Watercoloured Poinsettias

I am thrilled to be on the Design Team for Loll's and Bonnie's new challenge "CAS Watercolour".  The idea of the challenge is to create a clean and simple card that involves both watercolouring and the monthly theme.

I'm honoured that Loll and Bonnie chose a theme that I suggested for November:

The idea is to use some text on the card that is not the sentiment or is in addition to the sentiment.  It's an element that I've seen used by many cardmakers that I admire.

Here's my card:

As you can see, the script is a subtle background feature that enhances the overall look of the card.  See below for a version without the script for a comparison.

For the watercolouring, I stamped the poinsettia with Distress Vintage Photo ink on watercolour paper and coloured it partly by pulling out the Vintage Photo with a wet brush and partly by adding some black Elegant Writer to the edges of some of the petals and pulling out the colours that separate from it - amazing tones of teal green, pink, and black.

I learned this technique from a video made by the very talented Lydia Fiedler (aka UnderstandBlue).

Heather Telford also did a tutorial on this technique but hers is slightly different as she brings in more colours than just the Vintage Photo and the Elegant Writer.

Once the poinsettia had dried, I trimmed the image down to a square, masked the poinsettia (I stamped it and fussy cut it on masking paper), added some random bits of text in Antique Linen, and sponged around the edges with Antique Linen.  I watered down a bit of Black Soot ink on my craft mat and flicked it lightly over the background, and bordered the panel with black.  I used PTI Vintage Cream cs for the card base - it's the closest colour cs to watercolour paper that I've been able to find.  I embellished with a few black gemstones in the centre of the poinsettia.


Here is a version of the same poinsettia without any text on the background:

For this version, I masked the poinsettia, added a bit of black splattering and a sentiment, and left it at that.  I like this version as well and it's a cleaner look, but the text stamping adds some texture that I feel is lacking in this one, and also enhances the vintage look created by the Elegant Writer.

Let me know which you prefer!

And come and join us at CAS Watercolour with your cards featuring watercolouring and text.  You have until November 24th to link up.

Supplies:

Stamps - Penny Black poinsettia (both cards), Stampington script and postmark (first card), Tim Holtz sentiment (second card)

Ink - Distress Vintage Photo, Antique Linen, and Black Soot

Paper - watercolour paper, black cs, PTI Vintage Cream cs

Accessories - Elegant Writer pen, black gemstones and pearls