is what I came up with:

 

I used several different co-ordinating papers from the First Edition New Leaf paperpad.  I used the lace stamp from the French Country set over one of the sheets and used two different sentiment sets to form the Happy Birthday.  The border die is PTI, the leaf is Cheery Lyn and the frame is a Spellbinders label.  The flower I created myself using two different sized scalloped punches, water and scrunching (as per my earlier tutorial - see the link at the top of the page)

Here's the link to the challenge if you want to play along  http://waltzingmousesketchchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/challenge-100june-2-2012.html

Play Date Butterfly

I just adore the colour combo at Play Date Cafe this week and as it happens I had already been playing with two of the colours for a new technique, so I decided to make it into a card with the addition of the avocado. http://theplaydatecafe.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/play-date-cafe-pdcc126.html

I started by covering the back of a strip of grey card with double-sided tape and die cut the butterfly from it.  I lightly adhered it to a sheet of paper and then carefully removed the positive shape, ensuring that all the negative shapes stayed in place on the backing paper.  I die cut the same butterfly from the blue mist card (this was actually an already sticky piece of card stock fro DCWV) and then I added the positive into the space left behind by the grey one so you end up with a flat surface a little like wood marquetry but with paper.  (I actually kept the negative blue bits and added them to the positive grey so I have another two tone butterfly but with no background)

I die cut a ring using two round nesties to create a frame for the butterfly from a lightly patterned DP and finished with a pair of PTI sentiments in versamagic oasis green which is the closest ink I had to the butterfly.  I really like the shape the ring and the strip created and might make a set like this with images in the centre of the strip.