Blue Forget-Me-Nots

Time to remind you that you only have until June 24th to enter a card in the CAS Watercolour "Something Blue" challenge!

Every spring / early summer, my garden is full of blue Forget-Me-Nots.  I'm always sad when they are finished and I have to pull out the dying plants - but as you pull them out, they drop their seeds everywhere, ready for next year.

I stamped the image on hot press watercolour paper with archival ink and watercoloured with my Gansai Tambi paints, using quite an intense blue for the flowers, a very pale bit of green for the leaves, a bit of very pale blue on the postmark, and adding an even paler blue wash around the flowers (so pale it doesn't show in the photo!).

I used a linen cardstock for the card base and for the stitched frame.  The frame is popped up on foam tape over the image.

I added a tiny drop of cream from a Viva Pearl Pen to the centre of each flower.  Here's a close-up:

Please head over to CAS Watercolour and check out the rest of the Design Team and June's wonderful Guest Designer, TaeEun (rainbow in november).

Supplies:

Stamps - Penny Black

Ink - Archival Jet Black

Paper - hot press watercolour paper, linen cs

Size - A2

Accessories - Gansai Tambi watercolour paints, cream Viva Pearl Pen, Lil Inker stitched rectangle die, foam tape

Duck Egg and Plum

Less is More has a colour challenge going on right now:

 

I went with some ink blending to use the challenge colours.

 

I sponged Distress inks, getting the colours to overlap. Then I put my stamp and background in the MISTI and stamped the poppy. Leaving everything in the MISTI, I used a brush and bleach to remove the colour from the poppy, and then restamped to keep the outline distinct.

I framed it with a stitched window die, and added a sentiment and some dark irridescent gemstones.

I've really enjoyed using the bleach technique lately.

Supplies:

Stamps - SU Simply Sketched poppy, Savvy Stamps sentiment

Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Distress Faded Jeans, Seedless Preserves, and Broken China

Paper - white cs

Size - A2

Accessories - Die-namics peek-a-boo window, Lil Inker stitched rectangle die, dark iridescent gemstones, bleach

Santa Inchie

For the latest Jingle Belles Christmas Card Challenge, "Santa Baby".

I went with a Santa inchie:

I love the sweet little image of Santa riding a horse / rocking horse.

I stamped the inchies and punched them out. I mounted them on a scrap of dp, then bordered it with green cs.

It's good to pull out that old set of Christmas inchies!

Supplies:

Stamps - Darkroom Door Christmas Inchies

Ink - Memento Rhubarb Stalk

Paper - white and green cs, scrap of dp

Size - A2

Accessories - 1" punch

A Small Amount of Embossing

Less is More is asking for less than one third of the card to be either heat or dry embossed:

I went with a narrow strip of dry embossing under my image.

I thought that the dry embossed wavy line of snowflakes echoed the slopes and piles of snow, the plumes of smoke, and the snowflakes drifting down among the houses.  I chose a sentiment with a font with some wavy lines to complement everything.

The image is coloured with coloured pencils and Gamsol. I bordered it in black and popped it up on fun foam. 

Supplies:

Stamps - Serendipity village, Stampabilities sentiment

Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black

Paper - white and black cs

Size - A2

Accessories - coloured pencils, Gamsol, snowflake embossing folder border, fun foam